Action Alert: Join the Wait… What?! Campaign to Spread the Word about Equal Rights

Join the Wait... What?! Campaign today, and stand up for equal rights!

Did you know your friends can be fired in 29 states, just for being gay? Surprised? So are lots of folks; equal rights are farther from reality than many of us would like to believe.

Join the Wait…What?! social media campaign to learn some surprising facts and let your friends know that you support them.

Through viral sharing on Facebook and Twitter, thousands of new voices will chime in to bring attention to equal rights issues like employment and housing discrimination. The movement has made great strides over the past year, year with the repeal of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell and the passing of the marriage equality bill in New York, but there’s still much more to be done!

Friendfactor Founder Brian Elliot explains the campaign like this:

Not everyone realizes the full extent to which their gay friends are not equal: they can legally be fired and evicted in 29 states just for being gay. In 32 states, there’s zero protection from the law when gay friends are bullied. My straight friends are shocked when they learn these things, and we know other straight friends will be too. We believe there’s a tremendous opportunity to engage these friends and accelerate the pace of change for their gay friends.

Take Action: Join the campaign and share a surprising fact to stand up for your gay friends. The more eyes we can get on these facts, the faster we can fix what’s broken.

Action Alert: Tell the Sizzler, “Stop Attacking Gay Customers!”

Being a friend means not staying silent when somebody’s treating your friends badly. That’s why we’ve launched a petition on Change.org: so you can tell the Sizzler that discrimination and violence against gay customers won’t fly on your watch.

Add your name now.

The full story is in the petition, but here’s an excerpt that’ll send shivers down the spine of anyone who enjoys the occasional meal out with gay friends:

Imagine being out to brunch with a few pals. So far so good, right? Until, the manager aggressively approaches your friend, yelling and accusing her of not paying for brunch.

Screaming, the manager violently shoves your friend. He calls her a f***ing d*ke. An angry mob of patrons joins in, relentlessly attacking your friend with homophobic and hate-filled language, even threatening her with sexual assault. Finally the police arrive and your friend is taken, bruised and battered, by ambulance to a nearby hospital.

Take action now to help make it right.

It’s unthinkable, but true. This is what happened to Liza Friedlander at the Sizzler in Queens, and it could happen to you and your gay, lesbian, bi, or transgender friends. Lambda Legal has taken up Liza’s case, and now’s our chance to make a public showing that we all think this sort of treatment is unacceptable.

This isn’t an abstract political argument about why gay Americans should have full freedom from violence and fear of bias crimes. This is a real story that happened to someone’s real friend. This is why we all need to stand together and denounce this behavior and the lack of corporate response: we still live in a world where this can happen to our friends.

Be a friend: Add your voice.

Send a powerful message that it’s not just gay people who care about discrimination and assault – we all do. You can make a difference today by demanding that the management at Sizzler provides better training on anti-discrimination policies, gets serious about enforcement, and speaks out against discrimination and violence toward customers. Gay assault is assault, period.

Take Action: After you sign the petition yourself, share it or this blog posts with as many friends as you can. If we can reach our goal of 5,000 signatures, we’ll be letting Liza and all our gay friends know we have their backs when it gets tough. We can hold this corporation accountable and make the world a little safer for everyone.