Join us as we chat with Rebecca Willman, Family Equality’s Vice President of Community Impact and Programs! Rebecca comes to Family Equality with robust experience working with pregnant and birthing people and being a part of the reproductive rights movement. Following the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade, Rebecca’s experience across different facets of the movement for equality helps us better understand where we’ve been, where we are, and where we’re headed.
In the final episode of this season, we talk about the challenges LGBTQ+ families face forming and protecting their families. We also talk about the role that family — found, formed, and chosen — plays in our lives and in this movement. Give it a listen!
Episode Transcript
Rebecca:
I couldn’t have imagined anything like where we are right now. I do kind of wonder maybe are we in a one step forward two steps back moment? I can’t be sure. I think the backlash of our gains feels particularly heinous and loud right now. I think sentiments shift and change most impactfully when there’s a lot of exposure and familiarity, and I feel like we’re right between those things. We’ve got the exposure right now, but we don’t have familiarity yet. And so as a result, extremist politicians and others who want us back in the closet and running scared and they’re trying to create laws that silence us. I think ultimately they know that when people see us all as people, when people become familiar with who we are, regardless of our gender identity or sexual orientation, they’re all going to realize that we’re just as normal and happy and weird and boring as anybody else.
Eric:
This is Shining Through the Clouds, an exploration of the resilience of LGBTQ+ families in America. I’m your host, Eric Fleming. Meet Rebecca. She is the Chief Community Engagement Officer for Family Equality. Rebecca has had a world of varied experience in this space that gives her perspective so much richness and depth. She’s worked with birthing people, worked in the safe abortion space, and now she’s creating the container for community and action for Family Equality. This conversation was such a treat to listen back to. I want to frame this conversation with some wisdom from Audrey Lorde. She talks of community, of acknowledging difference, and using difference as a source of power. Lorde says, “Difference is that raw and powerful connection from which our personal power is forged. We’ve been taught to either ignore our differences or to view them as causes for separation and suspicion rather than as forces for change. Without community, there is no liberation. Only the most vulnerable and temporary armistice between an individual and her oppression. Survival is learning to take our difference and make them strengths.” This quote makes me think about solidarity and about how inextricably linked our oppressions are and what’s available to us when we lead from a place of community versus individualism. I am joined again today by Joy Channel founder and executive producer of this podcast, Luna Malborough. Hey Luna. So good to have you back.
Luna:
Hi, Eric. It’s so nice to be with you.
Eric:
So we chat with you at the beginning of this journey and now we’re wrapping it up. So I thought it’d be great to have you here to book-end the series. You have this incredible conversation with Rebecca from Family Equality. So I wanted to ask you, what do you think was so important about this chat? Why were you so excited to have it?
Luna:
Well, I was really excited to talk to a member of the Family Equality team who’s on the ground really working to support LGBTQ families across the nation. And I wanted to hear her perspective specifically on why community is so important and why the work that Family Equality does is so important. And it was enlightening truly.
Eric:
And what was so enlightening about it, like it was a rich conversation full of nuance, full of texture. But what do you remember that was so enlightening?
Luna:
Okay, so I came into this conversation really curious about the role of focusing on marriage equality and access to marriage and LGBTQ Liberation because I recently had been listening to Dean Spade, who is a trans lawyer and activist who works towards trans liberation, really criticize LGBTQ activists for striving for marriage equality and really talking about, like, maybe striving for marriage equality was not the right choice. Because there was a debate — and hearing Dean really breakdown that there actually was a debate for a long period of time in the LGBTQ+ community, especially in the sixties, seventies and eighties around whether or not folks should focus towards marriage equality and trying to gain equality through marriage or they should do it in other ways. And talking to Rebecca really helped me understand that marriage is a tool, and she speaks to it as such and that regardless, like I’ve shared before, I think I’m divorced. I had a beautiful same-sex marriage and a beautiful same-sex divorce, right?
And I know sometimes in listening to the stories that we tell or the stories that we hear about the love of LGBTQ+ families that it doesn’t really encompass everyone in the community because there are LGBTQ+ single folks and folks that are unpartnered that may never be able to have children in one way or another. And so I think that they are still part of the community, and I think about how sometimes the narrative of we’re just like you look at us with families can sometimes erase the lived experience of other LGBTQ folks, right? And thinking about Family Equality’s mission to really serve and champion specifically LGBTQ families and paths to create a loving family in whatever way you want that is inclusive of chosen family in a lot of different ways. And so I am talking to Rebecca really heard and understood that that was Family Equality’s message and that they are lifting that up and all of these different ways and that marriage is one tool to use and marriage alone even in all these other legal procedures and avenues that we have as tools still does not guarantee our safety and that is why we need community.
Eric:
Thank you to Luna once again for joining us with that beautiful insight. Much appreciated. Let’s hear from Rebecca about feeling seen and the power of community.
Rebecca:
I am Rebecca Willman, she/her, and I am the Chief Community Engagement and Program Officer here at Family Equality. I studied sociology in college and in grad school and one of my biggest takeaways as a former sociologist, I guess, is that when someone feels like they don’t belong and say they leave home or they go on a journey because they want to go find themselves. For most of us, we don’t go find ourselves by becoming totally isolated. We go find ourselves when we figure out where we fit and when we land in community, we are able to find where we fit. I love meditation and I taught yoga for many years and even though those practices are solo experiences, the most powerful practices and meditations I’ve ever had are when I’m sharing energy with others in the room. Most of us don’t live our lives to be alone. As parents, sometimes we would like to have a few minutes to ourselves, but right, we all say it takes a village, and so we need community now more than ever. We need to know that we’re not alone. I don’t care if you are an introvert. I’m like, I want you to go find your people and meet them and be awkward and get through it because I want everybody to have the support that they need. And to our allies and queer folks who feel safe in doing so, we need your pride and your visibility and your vocals more than ever. I think being seen and being authentic is literally proven to save lives. And for LGBTQ+ families, parenting is hard. I’ll tell you what, I’ve got three-year-old twins. I am in it, but it feels better when I get witnessed as a parent or when I’m able to share moments with other parents who understand what it’s like to be in the place where I am. And so, when we look back in history, social change, yeah, there are pivotal leaders and people that we really turn to for guidance, but movements take people, change takes all of us, and we didn’t come this far to turn back now. So we’ve got to keep going and we’ve got to keep showing up and for ourselves and for our families, for all the people who came before us, we are in the right. We are on the side of love, and if we stay this journey together, we will get through it.
Eric:
Going back to the intersections of it all, we asked what is she noticing in doing this work about these intersecting points and what is she noticing about the tactics of this harmful legislation?
Rebecca:
The biggest thing that comes up for me when you are asking that is really, especially with the recent Dobbs decision, the attacks on trans and queer people and families and attacks on rights to reproductive freedom. It is not coincidental, right? It’s not coincidental that states with the most barriers to abortion care are also the states that are targeting queer and transgender folks the most. The bills are one in the same. They exist so that a small group of people can define gender as directly linked to a sex assignment at birth and then impose a legal definition of gender. In the U.S., we really have to control for race as well because definitions of gender that extremists are trying to box people into are also entirely steeped in whiteness. And so what we know is that regardless of how someone defines their gender, even if they’re fully cisgender — so someone who’s sex assigned at birth matches their gender presentation — gender is different for everyone. I think there’s over 7 billion people on the planet. To imagine that we would all share two categories of gender is just preposterous. There is no way to legally define gender. You can’t do it. And so the intersection is fear, ideology, control. It’s a constant narrative of here’s what you may do with your body, here’s what you may not do with your body. And it’s that same thing over and over and over and over.
Eric:
Fear, ideology, and control. This is making me think about moments in modern U.S. history where we’ve seen monumental shifts socially and politically, and there was solidarity amongst marginalized groups to usher in this change. It was the civil rights movement alongside gay rights and women’s liberation of the sixties. It makes perfect sense that these current attacks are all about control of those same marginalized groups. Someone wins by keeping these groups in the margins. In this next section, we hear more to connect the dots between harmful rhetoric and political targeting. Rebecca goes on to say, you can’t take away fundamental liberties and resources and claim to be pro women and families.
Rebecca:
All I’ll say is that before I worked at Family Equality, I did work for many years with pregnant people, many of whom were seeking abortion. And I also did birth work, so supporting people during pregnancy and in the postpartum. And I’ve given you a little bit about my background and here I am now at Family Equality. I think ultimately attacks on freedoms relating to gender are about control. Abortion providers and seekers are good people. Queer folks and gender diverse folks are good people. We are all just out here trying to ensure our basic human rights: that we have the ability to live without fear and violence, the right to love and liberty. And attacks on these freedoms are truly meant to just scare and shame and silence and impose ideology, an ideology that is really void of understanding or curiosity or love. And I said it a thousand times in my prior role at Abortion Care Network, and I’ll say it again on behalf of Family Equality, politicians are not healthcare providers.
They should not be making decisions about healthcare, whether it’s about reproductive health, gender affirming care for young people or adults. They are not educators. They should not be making decisions about education policy. And furthermore, no one can understand what it’s like to be in our shoes with all of the intricacies and intersections and multitudes that we each contain. And so instead of closing off what someone can provide our access, why don’t we work to ensure that we’re each able to get what we need so that we can live healthy, vibrant lives? We know that what really works to protect the health and wellbeing of families and children is getting them out of poverty, is getting them the healthcare they need. It’s getting them access to resources. And what helps us thrive, what actually supports our wellbeing, is being able to exist in our bodies the way that we feel the most authentic and free. It’s seeing people who look like us. It’s living without violence. These are the things that save lives. Saying that you are pro-woman or pro-family when you’re working to remove fundamental liberties and literally take resources and healthcare away from families and parents and children as saying that you can walk into fire and not get burned, it just doesn’t work.
Eric:
A lot of the work that Family Equality does is in support of family formation. Thus far in the series, we’ve heard stories about adoption, reciprocal IVF, finding donors, et cetera. But here Rebecca gives us some high level commentary about the intersections of the challenges people face when navigating the healthcare system and the family formation process.
Rebecca:
The biggest struggle of these is really the intersection of the challenges and the way that they feed one another. And so the challenges often become omnipresent throughout the entire process of family formation. There are infinite ways to become a parent, but generally speaking at Family Equality, when we’re talking about family formation for LGBTQ+ families, we spend the majority of our time talking about adoption, foster to adopt, fostering, the use of reproductive technology — so things like sperm donation, IVF, embryo donation — and we talk a lot about surrogacy. So most of these things that I’ve just named take a lot of resources and money, and they take a lot of time, and they take a lot of intention. So, the primary struggles and barriers for those things, as you can imagine: Costs and finances, there is a huge lack of legal protections that are consistent across our country.
They vary very much from state to state. There are a lot of challenges in navigating the healthcare system. And then there’s a lack of awareness about where folks can begin and where to turn for help along the way. And so based on all of these challenges and then all of our multiple identities — our geography, our race, our economic status — all of these things can show up really uniquely because the combination of challenging factors can become kind of infinite. And I want to say, I want to recognize that many cisgender heterosexual couples also face tremendous struggles with fertility, and many of them have to do a lot of planning and emotional labor to create their family. But for queer folks, for most of us, that’s a given. And for us, there is an additional layer of intentionality because of the things that I mentioned, costs legalities, lack of affirming healthcare. As queer folks, for instance, we are less likely to have fertility related healthcare visits and procedures covered by insurance or offered by our employers. Leave time from employers is less likely to be extended to queer folks, especially if they are not giving birth.
Eric:
Continuing the conversation about red tape and barriers to family formation, here we dive into critical questions and thoughts that queer people have to consider in this process. Everything from state and legal allowances to securing legal bonds for parents. That’s a lot y’all.
Rebecca:
There’s state and legal issues, none of which is clear because states are not able to keep up with the myriad ways that folks are forming families. And in this climate, though we’d all like to take protections that we do have for granted, it feels like a gamble to do it. And so a lot of what people are considering when they’re thinking about forming families is: what are the adoption of foster laws in my state? Are they going to continue to be options? If one of us gives birth, what are the costs with confirmatory adoptions? If we use surrogacy, how are we going to legally ensure that we have the rights to our child when it’s born? What if we are not a legally married couple? What do we need to consider then? Because that gets very tricky. And then of course, it can just be so overwhelming.
Not only might you start down one path and have it not pan out, but the next best option may also be really costly. Assisted reproductive technology is very costly. Navigating the healthcare system is costly. Securing parentage and legal bonds to your children is hard. It’s pricey. We paid several thousand dollars for ours on top of the fees that went into healthcare and meds. And I also just want to say going back to what we were talking about before that the recent decision in Dobbs has tremendous implications for people who are seeking to start families and become pregnant. Many people who are on their journey to creating family but experiencing miscarriage are suddenly unable to receive what in most instances can be heartbreaking, but relatively simple procedural care. There was a woman recently who resided in D.C. and traveled to Ohio, and she was miscarrying. She was in Ohio and losing a tremendous amount of blood.
And so she went to the ER and rather than receive a very simple but lifesaving DNC procedure, even though the staff couldn’t find a heartbeat at the ultrasound, they said that they couldn’t be a hundred percent sure that the embryo wasn’t viable until they had confirmed a decrease in her HCG hormone. And they said that would take at least two days. The staff and the docs were so scared to give this woman a DNC procedure to help her not miscarry. She went home or she went back to her hotel. She nearly lost consciousness. She ultimately had to go back to the hospital in an ambulance, and she’s okay. She received a DNC. But is this a happy ending? Is this healthcare? Is this protecting families? And I don’t know if this person had any other children, but if so, the state imposition on her freedom almost caused those children to be motherless. And so at this point, thinking about starting a family really requires us to also get very grounded and familiar with the laws in our state.
Eric:
There’s an interesting question here about exposure versus familiarity, which parallels and deepens previous commentary about representation. We can have all the shows and representation in the world, but what are the consequences of having visibility without relationship? Going back to the Audrey Lorde quote that framed this episode, we can’t have liberation without community. If I don’t know you, if I’m not connecting and building with you, there’s still this chasm of perceived difference between us ultimately keeping us separate and keeping us from community and support.
Rebecca:
I remember when people started talking about marriage equality for queer folks, and now we’re at a place where there are sentiments that call marriage, queer marriage, very assimilationist. But for me, as someone who grew up without any recognition of my family, it felt so radical at the time to imagine that we as queer people would dare demand legal recognition of marriage. I know when I got into my twenties, some of my queer friends were starting to look at family formation, and I remember people traveling to different states to adopt where they could legally do so. And I can’t remember the moments that solidified those legal shifts, but I do feel like there was a point in the early two thousands where it no longer seemed wild that a queer person would want to create a family. And considering that when I was young, there were no families that looked like mine, I couldn’t have imagined anything like where we are right now.
I do kind of wonder maybe are we in a one step forward two steps back moment? I can’t be sure. I think the backlash of our gains feels particularly heinous and loud right now. I think sentiments shift and change most impactfully when there’s a lot of exposure and familiarity, and I feel like we’re right between those things. We’ve got the exposure right now, but we don’t have familiarity yet. And so as a result, extremist politicians and others who want us back in the closet and running scared and they’re trying to create laws that silence us. I think ultimately they know that when people see us all as people, when people become familiar with who we are, regardless of our gender identity or our sexual orientation, they’re all going to realize that we’re just as normal and happy and weird and boring as anybody else.
Eric:
Now, this next section was one that blew my mind. I had never really heard marriage framed quite in this way before. To bring in another Audre Lorde quote, “The Master’s tools will not dismantle the Master’s house.” But it is useful to have access to some of those tools, right? This section made me think about what’s available to us when we are able to use the full protections of the law that marriage allows, and what are we potentially missing out on by not doing so.
Rebecca:
When we talk about the intersections of oppression or systemic oppression that at the core of those are institutions, right? The institutions that maintain the status quo, that maintain ideology to keep us all “in check.” At the same time, the only way that institutions stay relevant is actually to change. So whether it’s Christianity, whether it’s democracy, whether it’s an institution like marriage, whether it’s education, there’s this tension between something that’s very old and something that has to change just enough to remain relevant. That is what’s coming up for me. When we think about marriage, it was radical. There were no married queer people. It was just not a thing that happened. The idea that queer folks would dare ask for legal protection from the state, from our nation, that was not something we could ever dream about. There are so many old cases of children being taken away from parents for being outed or being gay, and that still happens.
That is not something that is just old. It still happens. And so I think there was a time when asking for marriage equality felt radical. I don’t believe that it is radical anymore. I believe that it is a part of normative culture that two people who love each other have the expectation that they should be able to create a legal bond. I certainly don’t think that everybody needs to or should have to have rights to their children and rights to one another. But when I think about Family Equality’s work, when I think about what I know in terms of securing and maintaining parentage rights to our children, when I think about the number and hundreds and probably thousands of families that have gone before courts and lost children, one of the best ways to ensure your rights is to secure them legally. And marriage is a legal institution that guarantees or should guarantee some protection.
When two people create a child outside of that legal institution, that is absolutely their right, and they should be able to do that without any retaliation at any point. However, a court might not agree with me, and one of the ways that parents can demonstrate intentionality of family, one of the ways that they can work to have the law on their side more is to use the institutions that provide legal protections. So maybe I don’t see it as radical anymore. Maybe I see it as a tool. And when we are out here fighting for freedom, we need tools. And so if it’s a tool that works for you, then use it. And if it’s not one that you want to pick up, then don’t. But be aware of why and be informed, especially if you are looking to bring children into your home.
Eric:
Thank you so much to Rebecca for this amazing conversation. Again, Rebecca is the Chief Community Engagement Officer for Family Equality. So if you want to hear more from her or support the work that she’s doing, there’s always an opportunity to support Family Equality, follow their content, go to programming, get involved. That’s going to do it for Shining Through the Clouds. Thank you for joining me on this journey of curiosity and vulnerability. Thank you to all of our families that shared their stories. More than anything, I’m hoping that this series is leaving you feeling hopeful. Yeah, we’ve got some challenges, but we’ve also got a community that’s full of brilliant, resourceful, compassionate, and dedicated people. We are here, baby. We deserve to take up space, and that’s exactly what we’re going to do. I’m Eric Fleming. Thanks for listening. This has been a Joy Channel production in partnership with Family Equality.
As the leading national organization for current and future LGBTQ+ families, we’ve worked to advance equality through advocacy, support, storytelling, and education to ensure that everyone has the freedom to find form and sustain their families. Our executive producer is Luna Malborough, sound designed by Sean Braley, music and music design by Will Clemens of Ill Will Rhythms incorporated, story production and hosting by yours truly, Eric Fleming. You can follow us on socials at Find Your Joy Channel. Don’t forget to rate, subscribe, and review this podcast that helps us out a lot and spread the word. Send this to your friend, send it to your mom. Take good care, y’all.