R000588
Wednesday, March 13, 2002 9:33 AM
TGay partners of 9/11 Victims
Dear Mr. Feinberg,
I am writing to ask you to re-consider your policy with regard to surviving
partners of gay and lesbian people who died in the WTC tragedy.
I gather that the law will not be the determining factor in whether partners
of illegal aliens receive compensation from the 9/11 fund, and that they
will not be subject to prosecution or deportation if they make claims. I
applaud that policy.
At the same time, you have said that state law will determine whether or not
gay partners receive compensation. Considering what those state laws tend
to be, this double standard sends a powerful message. Are gay and lesbian
individuals and their children unworthy of compassion or care?
Gay and lesbian couples often have children, just like other families. In
some
instances the biological parent will have died in the WTC, while the
non-biological
co-parent did not. The co-parent will be left to raise their children. In
other cases,
the non-biological parent, and primary breadwinner for the family, will have
died in
the WTC, leaving the biological parent to raise the children without
support.
This policy harms not only the surviving partners and children of gay WTC
victims, but also their extended families and their friends. Your policy
tells ALL who lost a gay person they loved that theirs is a lesser loss than
that of others because a gay person has less worth. Gay people have mothers
and fathers, brothers and sisters, grandparents and aunts and uncles and
godparents. Your policy hurts the entire U. S., every single U. S.
citizen or resident, by giving the message that some human beings are of
less value than others. Finally, the message inherent in your policy is
devastating to gay and lesbian people in the U. S. and throughout the
world.
Gay and lesbian people are human. They love and grieve just like other
humans. They have the same funeral expenses , the same financial problems,
the same needs for trauma resolution. They have the same need to feel that
they are a part of the human family, and a part of their own country.
What does it mean that the U. S. -- the world's leader, the most powerful
nation on Earth, the world's shining beacon of equality -- discriminates
against an entire group of people?
Again, I ask you to re-consider your policy and to award funds to surviving
partners and children of gay and lesbian people who were lost in the shared
national tragedy of 9/11. If ever there were a time for a higher law to
rule the day . . . this is that time.
Thank you,
Individual Comment
Houston, Tx