 Welcome to today's interactive web chat in honor of LGBTI Pride Month, a month celebrating the contributions of the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and intersex community in the United States and around the world. The theme of this program is Community Voices for Inclusion. This discussion will feature representatives from faith communities, law enforcement, and businesses sharing their experiences and providing examples of practices and initiatives that promote inclusion, dignity, and respect for all. I'm Cory Andrews, a deputy director in the Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor at the U.S. Department of State. This is an important time to have a conversation on the human rights of LGBTI persons. While there has been a lot of progress in recent years, enormous challenges persist, particularly related to bias-motivated violence and anti-discrimination issues. One way to address these problems is to enable dialogue such as this and to encourage open discussion about these topics. Here to share their perspectives and answer your questions are Sabrina Kent, chief of staff at the National LGBT Chamber of Commerce, Father Kevin O'Brien, dean of the Jesuit School of Theology at Santa Clara University, and Sergeant Brayden Shragg in the Office of Community Engagement at the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department. We are also joined by viewing groups around the world including participants in Mexico at the U.S. Consulate in Ciudad Juarez. We will introduce their audience in a moment. Before we get started, I just want to mention that if you have questions for our panelists, please ask them in the chat space next to the video player or on Twitter using the hashtag LGBTI. We will try to answer as many of your questions as possible, and we will also provide links to resources in the chat space. Sabrina, welcome, and thank you for joining us. Can you briefly explain your role at the National LGBT Chamber of Commerce? Absolutely, and thank you so much for having us here. It's an absolute honor to represent NGLCC, and happy pride to all of you. So NGLCC is the economic voice of the LGBT community. We work to foster economic empowerment for LGBT-owned businesses globally. We are the sole certifying body for LGBT-owned businesses in the U.S. and the international registry for LGBT-owned businesses in other countries. We represent over 60 affiliate chambers, more than 50 in the United States and nearly 15 globally, and over a third of the Fortune 500 serve as our corporate partners who want to do business with LGBT-owned businesses. In my role as Chief of Staff, I manage our board of directors as well as our team, and I serve across special projects for the organization, including our work in our NGLCC global division, particularly on our India portfolio. NGLCC Global is really a major component of our work here and why we're here today to chat with you all, and I look forward to talking to it with all of you a little bit more about our work. Thank you. Father O'Brien, thanks for joining us. Do you mind telling the viewing audience a little about your work within the church and in academia? Sure. Thanks, Corey, for the invitation. Yes, I'm Kevin O'Brien. I'm a Jesuit priest that is in the Catholic Church. I'm the Dean of the Jesuit School of Theology at Santa Clara University in Northern California. At our school, we train and educate future teachers and ministers in the church, along with other schools located here in the different Protestant denominations and other Catholic traditions. I also serve as a priest or a minister at local Catholic churches in the area on the weekends. I'm here, I certainly speak out of the Catholic tradition, of which I'm a part, but I also want to give voice to the other traditions, religious traditions, which really share common ground on certain fundamental principles of human dignity. So I'll speak also about the Protestant traditions and the Jewish and Muslim traditions. All these faith communities, including my own, really do have common commitments to promote the dignity of all people. Thank you. Sergeant Shragg, welcome. Can you briefly share with us your background and work as a law enforcement officer? Absolutely. Thank you all for having me here, and I'm honored to be a part of this esteemed panel today and being able to speak to everyone throughout the world. So thank you all for those of you in the listening audience and viewing online throughout the world. Thank you for you being here today and giving us an opportunity to share. So my background, a degree in psychology. I've worked in pediatric mental health with children with severe emotional disabilities. I've also worked as a social worker with children who have been abused, neglected, either physically or sexually, and some time in the private sector. I've been with the police department since 2004 and had an opportunity to do some project development, grant management, working on our Office of Intergovernmental Affairs, as well as helping to start two programs, specifically our Fusion Liaison Officer Program, dealing in overt counterterrorism and working to counter violent extremism, as well as our Office of Community Engagement, where I'm a sergeant today. And in that role, we do a lot of work with a variety of community partners, be it the LGBTI or Q, depending on where you're at, how it's identified, as well as a number of faith-based civic institutions working closely with the youth to address issues of gangs, violent extremism, traditional violence, as well as human trafficking, and currently working on projects related to the opioid epidemic. Great, thank you. Let me set the stage for the discussion. In April of this year, the State Department released its annual Human Rights Report, and, once again, the report notes examples of violence being committed against LGBTI persons everywhere and government's failures to act on reports of such violence. These stories need to be told to ensure they become less common. I'm going to start the conversation with a broad question for our panel. You each come from unique institutions and organizations. Can you explain your approach and what lessons you think are most important to pass on for people working to make their communities more tolerant and inclusive of LGBTI individuals? Sabrina, let's start with you and your experience with the business community. Absolutely, thank you. So, as I mentioned before, we convene the private sector to work with LGBTI-owned businesses, both within the U.S. and globally. To that end, we believe that businesses are vital components to the economic fiber of any country, which, of course, we know through numbers. In 2016, NGLCC released a report called the America's LGBT Economy Report, and we're looking to replicate this study globally with our Latin American affiliates, and in the Caribbean, in a research study with the Organization of American States, we're very proud this was announced in April of this year, and it was actually an MOU assigned by our president and the OAS. But to borrow from our president, Justin Nelson, he always says, you cannot have full equality without economic equality, and that means that everybody has a seat at the table. Our report found that LGBT-owned businesses in the United States contribute $1.7 trillion annually to the global U.S. economy. As I mentioned, we're leading this research now on a global scale. Beyond that, I think it's important to underscore that LGBT-owned businesses aren't just LGBT-owned. They're women-owned, they're ethnic minority-owned, they're disability-owned, and so much more. So when we're making a seat at the table for all of these businesses, we're ensuring diversity of thought, competitive bids, and that ultimately drives business and influences our economy in a positive way. Great, thank you. Father O'Brien, your thoughts. Yeah, so I want to speak not simply from the Catholic tradition, but Protestant and Jewish and Muslim traditions would share certain common ground on principles which should define policy and structure debates about policy in this country and elsewhere. The most fundamental is religious conviction that we share is that all people are created in the image of God. And this means that they enjoy a special dignity that can never ever be taken away and must always be promoted. That's fundamental. So as children of God, and again, we may call God by different names depending on your religious tradition, because we're all children of God, we are brothers and sisters, and thus we have an obligation to care for one another as we would a member of our own family, regardless of our background or identity. Another way of saying that is that we live in solidarity with each other simply as human beings. This means that we have to accompany each other, walk with each other, listen to each other, and part of that listening then will ensure that any dialogue we have is truly deep and does not rest on superficial language and very quick ways or facile ways that we can relegate someone to the margin. So dialogue that goes deep. We also are striving to serve the common good, which means promoting conditions in society no matter where we are, that are necessary for people to flourish socially, economically, spiritually, and materially. And finally, faith communities, again, Christian, Muslim, Jewish, and others, we have a special obligation to be a voice for those without a voice, for those who are most vulnerable simply because they need us the most. And so while we certainly pray for our brothers and sisters, we also must pair that prayer or spiritual practice with a labor for justice and making sure that these principles which I've just enunciated are actually affected practically in our policy and in our societies. Great, thank you. Sergeant Shrag, what would you like to share with people in law enforcement working to make their communities more inclusive? A few things is when we look at making communities more inclusive, we really subscribe to community policing philosophy. We recognize that as law enforcement, we can't solve all the issues and problems of criminality and quality of life by ourselves. And so it's incumbent upon us that we subscribe to that philosophy and engage with a wide range of community partners. Those individuals know best what is needed for their community, and we want to make sure that we're not necessarily imposing our expectations of what is going to happen without having their inclusion. I take the philosophy, and we do in our office of community engagement, to kind of special interests. And that basically is no one gets hurt and no one ends up dead. And what I mean by that is we want everybody to have a voice inside the police department. I don't want anybody to feel afraid that they can't come to the police. And I want police to understand that it's their responsibility to get out and engage with the community. As leadership within the, within whatever community you represent, you take a commanding role in getting out and taking the first step. Many folks regardless of whether it's LGBTI or maybe a special interest group or somebody, a minority or ethnic group, they may see law enforcement in fearful eyes. And so it's our job to get out and make sure that we're doing everything we can to build and engage that community of trust with them. And we kind of do that through the application of social identity theory. And the very fundamental principles of the social identity theory is we move away from language of us and them to something more inclusive of we and our. It's basically developing our mosaic as a community. We have very vibrant communities all over the world and specifically here in Las Vegas. We work to not change who they are but have an adaptation that includes government and law enforcement, social services and other individuals they may not traditionally or normally engage with. And then finally is working through our four core principles of outreach, education, awareness and engagement. And those four core principles for us give us sort of a guideline of evaluation and reevaluation of what are we doing to connect with our community with the ultimate goal being that bi-directional engagement activity of developing or participating in a wide range of programs, projects or initiatives that make communities more inclusive. Thank you. Now before we turn to viewer questions from Ciudad Juarez and the larger global online audience, let's dig into a poll question we shared on social media in the days leading up to this discussion. We asked, where do you think LGBTI inclusion initiatives could be most effective within a community? You can see the results on the screen. The top answer was schools followed by local government then faith communities, law enforcement and businesses. What are your reactions to this poll? Sabrina let's start with you. Absolutely. You know I think it's really important to underscore that all of these segments are vital to our community and to our community's ability to thrive. And I think it's really important to also underscore that these different segments should work together to be able to create the largest impact. I think from the business perspective, you know businesses are government and economic influencers as we've talked before. Not just small businesses but corporations as well. And I think sometimes in the absence of governments especially in a global context corporations can really speak to a culture and really change the way people think about LGBTI inclusion. I'll give an example from our work in India. When we were conducting our in-country assessment in India, and I can't name the partner, we were meeting with a large corporation. They have over 20,000 employees across India. And this individual started on the tech side and now he's in a prominent leadership role on the HR and diversity and inclusion side of the company. And because of his experience being so welcomed in his corporation in his everyday job, he was then able to come out to his family and friends in a context in which he felt he would never have the chance to do that. So when we're talking from the context of businesses, businesses speak largely to the community and it's also very important to underscore that businesses employ LGBT people whether or not they know that and knowing that you can have a safe space to work or to contract as a business that might be LGBT owned is vital and important and also sends a message to our youth to say the future is better, that you can be out, you can live your life authentically. And that I think is very important in overall cultural attitudes and shifting minds. Great, thank you. Father O'Brien, your reaction to the poll? Yeah, I'm not surprised that faith communities are seen as a place where inclusion can be promoted and well simply because people are part of churches and synagogues and mosques and other faith communities in order to form their consciences in order to learn about values and to learn how to practice them. And so certainly inclusivity and dialogue and respect for human dignity would be fundamental to any faith community. So I'm pleased to know that that many people actually affirm the roles that faith communities have. And again, the other reason why I think they're so effective is that they're local. I mean, they're absolutely everywhere. And so often on the local level, most of the impact or the policies can be very, very effective and change can be affected on the local level often before the national level because again, we're dealing with people to people contact. So I do think that faith communities need to be affirmed and emboldened in their commitment not simply to this issue, but other issues that affect human dignity, including for instance, migration and immigration, which we are talking about a lot now certainly in the United States and Mexico. And Braden, your thoughts on the poll? I agree with Father O'Brien. It doesn't surprise me that law enforcement in some ways is listed more towards the bottom. But I think that there's a lot of influence and encouragement that law enforcement can provide to a wide range of communities. As a community leader in one of the most visible aspects of government in any country, we play a very commanding role in in how social issues or other activities of a community may be looked at or how they're shaped. Some of the work I'm doing in the opioid epidemic right now, the introduction of law enforcement has really shaped a much more collaborative environment with some of our community partners. And I believe the same in with other vulnerable communities. Our job is to protect all members of our community, regardless who they are and ensure that there's equal treatment. Our influence and sometimes just mere presence can have a significant influence and empowerment to vulnerable communities. And it also sets the stage for what is tolerated within a community. If law enforcement is passive and stands by, it sends the message that certain types of behavior are okay. And when we're looking to have inclusive environments and ensure that our most vulnerable populations are taken care of, it's incumbent that we take an active role in supporting those institutions, either independently or in collaborative effort, those institutions that are actively working to work. No one entity, organization can create an inclusive environment alone. It takes everybody working together as a team to make that happen. So I think that and we've seen that even with our transgender community of every couple of months, every other month, I spend time at our center, which is our hub of community and social services and speak to members of the transgender community or working with other community stakeholders. And sometimes just the mere presence of LVMPD's name of Las Vegas Metro's name on a flyer sends a message that this is about inclusion. This is we support this effort. So I think it takes everybody working together. Let's now go to our online viewing group at the US Consulate in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico, where Public Affairs Officer Brian Strait will introduce the group. Then we'll take a couple of questions from the audience. Hi, Brian. Cory, excellent to be with all of you today. And we couldn't be happier. We couldn't be prouder to be able to participate in this. So thank you very, very much for making it possible and for giving us an opportunity. Sure. I think that in Mexico, just like in most parts of the world, a lot has been achieved in terms of the struggle for equal rights for the LGBTI community, but there's a lot of work that remains to be done. And just like all of our panelists have alluded to today, none of the work is done by institutions or individuals operating on their own. Everybody, absolutely everybody, has to bond and work together with community leaders, with activists, with civil society, with everybody else, because really it's a question of strengthened numbers for positive changes to be made. And so to that end, it's the absolute same situation for us here at the United States Consulate in Juarez. We can't do anything on our own. And so we actively partner with civil society organizations and anybody who's willing to work with us in order to spread the good word about human rights and spread the good word about the need for equal rights for absolutely every person in the LGBTI community and for every other vulnerable community. And for that matter, for every single person in Juarez and the state of Chihuahua and Mexico and throughout the world. And so some of the best partners that we've had are actually with me today in this very room, our multi-purpose room here in the U.S. Consulate in Juarez. And they are representatives of an NGO that's been operating in the region here for 32 years. They just celebrated their 32nd anniversary. And they're called Programa Compañeros. We've been working with them very actively on a number of Pride Month initiatives and doing stuff, you know, all throughout the year with them, because this is really evergreen material, if you want to call it that. It's a struggle that needs to take place every day, all day. We've also got people from their youth group, which is called Pasalavos in English. That means spread the word. And then we've got representatives here from another NGO called Derechos Humanos Integralas, which means Integral Human Rights, another prestigious organization that is working here in Juarez and throughout the state of Chihuahua. Great. Thank you. Glad to see all of you. Does your audience have a question for us? Absolutely. Hi. Good morning, everybody. My name is Miguel, Miguel Jacome. And the first question is what are some best practices to empower the LGBT community? Great. Thank you. I believe the question was what are some best practices to empower the LGBT community? Let's see. Let's, Sabrina, would you like to try and answer that one? Sure. Yeah, I'll give it a go. So from the NGLCC perspective, we believe that it's very important for LGBT people to have an economic seat at the table, which is something that I mentioned prior to. And for us, we work with a global affiliate chambers of commerce. We have over 15 in our network, and they span over 30 countries. Those individuals are working in their respective countries to create opportunities for LGBT-owned businesses. So I would say a best practice, and going back to that idea that we have strengthened numbers and that we almost work together in order to achieve full equality, is to really drive that economic voice of the LGBT community on the ground, to really be able to empower folks to live their lives, put roofs over their heads. That's, I think, a vital component of anyone's survival, and it all starts with the bottom line, which is money. Yeah, Corey, I would say a best practice is something our parents taught us, that faith communities should imitate more and more, is welcoming people, hospitality. And you don't need a whole lot of money or organization to do that. That can be done on a one-to-one basis, or a faith community, local church, paris, synagogue, temple, whatever, can just be very intentional about how it speaks about LBGT persons, about their welcome to them. Now, within each of the religious communities, there are differences on doctrine and interpretation of scripture, and I don't mean to gloss over that, but those differences should never lead to marginalization and certainly not violence. So I think there's a way that we can have effective and meaningful dialogue by beginning with welcoming and listening. I mean, Pope Francis, you know, in the Catholic tradition, certainly has reminded those of us in the church that before we teach, we need to listen so that our dialogue and our accompaniment of others can be truly, truly meaningful and effective. Juarez, do you have another question for us? Yes, of course. Good morning to all. How can we promote a relationship between the police and the LGBTI community? Great, thank you. I believe the question was, how can we promote a better relationship between the police and the LGBTI community, which is great. Sergeant Shragg, I'll go to you. Excellent question. I think from a community standpoint, you know, it's important, let me start with law enforcement. It's important that we ensure as law enforcement that we're providing equal protection under the law, and everybody deserves a voice inside the police department. And it's a bi-directional action. Community needs to take an active role, and so does law enforcement engaging. And so from the community standpoint, I think it's actively engaging law enforcement, inviting them to events, programs, projects, or initiatives, working together in a collaborative effort to create something new that's never been done before in the community. And by doing that, we help to demystify and humanize each other. Oftentimes, law enforcement, especially in the U.S., is kind of this blanket thing, this apparition that sort of floats around. And at the end of the day, law enforcement are fathers, husbands, brothers, sisters, parents, grandparents, and that's the same thing in any vulnerable community. And from the LGBT community, it's important that officers see that as well. And it works to help break down those barriers and ensure a longer-term commitment and collaborative effort between everyone. So I would say just actively engaging or inviting law enforcement, holding an open house, educating the community law enforcement and other government entities about what are some of the services, capacities, and programs that are available, and encouraging law enforcement to, as they come across those who identify, that they now have an additional community resource. For some, it's a very difficult topic. And I know in U.S. law enforcement, sometimes it's a difficult topic, whether it's LGBT, IA, any derivative, it can sometimes be an uncomfortable moment. And if they don't know, it's an important piece, much like our four core principles, being able to educate officers about the community as much as officers can educate the community about how law enforcement engages and interacts. Great. Thank you very much. Now, let's take some questions from the chat space or those following along on Twitter using the hashtag LGBTI. Here's our question. Who have been your most unexpected allies? And what is your approaches to cultivating allies? Father O'Brien, would you like to take a stab at this one first? Well, I think the most effective allies are, I mean, within the faith communities are LGBTQ persons within our communities, right? Who, in a sense, teach those about their experience. I know those aren't allies. Those are actual LGBTI persons. But when I think about faith communities, what we need more of is their voices to be heard and understood. So I think that's something I think we need to reinforce so that we, in the faith communities, can be better allies to our LGBTQ persons who may not have a voice, whether economically or politically. As I reflect in this conversation and see our friends in Ciudad Juarez, I'm reminded that often, you know, we have, there's vulnerable populations everywhere, for instance, migrants and refugees, but LGBTI persons are often the most vulnerable within vulnerable populations. And so I think it's very, very important for us as allies to be very sensitive to those we're serving, to be their protector, particularly those who are most vulnerable to any type of abuse or physical violence. Thank you. And Sabrina, what are your approaches to cultivating allies? Certainly. So for NGLCC, you know, a large part of our work is influenced by the private sector. And so I would say it would be impossible for us to do our work if it weren't for the support of the private sector, mandating that they want to include LGBT owned businesses in their supply chains. They want that opportunity to be created, and they know that it's vital to the, to the success of their businesses. I think something, I don't know if it's as much of a surprise in terms of cultivating allies, but, you know, something that's interesting about NGLCC is we did not start as an organization that did advocacy work. But we were approached by various cities and states to begin doing this advocacy work to help mandate the inclusion of LGBT owned businesses into city and state law. And that's vitally important for our businesses to be able to identify themselves in the process of contracting with government. And so I would say, you know, from all aspects, our community partners, our affiliate, our global affiliates, as well as our local affiliates across the United States, as well as our advocacy partners in our corporations, have really been those allies that help strengthen our movement, that help drive home the message that LGBT owned businesses are important, they can't be ignored, their economic contributors, and their job creators, and they deserve an equal seat at the table. Great, thank you. For Father O'Brien and Sergeant Shrag, what has been the most challenging in your fields in advocating for LGBTI inclusion? And how have you overcome these challenges? Sergeant Shrag, can we start with you? Absolutely. I think sometimes there's an inherent fear of law enforcement, and in particular with our transgender community, there is a lot of times myths, and I think that's probably the same in the faith community about what really happens. And so we've seen some of the concerns from our community and work to address them through unrelenting outreach. It's been a dedicated effort and commitment and on our part to engage our community. As I mentioned earlier, participating, we have what's called Sergeant's Corner over at the center. And knowing that there is some hesitation or some fear of law enforcement by members of the transgender community, it was a commitment by myself and the center that even if nobody showed up, it was important that we were there. And that sends a message, I think, right away to help develop those relationships and conduct some of that outreach to help break down some of those barriers. And the consistency. It's consistency on the part of the officer on law enforcement to ensure that they're engaged. And we've taken some other unique approaches. We have our Sheriff's Multicultural Advisory Council where a wide range of community partners engage with law enforcement, our senior leadership, in particular with our Sheriff and the executive staff. And these include members from the LGBTI community who advocate on behalf. And so at the top, there's an expectation in receiving information and how we can best serve the community down to folks at my level and the officers that I supervise who go out and engage with the community. So we look at a top-down bottom-up approach and this helps to know, this helps to empower the community to know that at all levels, we're working to break down those barriers and engage with the community. And Father O'Brien, can you speak to the challenges in your work and how you've overcome them? Yeah, so I think, let me name two challenges. One, fear of the unknown. So I think that there are people within the church and religious communities that don't know, do not have direct experience or understanding of what it means to be an LGBTI person. And often the response is fear of the other. They don't know how to respond or how to talk or it's not part of their experience. They don't know what to do. So the first thing is to help overcome that fear from ministers and religious persons within a church community. And the best way to do that is by encouraging this dialogue that we've spoken about so far this hour. It's very, very important to assure them that that fear can be overcome when the other is known. The other obstacle, I think, is the hurt that LGBTI persons have experienced within faith communities. It could have come through their parents. It could have come through a religious authority of some sort, but somehow they have been hurt by or not have not experienced the love of God directly or have been told that they're not loved until they change. That goes against every part of any mainstream religious conviction where every person is a valued child of God. So the other obstacle we need to overcome or the other challenge for us within the faith community is to listen to that hurt and to help overcome that hurt or heal that hurt through the power of tenderness. And what I said earlier about the the awesome power of welcome. And so I think overcoming hurt and overcoming fear are two obstacles that we need to be very intentional about overcoming. Great, thank you. And we're going to stick with you for a second, Father O'Brien. We have a question from Rochelle and the viewing group at the U.S. Embassy in Namibia. What do you think is the path to acceptance of LGBT people in the Catholic Church and other traditions as opposed to tolerance? Pope Francis talks about that. That's a great question, Rochelle. And welcome to our friends in Africa. I do I there's a great distinction between tolerance, which is putting up with someone and true hospitality are welcome. And certainly in the Jewish Catholic of Muslim traditions, hospitality is a central virtue in religious practice. And hospitality means that when we welcome someone, we reverence them as in the Christian tradition, we would say the stranger is Christ coming to us. And so we reverence that person as holy. And that reverence means we just don't tolerate them. But we welcome them welcome them in as part of our community. Now, as part of that community, we all have something to learn. Religious authorities have something to learn. Those who worship with us have something to learn. People have been part of our tradition for decades of something to learn. And certainly newcomers have something to learn. But learning will only take place if we truly are welcoming people who are different than us in our communities and authentically listen. And that listening is hard because that means that sometimes our prejudices and biases are challenged, and we'll need to let go of them. So as we do this very sometimes difficult dialogue, I think it's very important for all of us to be very gentle and patient with one another, that we quickly do not fall into camps of right or wrong or either or or good or evil. That won't work. Instead, if we can practice the best of our religious tradition by being patient with one another and hospitable to one another, I think we can move a lot. Great. Thank you. Sergeant Shrag, I have a question for you from Alfredo Velasco from Ecuador, who asks, can you recommend public policies that can be used to combat cyber bullying against the LGBTI community? That's a really great question. Cyber is not necessarily my strong suit, but what I would say is there's a balance between freedom of speech and hate speech. And we look at it in context of wanting to share voices. We also need to work to ensure that those voices of our most vulnerable are heard. And I'd say from a public policy standpoint, even just an individual standpoint, social media and our digital platforms have become such a pervasive part of the fabric of our community. And it's such a change in a short period of time that working with those main providers, such as Facebook or Twitter, to have them internally work to remove some of the hateful and damaging speech that's out there, I think it's also about educating youth and our community about what is acceptable in a community, not tolerated. I agree with Father O'Brien on that difference between tolerance and acceptance. And so we need to look and say what is acceptable in our community and educate individuals about appropriate use of the social media tools and also teaching our youth as well as adults times to disconnect, times to unplug or ensure privacy settings are more refined and activities like that. That would be some of the initial suggestions, having also some open public forums and discussion throughout the community and public service announcements. But from one single public policy, I don't know that I would be in the best position to state that. And I have a question for you from Linda in Namibia that hopefully closer to your direct experience, how do you navigate non-responsive law enforcement agencies? It's, we've been very fortunate, many of the agencies that we've worked with have been responsive. But for those who are unresponsive and there are many of them out there is to continue to be an unrelenting voice. Making change is not easy. Making change sometimes is a little messy. The human condition is not a simple being. And so it's an unrelenting activity on the part of community. Finding advocates, individual advocates can make a change. We look at historically individuals and the growing connection between individuals has helped to make incredible change in whether it's law enforcement, the faith community, civil society. And so I would encourage to find that one individual, take somebody out for coffee. A big advocate of mine is time with coffee and get to know the individual. We may not be able to change the system right away, but we can change individuals and that can lead as leadership grows can lead to change. Also engaging in public policy or getting involved in government becoming an elected official or being an advocate in the government system can help to make some of those changes in the law enforcement community as well. Great. Thanks for sending in these great questions. Now we'd like to show a short video that highlights the historical and present day importance of Pride Month. Over the past 50 years, the conversation about lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer individuals in the United States has shifted from resilience in the face of intolerance to pride in a culture of acceptance. June is LGBTQ Pride Month in the United States. It is a time when Americans commemorate the 1969 Stonewall Uprising, an event that sparked the modern LGBTQ rights movement and highlights LGBTQ rights as human rights. On June 28, 1969, patrons of the Stonewall Inn who were tired of constant harassment and abuse from police in New York City finally fought back. While accounts of the night vary, the uprising ignited a national firestorm and inspired widespread activism in support of LGBTQ rights. After more than four decades of fighting for equal rights, the movement reached a milestone in 2015 when the United States Supreme Court recognized the rights of same-sex couples to marry. Today, Pride Month is celebrated by millions around the world with parades, lectures, parties, workshops and concerts. It is also a time to honor those LGBTQ individuals who have been lost to crimes motivated by bigotry and advocate for those in the over 70 countries who are still persecuted for who they are, some with the threat of execution. While Pride events occur year-round, Pride Month is an opportunity to celebrate the LGBTQ people who have changed the course of history to promote visibility of LGBTQ individuals in the fabric of society and to continue the dialogue about LGBTQ rights as human rights and the struggle for equal rights that continues around the world today. As we celebrate Pride Month here in the United States, I think it's important to note that Pride parades and LGBTI equality marches have been an important part of publicly representing the LGBTI community in cities across the world, as seen in the video in these photos. Diverse groups, including many of the institutions and organizations our panelists represent, faith groups, law enforcement agencies and businesses have come out to show their support for LGBTI rights. How important are these public displays of pride to communities around the world and how can groups similar to your own set an example by showing their support publicly for LGBTI individuals? Sabrina, what are your thoughts? Certainly, you know, dating all the way back to Stonewall, Pride marches really started as a protest against brutality and now it's a worldwide celebration where we can show solidarity for one another in our communities and it's not just for LGBTI people, it's for LGBTI people and our allies. Corporations and civil society organizations partake in Pride all around the world at this point and they show their support in very visible ways. I think we just had Pride here in DC a couple weeks ago and Hilton, one of our great corporate partners at NGLCC was the presenting sponsor of Capital Pride here in DC and that promotes visibility. That's incredibly important and from a business lens, whether I'm an employee, a business owner or youth, looking for what my next step in life is going to be, you know, that promotes hope and an understanding of safety that I'm a valued person, not because I'm LGBT, but because I'm all of my identities at one time. So Pride has really now turned into a wonderful celebration where we can all show our solidarity and support for one another. Great, thank you. And I'd just like to remind the panelists that we're running a little short on time, so please try to keep your answers as brief as possible, but Father O'Brien and Sergeant Shrag, any thoughts on this? Yeah, I would just say that we might just begin at home. That is, in many families, there are LGBTI persons. At your workplaces, there are LGBTI persons. In your faith communities, there are LGBTI persons. And so a lot of the work that we can do very practically is simply for us to be attentive and aware of those people who are already in our daily life and for us to be very sensitive about language and to be very welcoming and to actually learn from those persons as they express their identity and express who they are. So I would encourage all of us to begin close to home as a way for us to advocate for those often without a voice in these communities. And from a law enforcement perspective, we have participated in Pride, marches, parades, and various events both at the center and in our community throughout for the last several years. As far back as I can remember, and those of my colleagues who sit on the LGBTQ recruitment council for our department, which we have an active one, there's only been a couple of years that we haven't. And one of them was last year with the, in the wake of the tragic Route 91 festival, the 1 October incident here in Las Vegas. But we, that's been about the only thing. It's been a long-standing commitment and it's important that we demonstrate solidarity by participating in those events. And it's also provided us with an avenue for recruitment to recruit new officers into the department. So Pride marches, Pride parades are an integral part of our community to demonstrate support as we walk in uniform. So there's a high visibility of presence of law enforcement during those events. Thank you. Now let's go back to our viewing group in Mexico. Ciudad Juarez, do you have two more questions for the panel? Hi. Um, to be, to become a more inclusive society, how can we sensitize people about the need to respect members of the LGBT plus community? Great. Thank you. I believe the question was, in order to be a more inclusive society, how can we sensitize people to be more respectful of, of LGBTI persons? Father O'Brien, would you like to take a stab at that one? Yeah, we can't sensitize people unless we know them and are known by them. So the only way that's going to happen is if we, if we, if we have them, we've said at the table or in our communities or part of our, our social circles, the best way to sensitize someone about something that's very important is to make sure that that person is present in situations and communities at times that really matter. Thank you. And Sabrina, do you have any thoughts on that question? Yeah, I think exposure and living authentically are big ones. You know, we talk a lot about corporations and their ability to influence governments, but also their, their internal ability to influence their, their people. So talking about that top down effect that Sergeant Shrag touched on before, you know, many of the corporations that NGLCC works with have partners that have mandated from the very top of their chief executive officer all the way down to their associates and assistants and so forth, that LGBT inclusion is important and is an important part of this company and of this organization. And if you're going to be a part of this, you need to buy into that model and be an accepting person. And again, going back to that, that difference between tolerance and acceptance. And, you know, as a business person, I think there's, there's a big argument to be made for employee productivity. Corporation at the end of the day, they're going to care about their bottom line. And we know that when an LGBTI person feels that they have to hide their identity at work, 25% of their productivity goes out the window. That means that 25% of every single day is spent worrying about, am I going to be outed? Should I talk about my partner? You're sitting around the water cooler with your colleagues and what did you do this weekend? I went out with my wife and kids and blah, blah, blah, but you might not want to talk about your same sex partner. And so I think just allowing people to live authentically and having the policies in place to allow that to happen, corporations can influence that policy, both from an internal standpoint, but also from a government standpoint as well. From a law enforcement perspective, we participate in a program called Adopt a Cop where we take our brand new officers once they've completed field training in the academy and we place them in and with various community partners to include our LGBTQ community. And it gives that opportunity for one on one time and the opportunity to engage with each other and learn about the other and in a way that may not otherwise happen once they get into the daily grind. So I would say from the perspective is there's a, there's a transfer location or a business group, invite law enforcement, especially those new officers when they're still learning and molding who they are as a public servant to come out and become that advocate, get to know the community. Thank you. Juarez, do you have another question? Yes. Good morning, everyone. My name is Mario. And my question is, how can we support LGBT plus jout in doing harassment? Great. I believe the question was how can we support LGBT youth and during harassment? Father O'Brien, would you like to try this one? Yeah, I spoke earlier about the most vulnerable among us and certainly our young people would be in that category because often they feel they don't have a voice. And often our young people are victims of bullying, physical or verbal and emotional. So I think all of us, certainly in faith communities and schools attached to them have to be very attentive to really drawing the lines and making sure there's clear discipline against bullying or cyber attacking, emotional abuse of behavior or physical attacks on our young people. We have to be very clear, we have to stand firm that it will just not be permitted. So as vigilant as we are in making sure that people are not racially or ethically marginalized, we should do with the same vigilance we should act protecting LPGTI young people. It's also important that we have advocates in the community to help give a voice to the youth. Sometimes youth are marginalized oftentimes because of their age and they don't have necessarily the legal standing. It's important that we have advocates that can help speak on their behalf. And it's also important that we ensure that that information is reported to law enforcement that when crimes are committed and the bullying is taking place that we work through civic society and as it reaches that criminal level that we report to law enforcement we don't keep it hidden. If law enforcement doesn't know that something is happening, we may be aware or have an idea that it's happening but if community doesn't come forward and give us the information, we need to put a prosecutable case together, conduct an arrest or even an intervention. We work closely with our community and different partners such as in our gang prevention section where we go out and do interventions when we hear of things going on and the same thing can be replicated when there's issues pertaining to this type of activity as well. Great. Thank you, C. de Juarez for these great questions. Okay, we have some more good questions from online viewers. Here's a question from Mission Honduras for Father O'Brien. How can religious authorities in other countries stop discrimination that originates in religious institutions? Well, I think that's a great question. Greetings to our friends in Central America. Religion has often been misused to degrade or marginalize people and so it's very important for religious authorities and teachers and clergy and ministers to make sure that we enact and profess the best of our tradition and not the worst. So that's why good education, good preaching, good scripture study is vital in, again, beginning in the local community so that religion is never misused as a way of hurting people, in this case, LBGTI persons, but unfortunately history is rife with examples of how religion has been used to hurt people, marginalize people in order to protect people in power, to protect special interests. So I think it's a great question because it challenges me to make sure that we ensure that our religious tradition is not misused by those who seek to use it for self-interest. Great, thank you. And we have another question from Mission Honduras for Sabrina. Does the Chamber of Commerce support the expansion and establishment of LGBTI Chambers of Commerce in Honduras or other countries? Yeah, that's a great question. So as I mentioned before, NGLCC Global's network is comprised of over 15 global affiliate chambers of commerce spanning over 30 countries worldwide. Specifically, as it relates to Honduras, we currently do not have a chamber developing in Honduras, but we do have Colombia, Mexico, and the Dominican Republic as amongst other Latin American affiliates. Actually, our highest concentration of global affiliate chambers is in the Latin Americas. So we establish these chambers of commerce globally with folks on the ground. These are leaders that want to bring an LGBTI Chamber of Commerce to their country to support the LGBT small businesses in their area and their regions. So in doing so, we help them establish themselves with best practices and resources and knowledge sharing. We also connect them with fellow affiliate leaders from the global network as well as within the U.S. to help share some of the stories of their best practices, their trial and error, and what's really worked for them in their respective countries. Great, thank you very much. Looks like we have another question from Osman and Guyana for Sabrina and Sargent Shrag. How do we create discrimination legislation that protects all individuals? Sargent Shrag, any thoughts? I have not been a policy drafter, but I think has been mentioned. It is everybody deserves a seat at the table and everybody needs to have a seat at the table. Much like we look at law enforcement, everybody deserves a voice inside the police department. So should those who are drafting policy, they should take the leadership role to reach out to those who these policies are going to impact and affect and ensure that their voice is at the table physically or through written notes, video teleconference, but they have a say in the development of those policies or procedures that are being created to ensure that exclusionary language is mitigated or removed and that inclusion language and involvement is there through each step of the way. Great, thank you. Sabrina, any thoughts on anti-discrimination legislation? Absolutely. While anti-discrimination legislation isn't necessarily in the lane of NGLCC and what our portfolio works on, I think a major point to underscore here is the corporate influence on governments and policymaking. So in the United States, for example, in passing marriage equality, NGLCC along with many of our corporate partners signed on to the amicus brief to say that we were in support of marriage equality in the U.S. And so I think it's about coalescing a group of individuals and organizations that can have a strong influence on government by way of politics and economics to really drive that message home and to help craft that legislation in a meaningful way that's going to impact the LGBT community positively. Great. And our final question is from Mission Honduras, again for Sabrina. How do you create partnerships with the media to create awareness of LGBTI rights? Any best practices that you can share? Absolutely. I wish our Senior Vice President Jonathan Levitz were here because he really heads up our media efforts alongside our President Co-Founder Justin Nelson. But, you know, for us, it's really about driving that message home. We put together briefs for our media partners. We create strategic media partnerships with businesses as well as with media outlets to let them know about the work that we're doing. And therefore, you know, we're able to really spread this message in a widespread, meaningful way. So my suggestion would be to really forge those media partnerships, find your allies in media. There are LGBT people and allies everywhere. And it's just about finding those people that really want to take that story and arming them with the information that they need to be able to bring it together as concisely and quickly as possible to drive that message home. Great. Thank you. It looks like we are almost out of time. Father O'Brien, Sergeant Shrag, Sabrina, would you like to share any final thoughts? From a law enforcement perspective, the final thought that I would share is it's incredibly important that as leaders in one of the most visible aspects of government in any community, that law enforcement takes an active role in helping to ensure equal treatment and protection under the law and work to bridge gaps between various community stakeholders to really have the most positive impact that we can in any community. Great. My last word would be an encouragement to, as we address these very personal and sometimes difficult issues, is to certainly pray within your own tradition as a way of finding greater self-awareness and greater interior resources to be of help as an ally or to find your voice as an LBGTI person, but to always pair that, you know, spiritual practice with concrete action and labor for justice. And I would say, first of all, thank you so much for this meaningful dialogue. It was a pleasure to serve alongside all of you today. I would say, I would leave it with, you know, LGBTI people are economic drivers. They're valuable contributors to our global economy. We're job creators and we're taxpayers. And at NGLCC, we're really bridging the private sector and government together to really support LGBT-owned businesses. And so if you're an LGBT-owned person with a business, I would suggest that you get involved with NGLCC and learn about how you, being LGBT, can actually positively contribute to your business. And I would just say again, thank you so much for having us here today. NGLCC is proud to be represented. And thank you to all of the panelists for contributing your expertise and insights to this important conversation. A special thanks to the audiences and organizers in Mexico at the U.S. Consulate in Ciudad Juarez. And thank you to all of our online viewers, including those watching with viewing groups across the world at Embassy Belmapan Belize, Embassy Tegucigalpa Honduras, U.S. Consulate Monterey, Mexico, Colombo Americano in Medellín, Colombia, American Corner, Pristina Kosovo, and U.S. Embassy Wendok in Namibia. We hope this conversation will continue and the Department of State stands ready to continue to facilitate dialogue and conversation on this and other human rights issues. Please don't hesitate to reach out to us and our colleagues at our diplomatic missions to share ideas and suggestions of additional steps that we may take. Pride is really a celebration of the strength and resilience of the LGBTI community. The stories that we've heard today are a testament to that resilience and a tribute to all who fight for human rights and human dignity, for everyone, no matter who they are. Thank you for participating today and keeping the dialogue going.