Commentary: F*** HRC (Part II)
In continuation from yesterday’s post, here are other items that piss me off about HRC:
They demonstrate a lack of commitment to transparency and accountability.
There are numerous complaints against HRC for being secretive about their financial operation. A few months ago Andrew Sullivan called them on this, and asked for HRC to answer five questions, two of them being:
What percentage of the 2006 budget for all of HRC (both foundation and lobbying group) was taken up by fundraising, events, mortgage payments and administration?
What percentage was devoted to lobbying and organizing?
HRC still hasn’t answered. Why won’t they let us know how much of our money went to the job we expect from them? Aren’t non-profits supposed to disclose this stuff? Help me out here, readers.
A friend of mine went on a date with a high-level HRC staffer last year, and the guy expensed his non-work related date on the HRC dime. Twice. My friend had a couple of really nice dinners, but needless to say, he ceased his yearly donation to HRC. I’m not saying this kind of thing is normal for HRC, but when my friend told me he found out that the vast majority of HRC’s budget goes toward administration and non-lobbying/organizing activities, It makes me wonder just how far this kind of mismanagement/excess extends. Also, what exactly is a “reasonable” percentage of “fundraising, events, mortgage payments and administration” overhead? I was under the impression that 1/3 of an overall budget was typical for non-profits, not 3/4 (again, we don’t know the real percentage). Maybe some of our readers know more about this sort of thing, and can shed some light on the matter for inquiring minds, like mine.
They sell your contact information to gay lifestyle marketers
You will receive crap in your mailbox if HRC gets their hands on your contact information.
They misrepresent their membership numbers
Check out this article from the Blade that details the strange way HRC determines its membership, which is odd by non-profit standards and not duplicated by other gay rights organizations. It’s just shady.
They threw the trannies under the bus
By now most of you have heard that the House passed an HRC-supported ENDA bill that prohibits employment discrimination against gays and lesbians. You’ve also probably heard that high-profile gay legislator Barney Frank and Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi supported removing employment protections for transsexuals out of concern that the bill would not otherwise survive the vote. Granted, the bill may not have passed if the transgender protections were included, but should the gay community have taken a principled “carry as you climb” stand and protested any legislation that excluded one part of our community?
I can understand the argument that political progress is slow and often done in piecemeal fashion, and that refusal to recognize this reflects a naive understanding of how things get done in Washington, but I also know that when you carve up your base you lose strength, both politically and in your shared community. It also tells the world (and specifically the trannies we are f****** over) that the gay community doesn’t consider the whole community worth fighting for, and they should feel this way too.
I’ve read some compelling arguments from proponents of the “we’ll come back for you” strategy, but I find it curious that all of those arguments were from white collar, upper class gay men, those who have reaped the greatest benefit from the leadership, sacrifice, and passion of a transgender community that has historically been at the forefront of the gay rights movement. They were out, fighting, and fabulous when most of those upstanding HRC supporters were still hiding in the closet. I hear your arguments, fellas. I just can’t look myself in the mirror and still agree with HRC’s support of this strategy. I’d much rather lose my job than my soul.
They don’t do their job
I’ve heard from numerous sources that our premiere lobbying organization doesn’t seem to lobby anyone, unless they are our gay friends on Capitol Hill. Case in point, the tranny/ENDA situation. I read in the Washington Post how some congresspersons expressed an honest interest in knowing about transgender issues as they relate to ENDA, but they complained that no one approached them. Nice one.
They don’t engage on the marriage issue
During the last election cycle, when “gay marriage” was the cudgel used by the Republican party to scare the entire country, did HRC engage the people on this issue when it had the entire country’s attention? No. HRC followed the lead of the democratic party strategy of trying to bury the issue, basically saying “Why get sidetracked with this foolish wedge issue? There are so many more important issues for the country to deal with. Let’s pretend this doesn’t matter.” Well, it did matter to crackerfuck county, U.S.A., and they voted as such.
Yes, much was at stake and the party needed to shift message away from the republican hate machine, so once again HRC tucked its tail and followed the lead of the democratic party. Instead of taking this moment to forcefully promote our equality with the full weight of its resources and open a discussion on this issue when everyone was paying attention, HRC played politics. We’ll never know how many hearts and minds could have been reached if they would have spoken out forcefully.
If HRC is just a mouthpiece of the democratic party, why don’t we just give our money directly to the DNC, and skip the middle man?
They haven’t done ANYTHING
20 years old, they receive 20 million dollars a year, and they have accomplished NOTHING. Not one substantial piece of legislation, unless you want to include their recent ENDA “victory”, which can still get squashed by the Senate. They take credit for getting large corporations to become more gay friendly, but those companies would have done so anyway because they are market driven. Sure, the HRC pays many of their employees exorbitant salaries, they just bought a building (Apparently they plan on maintaining a reason to exist for another 15-20 years), they spend tons on their flashy brand marketing, and they have lots of nice events as defacto gay rotary club for upper middle class/rich white people to hang out and socialize while feeling like they’re actually doing something, but they are not a lean, mean, fighting machine. If HRC were a serious organization, they would learn from Tim Gill, who understands guerilla warfare and implements it with far less overhead.
Do yourself a favor, if you want to support a gay right organization, visit the Gay & Lesbian Task Force. Not only do they work well with other organizations (HRC is notorious for not doing so), but they support a transgender-inclusive ENDA and they work to change things on a grassroots level.
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hear, hear.
other organizations to check out:
-stonewall democrats for their grassroots, membership-based organization
-victory fund, for being awesome, doing lots of effective work (see: Sam Adams’ mayoral victory last night in Portland), and playing well with other lgbt orgs.
HRC is a sham. If you are going to put your money anywhere go for the grassroots groups actually getting things done instead of throwing black tie parties.
When is the last time they could actually claim a victory that were responsible for? When the California marriage ban was overturned, it didn’t take but hours for me to receive an email from HRC asking for money and claiming victory. You would think that had something to do with it, but I have yet to see anything to that effect in the many stories I have read about it. I have heard about several local CA groups instead.
HRC takes up way too much time and money trying to throw its weight around after non-effective causes. For example, the “ratings” they put out based on replies to their surveys. Many people use their ratings to base their opinions and spending habits on. They just put out ratings on hospitals and majority of the hospitals they sent surveys to didn’t even respond. Guess what? If an organization/company doesn’t answer their survey, they get a bad rating. So, you could be very pro-gay but because you don’t bother with their survey you get branded.
I could go on.
When I did fundraising for a national environmental group, we were required by most states to keep our fundraising expenses below 25%; if we went over, we weren’t allowed to fundraise in those states. These states and the IRS has specific formulas to figure out the %. It’s been many years and I don’t remember or I’d give you the instructions to figure it out based on public information.
in re: anonymous up there:
that email we got hours after the california decision was to donate not to HRC, but to a california-specific PAC (political action committee), where all funds would be used to fight the anti-marraige proposal on november’s ballot in cali that could overturn the court’s decision. every organization has issues, but i urge you to do the full research before bashing our brethren.
isn’t the mere fact that they are working in some way for equality a good thing?
also, do we know anything about these “exorbitant salaries” that someone mentioned? i know someone who worked there (took a higher paying job at another nonprofit) and made 30k a year doing tons of hours… maybe we’re exaggerating for the sake of hyperbole?
A few comments:
1) Thanks for mentioning the trans issue. HRC’s actions related to ENDA were completely inexcusable, especially since the legislation will never get through the Senate this term and would be vetoed by Bush anyway.
2) A commenter on the previous post mentioned HRC’s standing up for voiceless LGBT folks (and not urban white elites). I think actually the opposite is true. The trans issue is a case in point. Any clue what HRC is doing for LGBT people of color? Yeah, me neither.
3) For the financials, log onto http://www.guidestar.org (you have to set up a free account, but they never bug you). Type in Human Rights Campaign, and you can review the IRS 990s (tax forms required for all non-profits) and they even have their 2007 filings posted. Note that you need to look at both Human Rights Campaign Foundation and Human Rights Campaign Inc to get a fuller picture, as HRC is really 3 entities (the PAC filings aren’t on GuideStar).
Your passion is understandable — I don’t think the HRC is doing a very good job either, and their decision to half-ass it on ENDA was reprehensible.
But be careful. I like this blog and I really appreciate reading your commentary, but this post is sounding dangerously close to a political blog I-have-an-ax-to-grind-and-I-don’t-really -know-the-whole-story type of post. Your assertions are by and large true, but try to back them up with some sourcing. And to say that HRC hasn’t ever done anything is an overstatement.
I don’t disagree with your sentiment – the HRC doesn’t get one bit of my money — but you undermine your argument when you rely on hyperbolic language and few citations.
I’m with Anonymous 1′s comment on the importance of checking out other organizations. I’m always troubled to hear that people just throw massive amounts of money at HRC without doing any homework on other, more focused groups – or doing any homework on the ratio of the dollar donated to HRC vs. what’s used for overhead there.
If you have a particular issue you’re concerned about (trans, state/local, military, etc.) there’s probably a group out there that will get you more bang for your donation.
And we need more people working directly at a personal level, rather than letting a humongous organization do it for you.
Here is their Guide Star account:
http://www.charitynavigator.org/index.cfm?bay=search.summary&orgid=6229
Three stars – but a low organizational efficiency (1 star)
we don’t have a lot of options here and fact of the matter is HRC gets into the offices most organizations can’t.
I wish they didn’t drop the T but at the same time babysteps are a still progress in the direction towards full equality.
THANK you for mentioning the NGLTF works WITH local partners. Local partners should enlist their help (and listen to them!) more often, btw. But here’s something else about HRC:
They’ve paid the for-profit Phelps operation GCI for list-building purposes.
I just noticed 2/22 1:02.
Charity Navigator is useless for political orgs.
It’s used to measure the overhead ratio to services delivered (think of it as “how much of my money actually buys the food for starving people?”)
When the service is political power, or education, well, it’s all ABOUT a ton of staff. In many ways, it’s the opposite of the rating.
That said, HRC is awful. They raised money promising an inclusive ENDA and then right out of the gate asked members to contact their representatives to support the non-inclusive version. And for what? Neither was going to pass. So why start out with the goal of exclusion? No, they must no longer be supported until they change their board, leadership, and earn trust.
Personal animus and the relevance of HRC aside, one thing is clear: sexual orientation has nothing to do with gender identity.
Men who have sex with men are still men…and wish to remain so.
While the transgender issue is important I’m not sure it is a Gay rights issue.
Sorry, DBen, but I gotta disagree with you on that one. The crux of the anti-gay movement does have to do with sex, but at its heart its one of gender expression and identity. Just as the trans community is persecuted for not acting the way that a man or a woman is supposed to act, so is the gay and lesbian community. Men are SUPPOSED to have sex with woman. When we don’t, we get denied basic rights and freedoms. We get yelled at on the street, or disciminated against at our jobs. Its the same issue. Without rigidly defined gender identies, there would be no sexual orientation. Leaving out the T in ENDA will only come back to bite us in the end.
I used to work for HRC. the 990′s are published on the site actually, you can download them from their homepage. I know, I posted them there.
I have a bitter taste from my employment, but you’re very off on many things about them. The pay is actually quite low for the majority of the staff there. The top exec’s are the ones who get paid ridiculous amounts of money. The average staff member gets paid between 30-40k a year. They work long hours and put alot of effort in.
Also the building was purchased using an external source of income, they raised the money specifically for the the building. The non-profit portion owns it, and the PAC rents space from it.
the building cost 17 million dollars, but they are renting out the top 3 floors to cover the mortgage.
dben – sorry, i need to agree with Zach on this one. How can you possibly defend the idea that sexual orientation has nothing to do with gender identity/expression. The most basic tenet of masculinity is that you want a female, and of femininity that you want a male. Sexual orientation and gender identity/expression are always intimately bound up in one another, impossible to separate except for the purpose of discussion. Men who have sex with men are perceived to be less masculine, despite the fact that they are doing what they might see as a masculine thing. Unfortunately all too often gender expression, like beauty, is in the eye of the beholder.
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