Stuart Milk :: Taking on Global GLBT Rights

It goes without saying that the Harvey Milk Foundation's founding asset is the ever-deepening reservoir of goodwill toward the legacy of its namesake, slain LGBT human rights leader and late San Francisco City and County Supervisor Harvey Milk. Building on that legacy with tireless efforts to improve the plights of lesbian, gay, bi and transgender people around the globe is Milk's nephew and Milk Foundation President, Stuart Milk.

Milk, the younger, is heir to his uncle's passion for equality, justice and human rights. He also inherited the elder Milk's legendary ability to take on the problem of homophobia with practical alliances and relatable outreach efforts. Milk's hands-on pragmatism is evidenced by the Harvey Milk Foundation's decidedly globally focused program, informally titled "Beyond Tolerance - Equality Around the Globe."

He just returned from France where there has been a large right-wing movement away from minority rights, including LGBT rights. According to the foundation, some of the largest anti-marriage equality demonstrations in the world have happened in France recently. In cooperation with the U.S. State Department, Milk brought together nearly two dozen French civil society and LGBT-rights organizations that had never previously collaborated with one another. The foundation indicated that the effort will prove to be a vital first step toward keeping the French progress on equality for LGBTs.

The ongoing campaign, now in its fifth year, has Stuart Milk meeting dignitaries to local community advocates in places as far apart as Dublin, Santiago, Hanoi, Vilnius and Istanbul."Both I and my cofounder, my uncle's campaign manager Anne Kronenberg, have believed in the need for global equality for over a decade now. Anne and I have traveled across the globe, often going where others won't in the understanding that history can repeat itself. We need not just a Western oasis of LGBT rights, but a global paradigm that sees equality for all as a prime ingredient for the success of humanity," Milk told The Rage Monthly in an exclusive interview.

At the time of this writing, Milk was in southeast Asia, where he is a guest of honor and headlining speaker at the third annual VietPride event. Stuart Milk, who is gay, serves as a human connection in a way that no one else on earth can to a storied past when his uncle became America's first openly gay publicly elected official. "Asia from the Euro-Asia corridor to the subcontinent is where more than two thirds of humanity resides," says Milk. "We must work with all doors that open up for us whether southeast Asia, Turkey, Nepal - all those nations that have created a crack. We need to support the local LGBT heroes and allies, on the ground, face to face, even in challenging circumstance and always with agreement and a culturally unique understanding and mind-set."

The genius of Milk's international effort is its focus on finding the nexus among complementary human rights causes and then pointing out common interests to potential allies."We must always outreach and link to women, ethnic and racial minorities, the disabled, immigrants and those whose religion or lack of, do not match the majority view," Milk says. "The enemies of equality like nothing better than division and non-communication among all those who look, love or believe differently then the majority."

Milk reached out to and has publicly lauded one of the African-American Civil Rights Movement's most celebrated elder statesmen, Rev. Jesse Jackson, for supporting LGBT equality early on. Jackson, who was a close confidant of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, a 1988 presidential contender and who has served presidents as an international hostage negotiator, was as Milk notes, the first top-echelon civil rights leader to acknowledge the struggle for LGBT equal- ity as being on par with the ongoing battle for racial equality in America. "Reverend Jackson, an incredible and tireless advocate for all people worldwide, talked with me about the misconception that there is an end date of the fight for minority justice and equality and he referenced one of our founding fathers, Thomas Jefferson who famously said, 'The price of justice is vigilance,' " said Milk. "The struggle does not end."

Stuart Milk's passport must be running out of pages. In 2014 alone, he will not only have traveled to Hong Kong, London, Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam, but also to Panama, Paraguay, Italy, Ireland, Hungary, Mo- rocco, Lithuania, Latvia and France, all for the cause of promoting LGBT rights and equality. Milk's global work on behalf of LGBT people and respect for human rights is frequently completed with cooperation and often the direct engagement of the foreign embassies operated by the United States Department of State. Milk also makes a very concerted effort to highlight the openly gay Foreign Service members resource group (GLIFAA). Always asking that these living examples of LGBT authenticity be included in any events and meetings he is involved in abroad.

Stuart Milk and other officials from the Harvey Milk Foundation frequently appear alongside top State Department and White House officials, including United Nations Ambassador Samantha Power and National Security Advisor Susan Rice at events ranging from this May's unveiling of the first U.S. postage stamp to honor an openly gay man (that of course, being Harvey Milk) to the first-ever White House Forum on LGBT Rights, which was held in June of last year's White House Champion of Change awards.

Milk laments the "deeply embedded" anti-LGBT legal system and societal structure in Africa, the Middle East and much of Asia - not to mention a recent Indian Supreme Court decision that recriminalized some members of the LGBT community. "In many ways this is the best of times, for both the progression of legally equality and the movement of societal equality in many parts of the West but certainly not everywhere," Milk told The Rage Monthly, noting that central and eastern Europe are especially troubled spots for LGBT people nowadays.

Stuart Milk will be in San Diego Thursday, August 14, to host what organizers promise will be a "very engaging and personal" talk at the San Diego LGBT Community Center about the global LGBT human rights movement. He will also be on hand Friday, August 15, to dedicate a community mural commemorating Hillcrest's diversity and history, in the newly-renovated Wells Fargo branch. Both events are part of the Milk Foundation's education campaign, launched in 2009 at the urging of the Foundation's Advisory board member, Nobel Peace Prize winner Desmond Tutu.

For more information or to find out how you can help bring positive change to LGBT people around the globe, visit facebook.com/Harvey.Milk.Foundation or milkfoundation.org.

To RSVP for the mural dedication contact Wendy Hernandez at 619.688.2805 or email [email protected]