About The Alliance for Full Acceptance
In Charleston, our rich storytelling tradition is rooted in a culture of secrets, half-truths, and people hidden in shadow. We live, work, and raise families in a city of opposing forces, where gracious hospitality exists alongside systematic exclusion; where breathtaking beauty meets punishing heat.
To be lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender in Charleston in 1998 was to be hidden, closeted, excluded, and denied. That is, until a group of committed lesbian and gay citizens united around a belief – that the success of our shared future lies not just in our ability to make sense of culture’s opposing forces, but to create a new narrative of a healthy, strong, and prosperous community – with equality and acceptance for all.
A community that understands when we marginalize, attack, discriminate against, or define any part of our people as “other” or “less than,” we weaken, degrade, and devalue the community as a whole.
Our mission is to achieve, nurture, and defend equality and full acceptance for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) people. To dispel the myths and half-truths that trap us all – about economy, race, and origin; who we can and can’t be; who we can and can’t love; who’s entitled to freedom and expression, and who’s not; who’s valuable, and who’s expendable – and reveal our true essence and pride.
That’s why we root out ignorance, hatred, and inequity wherever they live – in courtrooms, in fine print, in emergency rooms and classrooms, in boardrooms and living rooms, in systems, institutions, and language, in private and public spaces – and replace them with knowledge, empathy, and justice.
