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I once watched my dad stand up in front of his Baptist church council and make the case for a gay kid to sing in the choir. He didn’t have the perfect language or a polished argument. He simply believed church should be a place where everyone belonged. He chose love over judgment.
That moment shaped me. It taught me something I’ve carried ever since: Real progress happens when we choose to see people as neighbors, not opponents. Especially when we disagree.
I grew up in working-class, small-town Iowa — where faith and kindness ran deep and people showed up for each other even when they didn’t see eye to eye. My dad worked at a local window manufacturer every day for nearly 40 years, and my mom was the school lunch lady to earn some extra money (and keep an eye on me!). My parents — through sheer grit and determination — put me through college, making me the first in our family to earn a degree. Hard work, humility, and decency are still my foundation today.
Those values mattered even more when I came out — at a conservative Christian college, no less. Like many LGBTQ people, I learned quickly how to navigate hard conversations and developed some guiding principles. Meet people where they are — don’t berate them for responding the “wrong way.” See the best in them. Treat them as neighbors, not opponents.
I managed to find common ground, even in the most unexpected places. My college roommate — the captain of the football team! — become my biggest cheerleader. A campus community that didn’t fully understand my identity still found ways to embrace me.
That approach wasn’t easy — but it was transformative. For two decades in LGBTQ advocacy, I’ve returned again and again to those principles and forged relationships and built bridges with some of the unlikeliest allies: Christian college leaders, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the Salvation Army, union workers, business leaders.
For a long time, those principles worked. In 2022, Democratic U.S. Sen. Tammy Baldwin of Wisconsin found common ground with Republican colleagues Mitt Romney of Utah and Joni Ernst of Iowa to pass the Respect for Marriage Act — proving that so-called opponents can become allies. In Utah, advocates worked with Mormon leaders and Republican Gov. Spencer Cox to ban conversion therapy.
But lately, this approach is becoming rare — not just in the LGBTQ movement but across the progressive landscape. And it leaves me wondering: When did we stop seeing neighbors and start seeing enemies? What if we had more open hands and fewer closed fists? How can we make room at the table for those we disagree with?
I am not suggesting we accept the unacceptable. We should hold true to our values and draw red lines when needed. We should not tolerate violence or acts of hatred. Not everyone has the privilege of seeing the “best in people” when trying to protect their own physical safety and their families. For me, the red line is cruelty for cruelty’s sake — attacks on defenseless kids or the most vulnerable.
We make multimillion-dollar funding decisions over Zoom, influencing the fate of places without ever setting foot there.
Unfortunately, too often today we’re unwilling to make room at the table. We use language that’s completely inaccessible to many in the public — “microaggressions,” “power shifting,” “asset mapping,” “intersectionality.” We need to use words that you’re more likely to hear in your local Walmart or community meeting than in my liberal arts gender studies class or philanthropy roundtables.
We turn to academic theories to solve real-world problems — without thinking to engage the people affected. We make multimillion-dollar funding decisions over Zoom from San Francisco, New York, and Washington, D.C., influencing the fate of places like my hometown in middle America without ever setting foot there. And we dismiss consensus as compromise and disengage from anyone who doesn’t perfectly mirror our values.
That’s all easy to do from the insulation of privilege — from blue cities, think tanks, philanthropic boardrooms, and exclusive gatherings. But most Americans don’t have that luxury — especially those people we’re attempting to serve. Many people without a seat at the table coexist every day with those who see the world differently — and they make it work!
Meanwhile, our institutions — dominated by the wealthy and highly educated — have become rigid in tone, exclusive in culture, and ineffective in tactics. It’s not working!
But I still have hope.
I see a different, emerging philosophy from philanthropic leaders trying to solve problems. I see it in visionary donors like Tim Gill and Scott Miller who see the world as “friends and future friends” — and who are willing to work across lines of difference. I see it in philanthropic leaders like Freedom Together Foundation president Deepak Bhargava, who reminds us that “the impulse to bridge and welcome, rather than shun and exclude, is essential to preserving democracy.” And I see it in the embrace of difference from Melinda French Gates, who believes we must include everyone, “even those who want to exclude us. It’s the only way to build the world we want to live in.”
I see it in efforts across the spectrum — from progressive organizers to center-right problem-solvers — who are tired of the stalemates and ready to move. Because at the end of the day, this work isn’t about purity or partisanship. It’s about making progress for real people.
For those in philanthropy, embracing this mindset could reshape how change is made. It might look like funding narrative change that speaks in plain language and lifts up “journey stories” that show how people can change and grow in their views.
It could mean forging grant-making strategies that build new, unexpected alliances or investing in donor relationships across lines of ideological difference. In the end, a zero-sum approach in philanthropy won’t create the change we seek: We need to expand the tent to achieve the solutions our communities desperately need.
And what if we used this mindset on some of the big issues facing our country — climate, democracy, affordable housing, and child care? What if we led with humility instead of hostility to solve these challenges?
And after a decade leading a foundation committed to advancing LGBTQ rights, here’s my deepest hope: that more of our movements — and more of our philanthropies — will return to what organizing has always known at its core: See people as neighbors, not opponents. That’s how real change happens.
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