WHY is the LGBTQ+ still discriminated in the workplace?? This happened to me and it's unacceptable!

Help James Calloway fight workplace discrimination and reclaim his dignity.

I Debated Whether to Do This.

Honestly, I sat on this for a long time. I'm not someone who asks for help easily. I've spent my entire career being the person other people lean on — solving problems, building teams, making things work. Asking strangers on the internet to help fund my legal battle is about as far outside my comfort zone as it gets. But I kept coming back to the same thought: if I don't do something, nothing changes. Not for me. Not for the next person who goes through this. So here I am.

Who I Am. My name is James Calloway. I'm a technology professional with over 20 years of experience — I've served as a IT Professional, a cybersecurity expert, and a trusted advisor to organizations across the country and internationally. I've built security programs, led global teams, and spent the better part of my career helping businesses protect themselves and their people.

I'm also a gay man living in southern Alabama. And for most of my career, I kept those two things as far apart as I could. I learned early that certain places have unwritten rules, and if you want to survive professionally, you follow them — even when it costs you a piece of yourself every single day. I got tired of paying that cost.

What Happened to Me.

At my last job, I was discriminated against because of who I am. I want to be clear about that. This wasn't a misunderstanding. This wasn't a personality conflict. This was deliberate, sustained, and rooted in the fact that I am gay. It started subtly — the way it usually does. Comments that were just a little too pointed. Meetings I was excluded from that I should have been in. Equitable pay and pay increases denied. Reimbursement for my Master’s degree denied, even though others received that benefit. Credit for my work quietly redirected to others. Opportunities I was qualified for passed over without explanation. Comments made about my husband and the kids we shared were sometimes leud and cruel. For a long time, I told myself I was being oversensitive. I told myself it would get better. I told myself a lot of things to keep showing up and doing my job.

Friends and colleagues asked me why I stayed for 12 years and the answer was simple…..I had a family to raise and counted on my paycheck. It didn't get better. It escalated. And when I finally said something, the retaliation was swift and unmistakable.

I have spent more nights than I can count replaying those experiences, wondering if I handled things differently whether it would have gone another way. I've questioned myself in ways I never had before. I've had moments where the weight of it — the humiliation, the helplessness, the feeling that I was invisible and disposable — was almost too much to carry…I finally decided to resign.

I am sharing this because I think it matters for people to know that discrimination doesn't always look like a dramatic confrontation. Sometimes it's a slow, grinding erosion of your worth. And that kind of damage runs deep.

Why I'm Fighting Back!

In 2020, the Supreme Court ruled in Bostock v. Clayton County that Title VII of the Civil Rights Act protects employees from discrimination based on sexual orientation. Federal law is on my side. I have a case, I have documentation, and I have found legal counsel willing to pursue it. What I don't have is the money to see it through.

Employment litigation is expensive under the best circumstances. Pursuing it in the Deep South, against an employer with resources, is even more so. Attorney retainers, filing fees, depositions, discovery — the costs add up before a case even gets close to resolution. And the cruel irony of discrimination is that it often leaves you financially vulnerable at exactly the moment you need to be able to fight.

I am not looking for someone to fight this battle for me. I am more than capable of doing that myself. I just need to be able to afford the arena.

What Your Support Actually Means Every dollar raised goes directly toward legal costs — the retainer, filing fees, and litigation expenses. Nothing else. I am not in a financial crisis. I am in a justice deficit, and that is a very different thing.

But beyond the money, what your support means to me is something harder to quantify. After months of being made to feel like I didn't matter, like my work wasn't valued and my dignity wasn't worth protecting — knowing that people see this, believe me, and want to help is genuinely healing. It matters more than I expected it to.

If you've ever been treated as less than — because of who you love, how you look, where you come from, or who you are — you already know what I'm talking about. And if you haven't, I hope you never do. But I hope you'll still show up for those of us who have.

To Anyone Who Feels Alone in This.

If you're reading this and you've been through something similar — and you haven't said anything because you're afraid of what it will cost you — I want you to know something. You are not crazy. You are not oversensitive. What happened to you was real, and you deserved better.

I stayed quiet for a long time because I didn't think anyone would believe me. Or because I thought the professional fallout wasn't worth it. Or because I was just too exhausted to add one more fight to my life. I understand every one of those reasons. I lived them.

But silence doesn't protect you. It just protects them. And I'm done with that.

Thank You for Being Here!

Whether you contribute $5 or $500, whether you share this with one person or a hundred — it means something. You are part of the reason I believe this is worth doing.

I've given a lot of years to doing right by other people's organizations. I just want a fair shot at someone doing right by me.

Thank you. From the bottom of my heart — thank you.

With gratitude and hope,

James Calloway

Southern Alabama