This month an op-ed from former Denver Councilwoman Susan Casey caught my eye. Her leading question is an exceedingly pertinent one.

I wonder how easily progress can be forgotten, how complacent we all can quickly become.

—Haines Eason 

____________________

By Susan Casey

Then and now. 25 years ago, Denver’s neighborhoods were in turmoil. 

In the fall of 1990, after the Denver City Council passed an amendment to its human rights ordinance to add protection from discrimination based on sexual orientation, there was a collective sigh of relief in the LGBT community. Finally, discrimination against gays and lesbians would be illegal. But before the ink was dry, a group which Denver Post columnist Ken Hamlin referred to as “mental dinosaurs spewing bigotry and hate” worked to overturn the ordinance. Those battling for social justice began to hold their collective breaths.

It took another five years to beat back the local and statewide efforts of anti-gay forces in Colorado. I was at the end of my first year as a new member of the Denver City Council when the U.S. Supreme Court handed down its historic decision in Romer v. Evans. The court ruled any attempt to deprive homosexuals of the basic rights shared by all Americans is prohibited by the equal rights protections guaranteed in the U.S. Constitution.

Denver was different after Romer v. Evans. Better. However, few would have predicted that 20 years later not only would gays and lesbians enjoy protections from discrimination in housing and employment, but they would also be allowed to serve openly in the military, adopt children and even marry one another.

When it comes to equal justice and equality, it is easy to see the gains over the decades and to celebrate them. Long before gay rights activists gained legal protections and equal access to the basic rights of other Americans, the civil rights and women’s movements dramatically changed the lives of blacks and women, making things like voting rights, the right to live where you want, equal access to jobs and positions of power standard fare.

I have spent the last three years researching and writing a book about one woman’s journey through the glass ceiling and came to appreciate how far we have come in creating a more just and equal society. But then in the past year or so the lingering remnants of sexism, bigotry and intolerance burst into full bloom in Ferguson, in Orlando, in North Carolina, at Fox News and on the campaign trail.

Gender roles were bound to become a topic of conversation after a woman became the presidential nominee of a major party. But when the presidential nominee of the other party began regularly peppering his comments with misogynistic innuendos and a steady stream of hate-filled sexual, ethnic and racial references, I began to have again doubts about just where we are as a country when it comes to equality and justice

Have we come a long way, baby? Or have we just come full circle?

Colorado will play a key role in the outcome of this presidential election. And, many of us are holding our breaths once again to see what kind of state we are, and what kind of country we will be.

Susan B. Casey is the author of Appealing For Justice and a former Denver city councilwoman.