COLAGE Mourns the Passing of Bonnie Tinker

While celebrating a lifetime of her activism and passion, COLAGE mourns the recent death of Bonnie Tinker a leader in our movement and lesbian mother (and grandmother). Tinker was killed Thursday in Virginia when she was struck by a truck while riding her bicycle.
“In so many ways, Bonnie Tinker was a pioneer of LGBT family activism. She will be missed although her legacy will live on,” shared Beth Teper, COLAGE Executive Director.
Through her life, Bonnie was a fierce and fabulous activist. She was a leader in the anti-war group Seriously P.O.’d Grannies and the founder/director of Love Makes a Family, an affiliate of COLAGE based in Portland, OR. Love Makes A Family works to create a supportive environment within our communities and to provide a public voice for all families, especially those subjected to social, economic and legal discrimination due to sexual orientation or gender identity/expression. COLAGE had the pleasure of collaborating with Bonnie in LGBT family equality work over the years and with her family on a groundbreaking Barbara Walters 20/20 special on youth with LGBT parents in 2001. Following the airing of the program, Bonnie led efforts to reprimand ABC and Barbara Walters who simplified the story of her family by omitting interviews with her children of color thereby bringing awareness to the complexities of sexuality and racial justice that often intersect in our families.
Tinker led efforts that included banning military recruiters from Portland schools and representing LGBT as well as transracial families. She got her start as a teenager, during one of the most significant high school lawsuits ever. Tinker had graduated from high school when two of her siblings were suspended for wearing black arm bands to school to protest the Vietnam war. In Tinker v. Des Moines, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the right of students to wear black arm bands and make other free-speech displays in public schools.
Tinker is survived by her partner Graham, along with their three children, Alex, Josh and Connie. Our condolences go out to the family and friends of Bonnie and we thank her for tireless activism, radical passion, and being a leader of the movement.