{"id":43337,"date":"2025-08-19T14:23:02","date_gmt":"2025-08-19T21:23:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/?p=43337"},"modified":"2025-08-19T14:25:38","modified_gmt":"2025-08-19T21:25:38","slug":"park-ranger-fired-after-helping-drape-a-transgender-pride-flag-on-yosemites-el-capitan","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/2025\/08\/19\/park-ranger-fired-after-helping-drape-a-transgender-pride-flag-on-yosemites-el-capitan\/","title":{"rendered":"Park ranger fired after helping drape a transgender pride flag on Yosemite’s El Capitan"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The ex-ranger said they plan to fight the decision, citing an executive order issued by President Trump that protects Americans\u2019 free speech rights.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"SJ<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

SJ Joslin on the face of Yosemite’s El Capitan near a massive transgender flag in May. Miya Tsudome<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Aug. 18, 2025, 2:35 PM PDT \/ Updated Aug. 18, 2025, 3:30 PM PDT (NBCNews.com)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

By Jo Yurcaba<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Yosemite National Park fired a park ranger last week for hanging a transgender pride flag on the park\u2019s iconic<\/a> El Capitan rock formation in May.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Shannon \u201cSJ\u201d Joslin, who has been a ranger and a wildlife biologist in the park since 2021, said they were fired Aug. 12 from what they described as their dream job. They said park leadership told them they \u201cfailed to demonstrate acceptable conduct\u201d in their role by participating in the trans flag display.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI\u2019m devastated,\u201d said Joslin, who is trans <\/strong>and uses they\/them pronouns. \u201cWe don\u2019t take our positions in the park service to make money or to have any kind of huge career gains. We take it because we love the places that we work. I have a Ph.D. in bioinformatics, and I could be making a lot more money in Silicon Valley, which is only a few hours away, but I made career choices to position myself in Yosemite National Park, because this is the place that I love the most.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Yosemite
SJ Joslin was a park ranger and wildlife biologist for Yosemite who studied bats.Courtesy SJ Joslin<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

When asked for comment on Joslin\u2019s termination, a spokesperson for Yosemite National Park said the National Park Service, which oversees Yosemite, \u201cis pursuing administrative action against multiple National Park Service employees for failing to follow National Park Service regulations.\u201d The spokesperson declined to say which regulations the employees allegedly violated.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Rachel Pawlitz, a spokesperson for the NPS, said the agency and the Justice Department \u201care pursuing administrative action against several Yosemite National Park employees and possible criminal charges against several park visitors who are alleged to have violated federal laws and regulations related to demonstrations.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Pawlitz added, \u201cWe do not comment on the specifics of personnel actions or criminal investigations. However, we want to emphasize that we take the protection of the park\u2019s resources and the experience of our visitors very seriously, and will not tolerate violations of laws and regulations that impact those resources and experiences.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Most demonstrations require a permit, Pawlitz said, and as a result, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of California \u201cis evaluating possible criminal charges based on a National Park Service investigation.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Joslin, who is 35 and had been going to the park for more than a decade prior to working there, <\/strong>has written Yosemite climbing guidebooks and volunteered to work overtime to help issue hiking permits and manage traffic in the park. As a wildlife biologist, they managed the park\u2019s \u201cbig wall bats\u201d program<\/a>, to study how bats use cliffs and protect them from a deadly disease called white-nose syndrome.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Joslin said they came up with the idea to hang the trans pride flag on El Capitan in the spring after President Donald Trump issued a variety of executive orders targeting trans people, including orders to change the federal definition of sex to exclude trans identities, restrict access to trans health care and prohibit trans women from competing in female sports.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"A
A transgender flag hangs on the face of Yosemite National Park’s iconic El Capitan rock\ufeff formation in May.Jayce Kolinski<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Joslin said the flag display, which they organized with other LGBTQ climbers and advocates and participated in outside of work hours, was intended to celebrate trans people and show that everyone is welcome in the nation\u2019s parks. The flag was up on El Capitan for about two hours when park officials told the climbers to remove it, though the climbers said at the time that they were not told that they had broken any park rules.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

About a week after the display, Joslin said, park leadership told them they were the subject of a criminal investigation into the hanging of the flag. After that investigation, Acting Deputy Superintendent Danika Globokar fired Joslin due to their participation in what leadership described as the \u201cflag demonstration,\u201d Joslin said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Joslin said they asked for evidence proving that the flag display was a demonstration but said leadership did not provide any.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

They also cited the long history of a variety of flags being flown on the rock\u2019s face, including by park employees. For example, park employees flew an upside-down U.S. flag during Yosemite\u2019s firefall event<\/a> in February to protest the Trump administration\u2019s cuts of National Park Service employees. A group of activists also raised a \u201cStop the genocide\u201d flag on El Capitan<\/a> in support of Palestinians in Gaza in June 2024.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"SJ
SJ Joslin with a Townsend’s big-eared bat.Courtesy SJ Joslin<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

There was no policy prohibiting the display of flags on El Capitan until the day after Joslin and their team hung the trans flag, when the NPS issued a new rule banning the hanging of large flags in wilderness areas. Yosemite leadership updated the 2024 Superintendent\u2019s Compendium to include the update<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cHanging flags has been a tradition that climbers have done on El Cap for decades, and that\u2019s both individuals who are visiting the park, but also employees that are on their off time,\u201d Joslin said. \u201cThere\u2019s never been any kind of ramifications to any of those flag hanging activities. I\u2019m the only one who\u2019s been fired for it.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Joslin said two other NPS employees \u2014 one who works in Yosemite and another who works in a different park \u2014 are under investigation for helping to display the trans flag.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

0 seconds of 41 secondsVolume 90%<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"\/<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

<\/a><\/a><\/a>Yosemite climbers display transgender pride flag on iconic El Capitan<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

00:41<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Joslin said being fired from a federal position will hurt their ability to work for the government, or any other park, in the future. They plan to seek legal counsel to try to contest the decision, citing an executive order Trump issued on the first day of his presidency to protect free speech and end federal censorship<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI\u2019m going to fight this tooth and nail,\u201d Joslin said. \u201cI think that everyone as Americans should be upset about this, and it doesn\u2019t matter who I am or what my identity is, this is a matter of free speech.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"\/<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

<\/a>Jo Yurcaba<\/a><\/a><\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Jo Yurcaba is a reporter for NBC Out.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The ex-ranger said they plan to fight the decision, citing an executive order issued by President Trump that protects Americans\u2019 free speech rights. SJ Joslin on the face of Yosemite’s El Capitan near a massive transgender flag in May. Miya Tsudome Aug. 18, 2025, 2:35 PM PDT \/ Updated Aug. 18, 2025, 3:30 PM… Continue reading → <\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43337"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=43337"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43337\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":43339,"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43337\/revisions\/43339"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=43337"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=43337"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=43337"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}