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| A Colorado appeals court just ruled that this will not be a legal reality in the state. |
The religious right's attempt to exploit the concept of 'religious liberty' as a tool to strike LGBTQ non-discrimination laws failed on Tuesday afternoon.
According to The Associated Press:
A U.S. appeals court has ruled against a web designer who didn’t want to create wedding websites for same-sex couples and sued to challenge Colorado’s anti-discrimination law, another twist in a series of court rulings nationwide about whether businesses denying services to LGBTQ people amounts to bias or freedom of speech. A three-judge panel of the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Denver on Monday denied Lorie Smith's attempt to overturn a lower court ruling throwing out her legal challenge.. . . In the 2-1 ruling, the panel said Colorado had a compelling interest in protecting the “dignity interests” of members of marginalized groups through its law. The anti-discrimination law is the same one at issue in the case of Colorado baker Jack Phillips that was decided in 2018 by the U.S. Supreme Court. The high court decided the Colorado Civil Rights Commission had acted with anti-religious bias against Phillips after he refused to bake a cake for two men who were getting married. But it did not rule on the larger issue of whether a business can invoke religious objections to refuse service to LGBTQ people.
“This really isn’t about cake or websites or flowers. It’s about protecting LGBTQ people and their families from being subjected to slammed doors, service refusals and public humiliation in countless places — from fertility clinics to funeral homes and everywhere in between.”
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| Anti-LGBTQ activist Anita Bryant's gay granddaughter doesn't know if she wants to invite her to her wedding. |
If there's one thing the religious right thrives upon, it's incidents which they can exploit and manipulate against the LGBTQ community. Religious right groups love to canonize 'ordinary American citizens' as victims of a so-called gay agenda which threatens to wreck their lives. That's pretty much what their "religious liberty" argument was all about. Now it would seem that they may have found two individuals to aid in their recent attacks against transgender youth.
From Oregon Public Broadcasting:
Two educators in Grants Pass were terminated by the school board Thursday. The board found North Middle School Assistant Principal Rachel Damiano and science teacher Katie Medart used district time and resources to promote their campaign to challenge school policies on gender identity. Both Medart and Damiano are outspoken opponents of policies meant to accommodate transgender students in Oregon schools. Last spring, they launched an online campaign called I Resolve. I Resolve calls for a rollback of those policies. For instance, they say teachers should not be required to call students by their preferred pronouns or name. They also want to change signs on restrooms and locker rooms to say “anatomical male” and “anatomical female.”
Medart, in particular, was accused of creating a disruption in the school district. In a video posted online, she talks about a student who had come to her with gender identity questions. Although she doesn’t mention the student by name, many in the district recognized who she was talking about.
The article is simply amazing due to the honesty and brevity of the parents. They speak from the heart and you will learn more from reading this than any foul anti-trans book or talking points spewed from the mouths of right-wing phony experts.
Here is just an excerpt and after reading it, you will want to read more:
Anger has played a role in all four parents' efforts to speak out against transphobia. Stephen Chukumba of New Jersey told CNN he'd never considered what it meant to be trans until his son, one of his four children, came out as trans. He quickly caught up on the proper vocabulary and history and learned the myriad ways in which trans Americans have been excluded from society. "I found myself really incensed by it," he said of transphobia. "I just can't sit idly by."Amber Briggle would agree. It was rage that spurred the owner of a massage business to alert local media in 2016 to a Facebook post by a candidate for sheriff in Denton County, Texas, in which he endorsed physical violence against transgender people. The same year, she invited the state attorney general who criticized trans-inclusive policies to her house for dinner with her husband, daughter, and her son, Max, who is trans. She may not have changed the attorney general's mind that night, she said, but her dinner did get the attention of the Human Rights Campaign, with whom she helped create the Parents for Transgender Equality National Council. She did a TEDx Talk, too, about supporting her son's transition and started a blog about what it meant to be his mother in a state with hostile policies toward trans people.. . . All four parents unequivocally support their children, though some said they could have been better allies in the beginning of their sons' transition. "I would say I failed at first, although my kid laughs when I say that," Trujillo said.From the time her son was 2, he showed her in different ways that he was a boy, Trujillo said. He'd draw himself as a boy and leave LEGO figures of boys around the house to hint at the way he saw himself, he told her. When she finally overheard Danny's friends use "him" in reference to her son, "all the puzzle pieces fell into place," she said.Danny was 8 when he socially transitioned, and Trujillo immediately affirmed him. Before he formally came out, she said she didn't see him as trans because she worried that she'd say the wrong thing or damage Danny in some way. But once he transitioned, she realized he knew himself better than she did. Briggle said she'd do "a million things differently" now than she did when her son came out. For one thing, she said, he'd been "expressing that he was a boy" since he was 2-and-a-half, but she didn't understand what he was trying to tell her.
After reading the article, I made one sad realization. Transgender issues are similar to the problems we are facing when it comes to misinformation about the COVID vaccine. Too many people are being manipulated to draw their own inaccurate conclusions by others with ulterior motives. They aren't being empowered to educate themselves. They are being empowered to think they know more than the medical experts and others invested in these issues. Sometimes people need to realize their limitations, shut their mouths, and listen to those who know what they are talking about. That would do a world of good.
Photo does not include children in CNN article. It was taken from the Human Right Campaign's Transgender Children & Youth: Understanding the Basics
Here’s all the actions taken so far by the Biden-Harris administration to advance equality - Thus far but no harm in wanting more.
‘Nobody should be denied.’ Blue Cross NC expands coverage for transgender people - Kudos to Blue Cross NC.
Senate confirms lesbian, trans nominees to high-profile defense roles - Awesome!
Half of states now restrict conversion therapy for LGBTQ kids - Not bad. Let's work on the other half.
