Voters in Houston soundly defeated the proposed Houston Equal Rights Ordinance (HERO), which would have broadly expanded LGBT (and other) anti-discrimination protections, with 39 percent voting “yes” and 61 percent saying “no.”
The measure would have prohibited bias in housing, employment, city contracting and business services for 15 protected classes, including race, age, sexual orientation and gender identity. But, as the Texas Tribune reports, opponents successfully framed the measure as a “bathroom ordinance,” since it presumably would have allowed transgender individuals who have not undergone gender reassignment surgery to use the public restrooms that they felt were appropriate to their gender identity, which transgender people often point to as a challenge. That opened the door for this:
Outside of polling places, signs read “NO Men in Women’s Bathrooms.” And television ads bankrolled by opponents depicted a young girl being followed into a bathroom stall by a mysterious older man.
The challenges faced by transgender people are great, and restroom accommodation is among them. Since people don’t typically walk around public restrooms naked (and they do have stalls, after all), the opposition seems on the hysterical side, but it was obviously effective.
On the other hand, there are cases involving locker rooms where people do get naked, which raise more difficult issues. This week, for instance, the U.S. Department of Education found that a Chicago suburban high school district discriminated against a transgender student who has not undergone gender reassignment surgery, and gave the school a month to provide her with full access to girls’ locker rooms or lose federal funding.
The school district had “provided the student with a separate changing facility outside the locker room and installed privacy curtains on stalls in one locker room out of the three that she uses for physical education, swimming and athletics programs, according to the federal government’s findings.” No matter; the ACLU and transgender activists considered that accommodation separate and unequal (because the race analogy applies to everything) and sued.
This is not an isolated case; other transgender suits have involved swimming pool locker rooms and saunas. But the focus here on mixed-anatomy nudity among public school minors seems particularly incendiary.
When gender identity and physical anatomy conflict, pushing the fight to nudity in locker rooms—including in high schools—is the kind of tactic that provokes a broader backlash under which reasonable demands get lumped and fought.
Might it be, in fact, a reasonable compromise for those who are transgender but have not made a full transition to use gender-neutral single facilities for changing and showering?
More. The Washington Post on Why Houston’s gay rights ordinance failed:
But as much as HERO’s proponents decried the vote, the proposition was rejected by a decisive majority of the citizens of the nation’s fourth-largest city. Turnout was strong among white conservatives and African Americans — demographics likely to oppose the measure….
Many in the protected classes under the ordinance, including race and age, are already covered by federal anti-discrimination laws. LGB&Ts are not.
This helped opponents characterize the bill as if it were just about transgender bathroom use. And that, I believe, was itself an encapsulation of pent-up reaction to a range of LGBT advances, from the legal recognition of same-sex marriage to the perceived persecution of conservative Christian small business owners who don’t want to provide services to same-sex weddings.
Furethermore. I usually agree with columnist Steve Chapman, but he comes down on the other side of the locker room controversy, writing:
What does that leave? Either treating Student A as a girl for all purposes, as the government insists, or for all purposes but one, as the school district has chosen….
If the district is serious about privacy, it can offer more spaces that cater to the needs of modesty. It might also post signs stating a locker room rule that most kids already know: Keep your eyes to yourself.
Maybe that works in some places (Chapman cites, approvingly, a local newspaper’s survey of students at two suburban Chicago high schools), but there are times when penises in the girls’ locker room (or womens’ locker rooms, regarding public pools and saunas) is going to be a legitimate issue, and not just among “bigots.”
And certainly a political issue. Via the conservative Weekly Standard:
There is a lesson in this, especially for Republicans. The left is in the process of overreaching on an issue that the average voter cares about, deeply. People might be able to rationalize supporting same-sex marriage by telling themselves that, even if it’s not their thing, it makes no difference to them what gay couples do. But if you’re a woman using the locker room at the gym, it might matter quite a lot if a man who says he’s a woman on the inside is using the shower next to you. …
We have reached a bizarre moment in our politics, where the “progressive” left resists having conservative speakers on a college campus because they make students feel “unsafe,” but insists that boys who identify as girls be allowed to shower with girls in the public schools, and misgivings must be educated away, or litigated into submission.
And from The Federalist:
When liberal Houston — a city with a three-term lesbian mayor — overwhelming rejected an anti-discrimination ordinance for the transgendered (among others), a hysterical New York Times editorial accused voters of being transphobic hate mongers with blood on their hands.
Boycott Houston!
48 Comments for “Backlash in Houston”
posted by Tom Jefferson III on
I might be more willing to buy the Stephen’s narrative, if the folks that campaigned against the measure actually had some viable alternatives, beyond the hysterics and burying their heads in the sand.
Correct me if I am wrong — I do not live in Houston — but the organized opponents of the bill were not expressing support for a reasonable civil rights bill. They were not willing to sit down and try to deal with the gender identity, like mature adults.
posted by Houndentenor on
No they were not and even had we been willing to delete trans people from the law, the same people would have objected to it. They would have used different scare tactics, but the lines drawn would have been the same.
posted by Tom Jefferson III on
In addition, I am not 100% up to date on the process involved, but I believe that a person seeking gender reassignment surgery has to jump through several hoops with various medical professionals.
One of the general rules is that the person has to be able to live (convincingly and for a set period of time) as the gender that he or she plans to become (post surgery).
If a man — seeking to become a woman — uses the men’s room does this violate this particular rule? Also will they be safe? By that I mean, what is going to happen when a man, wearing makeup and a dress, attempts to use the men’s room?
posted by Mike in Houston on
In the tradition of grand tradition of Joseph Goebbels, “If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it.”
That was what happened in Houston.
The anti-HERO side (and that included all the usual national players — and many homocons on Breitbart) went for the Houston ordinance to send a message to the LGBT community: “you may have won at the Supreme Court on marriage, but it’s not over”. They absolutely HAD to win in Houston or they would not be able to continue to raise $$$ to fund their hate. And hate is what it was and is.
The anti-HERO forces solidified around a single lie: no men in women’s bathrooms. There was no nuanced discussion about transgender issues. Trans people were smeared as cover for perverts and worse. It was slash & burn — and the trans community got the full brunt… with everyone else taken out as well…
But lest there be any illusions that the other side would have been fine if only we had taken gender identity out of the ordinance… they are already solidifying around their next message: (you guessed it) persecution of Christian bakers, photographers & florists. At the post-election celebration by the NO coalition, their speakers made it very clear that a re-written law that included sexual orientation (even with broad carve outs for Christian religious liberty) was an unacceptable affirmation of our perverted lifestyle.
And all the black pastors that stood shoulder-to-shoulder with the anti-HERO folks will now have to reconcile that their congregants can still be discriminated against with impunity (federal lawsuits are expensive)… and that their allies in the fight against the LGBT perverts also call the “black lives matter” movement terrorism.
The trans community was already in fear because of the epidemic of murders this year… that fear is now compounded and amplified.
Stephen may say “the opposition seems on the hysterical side” but that kind of downplaying is what I’ve come to expect from someone that lives in a safe, blue zone with full legal protections.
posted by Tom Scharbach on
Thanks for reporting, Mike. You must be exhausted after the last couple weeks.
The opposition brought together the full force of the conservative movement in Texas — Texas Values, conservative Christian pastors and churches, national anti-gay organization like the Family Research Council, the conservative media and blogoshere, and the Texas Republican Party from top to bottom.
Early on, I was amazed at the level of outside involvement the repeal effort was attracting, but as the fight went forward, I came to realize that the Houston fight was an absolute must-win for the Republican Party if it is to retain any credibility at all with conservative Christians. So Governor Abbott and the rest of the establishment did what was needed.
It will be interesting to watch Stephen and the other homocons spin the issue to put the blame on you and the others who fought for HERO, and exonerate the Republican Party. Not fun, but interesting.
posted by Jorge on
I’m inclined to agree with Mr. Miller. However, I believe that the stories about bakers and wedding photographers and marriage clerks played a role as well.
I might be more willing to buy the Stephen’s narrative, if the folks that campaigned against the measure actually had some viable alternatives, beyond the hysterics and burying their heads in the sand.
To be blunt, I believe the results of that referendum suggests that the burden of proof is on the LGBT community to educate people as to why burying our heads in the sand is not a viable alternative. Is there something wrong with the simple proposition that men should use men’s facilities and women should use women’s facilities? It is untenable for only GLBT people and progressive allies to understand that there is. Thus, the Houston campaign drew an ad campaign that showed it actually appears quite discordant when transgender people are in bathrooms that correspond to their sex. Well, that was an important national development. Just as the gay community has encountered, visibility is important to create the conditions in which people can dispel bad assumptions.
…If a man — seeking to become a woman — uses the men’s room does this violate this particular rule? Also will they be safe? By that I mean, what is going to happen when a man, wearing makeup and a dress, attempts to use the men’s room?
What you are asking is part sociological, part psychological. I’m quite sure the medical considerations you cite are psychological. Does genitalia make a difference in one’s ability to cope with discrimination?
The trans community was already in fear because of the epidemic of murders this year… that fear is now compounded and amplified.
Which side feels their backs to the wall changes by a razor’s edge…
posted by Jorge on
““It is illegal today to go into a place of public accommodation for the intent of committing a crime,” she said. “It was illegal before, it’s going to be illegal after.””
Well, Houston’s mayor makes her argument better than the last attempt I’ve seen: disorderly conduct, plain and simple. Did I mention this already? The last online opinion piece that tried to rebut the bathroom argument with a law pointed to a law prohibiting entering a bathroom designated for the opposite sex for the purpose of creating a disturbance. But, um, duh, that specific of law only applies to transgender people, and would have to be struck down as discriminatory under the HERO.
Turnout was strong among white conservatives and African Americans — demographics likely to oppose the measure….
Call me biased, but I think white conservative and African American voters are more likely to be persuadable on the need to create practical solutions for innocent people in delicate situations than the general population. You may not like what they’ll come up with, but they will act on a need.
posted by Houndentenor on
It would be true that a reasonable compromise could be made IF the religious right had any intention of any compromise at all. You have to know that they have no such intention. The “men in girl’s locker rooms” tactic was a talking point, not an actual campaign issue. Those funding the opposition to HERO would not have supported the bill even had we thrown out any mention of trans people. To pretend that this is about two sides that just need to sit down and work out a compromise is absurd. Also, there is no known case in any of the cities with similar ordinances of cisgendered men dressing as women to get into women’s restrooms or locker rooms. There are however many cases each year of trans people being attacked and even murdered. One group needs protection and in Houston at least they are not getting it. Their blood is on the hands of every person who voted against HERO.
posted by Tom Scharbach on
Call me biased, but I think white conservative and African American voters are more likely to be persuadable on the need to create practical solutions for innocent people in delicate situations than the general population. You may not like what they’ll come up with, but they will act on a need.
At some point, Jorge, reality — in the form of experience — counts.
I don’t join the panic over “bakers, florists and photographers” because I know that the number of business owners harmed by including gays and lesbians in public accommodations laws is so small as to be almost non-existent. The reason I know this? It is because Wisconsin has included “sexual orientation” in its public accommodations laws since 1982, when a Republican governor signed the bill including “sexual orientation” as a protected class, and in the ensuing 34 years no problems have developed. Business owners elected, in all but a very few cases, to act like business owners, and obey the law.
Similarly, I don’t believe the “No men in women’s bathrooms!” nonsense because every major city in Wisconsin has enacted ordinances including transgender people in local non-discrimination laws in recent years, and we’ve had no issues. Transgender people are few in number, and like gay men in locker rooms, know how to behave themselves, and do.
I understand this Wisconsin’s experience may not translate well into “Christian America”, in which a large majority of the population consists of biblical illiterates, living in states with the highest rates of social disorder — divorce, domestic violence, violent crime, poverty, dropout rates and so on, with the attendant levels of fear and irrationality.
But even in Texas (with which I have some experience because I have many in-laws in the state), a swaggering cesspool of self-delusion in which every bellowing yahoo with a hat and forty acres thinks of himself as a rancher, it would not seem likely that including transgender people in local non-discrimination ordinances is likely to lead to widespread rape in public restrooms.
Wake up and smell the coffee.
The staunch Republican opposition to HERO was an answer to a political problem with the Republican base in Texas, not a practical problem. The fact that African-American voters bought into the nonsense because Jesus, neatly eliminating local protections for themselves in the process, is frosting on the Republican cake.
Christian America can’t stand you and me, Jorge, and Republicans are going to, once again, go full tilt boogie to exploit the feat and loathing that is preached in the churches in the name of Jesus.
We saw that in several elections on Tuesday, most notably in Kentucky, where Matt Bevin pulled out all the stops to exploit the controversy over Kim Davis, Christian Martyr, in the final weeks of the campaign. He did everything but sleep with her husband, Hew Haw, to get the conservative Christian vote out in force.
You may not feel the brunt of the Republican strategy in your New York safe haven now, any more than you did in past years (New York never even passed an anti-marriage amendment and has strong non-discrimination laws protecting you on several fronts, including your sexual orientation), but the strategy is evident to gays and lesbian living outside the protected blue state cocoon.
posted by Jorge on
At some point, Jorge, reality — in the form of experience — counts.
Why, thank you.
The fact that African-American voters bought into the nonsense because Jesus,
I think it would be more accurate to say African Americans bought into it because “Jesus, Mary, Joseph, look at this nonsense!”, even though most African Americans are not Catholic. I stand by my statement that it is not tenable for for only GLBT people and progressive allies to understand the need for transgender protections. Or protections for gays, for that matter.
Christian America can’t stand you and me, Jorge,
Bullshit. Out of Rick Santorum, Michelle Bachman, and Mike Huckabee, one’s an advocate, one puts tolerance ahead of faith, the other I’ve said enough about just by naming him.
The people who cannot stand you are conservative Republicans of the Tea Party style–faith has less to do with it than politics. The people who cannot stand me are diversity progressives of the MoveOn.org bent.
posted by Tom Scharbach on
Bullshit. Out of Rick Santorum, Michelle Bachman, and Mike Huckabee, one’s an advocate, one puts tolerance ahead of faith, the other I’ve said enough about just by naming him.
You want to explain this a bit? All three are staunch opponents of marriage equality, all three argue that there is no constitutional right to marriage (let alone marriage equality), all three oppose non-discrimination laws covering gays and lesbians, all three oppose any legal recognition of gay/lesbian relationships, all three oppose gay/lesbian adoption, and so on.
Other than the fact that Rick Santorum is a priggish Catholic, Michele Bachmann is a nutcase married to a closet case, and Mike Huckabee is a good ol’ boy, I don’t see a dimes worth of difference between them. Not on the issues, anyway.
posted by Kosh III on
None of the other R candidates, even those like Jeb! who have openly gay staffers, will lift a finger to support our right to life liberty and the pursuit of happiness.
Just like Hillary, they will throw us under the bus at the least hint that THEIR privileges are endangered.
posted by Jorge on
You want to explain this a bit?
Not really. I’ve already explained my thoughts on them many times. I’m sure that after another three months or so I will have done yet another raving on each of them. I’ll give you two relevant comments. 1. Santorum said of the former Bruce Jenner, after his last interview as Bruce, if he says he’s a woman, he’s a woman, his (Santorum’s) responsibiilty is to love and accept people, not to criticize people for who they are. 2. I think it takes a special degree of meanspiritedness to puff up and link hands with Kim Davis without so much as offering gay couples a glass of water.
So what has been New York’s experience since the inclusion of gender identity in non-discrimination laws? Any significant problems? Anything Houstonians could learn from the experience? Or anyone else in America, for that matter? Or is New York just so different from the rest of America that no lessons can be learned?
First things first: Any significant problems? YES! Gay and transgender people get murdered, and law enforcement is only very good at taking hate crimes seriously, not uniformly acceptable.
To clarify: only NYC has gender identity/expression as a protected class. The state has recent experience with a school bullying law written in the form of anti-discrimination on behalf of protected groups including gender identity, but gender identity is not a protected employment class in state law.
I can speak most about what anti-discrimination laws mean as a city employee. This will lead to anti-discrimination trainings. I think the agencies will have implementation plans so as to ensure that government agencies and employees are complying with the law; about half the time the trainings cover engaging the public; employment discrimination and discrimination in public services are two different required trainings. It’s a certain element of bureaucracy. It’s also a certain element of very keen language and definitions. There *is* resistance and disagreement, usually either underground or during the trainings themselves because these are taboo subjects and nobody wants to get reported for a violation of anti-discrimination policy. I’m very big on the right to political dissent or to have your own values. I think the government gets the distinction between personal values and objectivity in public service exactly right, when they’re presenting. When people ask questions, that’s when non-government (i.e., civil rights advocates) sometimes say things that are BZZZZT! WRONG! The material can be presented honestly in a way that’s faithful to why these laws were passed. It takes years before you can say a supermajority of people get it. It’s not too difficult in fields which place values on positive traits like compassion, service, excellence, and fairness. Then what you see is people trying to do the right thing but breaking the letter of the law or policy.
I have seen a smaller effect on the public whom I and my subordinates deal with, most of whom are either family leaders or have a clear connection to a family. Homophobia continues to manifest itself in beliefs and reactions. However those who are already likely to be engaged in a tug of war with the city on other bureaucratic or values questions are not too resistant to the idea that the city shall also take an upstanding position on respecting gay children or children with different gender expression than their parents. I speak as someone who rejects the notion that “I’m from the government and I’m here to help” are the nine most terrifying words in the English language.
I believe it is also true that anti-discrimination values–not just laws–are in the newspapers, of all reading levels and I think languages. A new civil rights law creates a big headline with detailed media analysis. A hate crime or a local rally–whether pro or anti LGBT–creates headlines or social media buzz that creates a back and forth [NOT the march in my opinion; people speak more freely about local or unexpected stuff].
Frankly, I believe that the gay [and probably even the GLBT] activist community of New York State performs superbly at representing the political interests of the community members both as a whole and as individuals. This means it takes every single progressive political position there is on LGBT civil rights, and that it argues the merits of every single progressive position as if it is a social and religious conservative one. The big organizations avoid arguing social theory and defamatory statements. You will always find people who make them–I credit the initial failure of the NY’s same sex marriage law to the proliferation of such statements. But compare the Empire State Pride Agenda with the Black Lives Matter Movement. Claims of radicalism and hatred stick easily on the latter, not the former.
It is easy to sneer at so-called “national conversations” on big diversity issues. I think conversation, when done right, when focused on specific causes and problems, when addressed to specific people, and when done over and over again, has results on specific causes and problems and on specific people.
posted by Tom Scharbach on
To shorten this up a bit:
(1) You don’t want to talk about Santorum’s radio interview of two days ago in which he expressed opposition to HERO and other non-discrimination laws:
(2) The New York laws/ordinances have created no problems of the kind conjured up in order to defeat HERO.
posted by Jorge on
Rick Santorum is entitled to his opinion. As opinions of opposition go, he’s not wrong in the quote you gave. What it doesn’t explain is why that concern leads him to oppose the HERO. What you have to remember is that because he is suspicious of anti-discrimination laws, he will weigh the balence of interests differently. You must confront people like him with the hard truths. Fighting day and night over policy isn’t necessary when you have an opportunity to make a difference on ideology.
The New York laws/ordinances have created no problems of the kind conjured up in order to defeat HERO.
Those opinions do exist in the state legislature, but they don’t go anywhere. Our state’s opposition figurehead follows the Santorum model.
posted by Tom Scharbach on
Tom: The New York laws/ordinances have created no problems of the kind conjured up in order to defeat HERO.
Jorge: Those opinions do exist in the state legislature, but they don’t go anywhere.
Opinions are not evidence. Opinions are not facts.
Jorge: Our state’s opposition figurehead follows the Santorum model.
Why am I not surprised? Does the opposition have any evidence to back up the claim that including transgender people in the state’s non-discrimination laws is likely to lead CIS children to decide that they are transgender? Or is it just the usual fear and loathing.
posted by Tom Scharbach on
Tom: At some point, Jorge, reality — in the form of experience — counts.
Jorge: Why, thank you.
So what has been New York’s experience since the inclusion of gender identity in non-discrimination laws? Any significant problems? Anything Houstonians could learn from the experience? Or anyone else in America, for that matter? Or is New York just so different from the rest of America that no lessons can be learned?
posted by Tom Scharbach on
Many in the protected classes under the ordinance, including race and age, are already covered by federal anti-discrimination laws. LGB&Ts are not.
That’s right — federal law, specifically the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and its progeny.
Texas, on the other hand, has no state-level anti-discrimination laws at all covering public accommodations. I’d suggest that this is just another example of “Texas values”, but Alabama, Mississippi, Georgia are the other holdouts. Get the picture?
As to the fact that the Civil Rights Act of 1964 does not cover LGBT’s, the Equality Act of 2015 seeks to remedy that deficiency. It won’t go anywhere in this Congress, because it has run into a brick wall called the Republican Party, the same party which supports yanking the teeth out of the Voting Rights Act and eliminating Affirmative Action. See that pattern?
posted by Kosh III on
“Christian America can’t stand you and me, Jorge,”
Right on. Jorge has NO clue about anything outside the liberal safezone he cowers in.
Put your avowed conservative values in practice. Move to Oneonta Alabama, visit First Southern Bigot Convention church and hold hands with your husband. See how loving those folks are.
Or Straight Mountain Baptist or Corpus Christi Catholic.
Move On neither knows nor cares who you are.
posted by Jorge on
Right on. Jorge has NO clue about anything outside the liberal safezone he cowers in.
I daresay I know a few things about the musty achieves of the Vatican and the hearths of the most homophobic county in New York City, if not the state itself.
posted by Mike in Houston on
Let me just point out that availing yourself on Federal protections is always costly and time consuming.
The Houston ordinance would have provided extended protections (additional classes not covered by federal law – genetic information being one of them) but more importantly, it would have given people the opportunity to use a local tool to resolve the issue in a timely and tailored manner… without necessarily having to either go to court or even have the issue become a matter of public record.
posted by Wilberforce on
This isn’t the first time the transgender bathroom issue has destroyed a gay rights bill. It also stopped ENDA, which was a hundred times more important. It’s bad strategy to include this minor issue in major civil rights legislation. But I think it’s another case of the left snatching defeat from the jaws of victory.
posted by Mike in Houston on
First: this was not a “gay rights” bill. Sexual orientation & gender identity were among 15 other protected classes.
Second: Houston has NO non-discrimination ordinance whatsoever.
Third: Even had gender identity been stripped from the ordinance, the opponents of HERO would have fought just as hard and equally nasty against protections for the GLB community. Believe me, the anti-HERO backers are hard core anti-gay. (Google Steven Hotze, Pastor Dave Welch, etc.)
And finally, the WAPO gets this one thing wrong: this ordinance was not shot down by a “decisive majority of the citizens”. Only ~250K votes total out of 2.1 million citizens (150K against / 100K for)
Sometimes we (the LGBT — and yes, I include the transgender population because the opposition doesn’t see a distinction, so why should we?) need a collective kick in our complacency… hopefully, this temporary loss will let even those safely ensconced in blue enclave know that the fight is not over yet. Not be a long shot.
posted by Tom Jefferson III on
“…need a collective kick in our complacency… hopefully, this temporary loss will let even those safely ensconced in blue enclave.”
Hopefully. I certainly have seen quite a bit of complacency in parts of the Midwest, especially within the large, metropolitan centers (i.e. Minneapolis/St. Paul)…which often means that funding and other resources dedicated to education or civil rights legislation (outside of these blue enclaves), is often the first to get slashed/eliminated.
posted by Tom Scharbach on
We don’t need to toss transgender people under the bus, Wilberforce.
Seventeen states and 100+ cities/counties in other states (including all of the major cities in Wisconsin) have successfully implemented statures or ordinances that protect “gender identity”, with no increase in public safety problems. The “bathroom issue” is a political contrivance whipped up to leverage fear and loathing, nothing more or less.
Gays and lesbians been the subject of a decades-long campaign of lies and fear mongering by conservative Christians and their Republican allies. We are finally, after spending millions upon millions of dollars, and countless hours of hard work, coming to the end of that road. Have we learned nothing from that experience?
posted by Houndentenor on
We gay people have been thrown under the bus enough times to know what that’s like. To turn around and do the same to trans people is disgusting. I won’t. I am not depraved enough to do so. Also, the trans/bathroom nonsense was just a talking point. It allowed bigots to feel less bigoted. How many people bought that who otherwise would have shown up and voted for the initiative? I don’t buy that this is what motivated them. It’s what they tell themselves so they don’t have to admit that they are bigots.
posted by Tom Scharbach on
The homocons have started a “Drop the T” petition at Change.Org. The petition is authored anonymously, of course, but Breitbart and other conservative rags are right on it, supporting.
Transgender people have been part of the “LGBT” fight for decades. Now, when it becomes apparent that the fight for equal treatment under the law for transgender people might make the road ahead a bit less smooth for gays and lesbians than it might be if we tossed them under the bus, the homocons who have urged us all along to appease conservative Christians to avoid “backlash” are at it again — this time agitating to “Drop the T”.
I repeat my question: Have we learned nothing from our experience over the last three decades?
posted by Tom Scharbach on
And that, I believe, was itself an encapsulation of pent-up reaction to a range of LGBT advances, from the legal recognition of same-sex marriage to the perceived persecution of conservative Christian small business owners who don’t want to provide services to same-sex weddings.
Maybe so. More likely, though, it is the predicable product of a long, relentless fear and loathing campaign run by conservative Christians and the Republican Party for the last decade and a half.
Gays and lesbians have been political cannon fodder for a long time. It will take a long time to undo the damage done by the relentless attacks upon us. We are making progress, little by slowly, and a lot has changed over the years, but one thing that has not changed: When conservative Christians and their political allies have the power to do so, pro-equality legislation will be blocked.
We all know that, but I disagree with the underlying premise you posit — that if we abandoned marriage equality or acquiesced in laws and ordinances sanctioning discrimination against gays and lesbians, and gays and lesbians alone, conservative Christians would be appeased. I don’t believe that for a New York minute.
posted by Mike in Houston on
Tom — at least Stephen is now admitting that it’s not actual but “perceived persecution of conservative Christian small business owners who don’t want to provide services to same-sex weddings.”
posted by Tom Scharbach on
Conservative Christians and their political allies have worked hard to create the “perceived perceived persecution of conservative Christian small business owners” by jacking up a half dozen minor incidents into an anti-Christian juggernaut. It is absurd.
Stephen, who has worked tirelessly to create the perception, is in a poor position to complain about the effects of the perception.
posted by JohnInCA on
Y’know what would be far more shocking?
If conservatives could pull off one of these “victories” without lying.
But it seems whenever they *do* get their “victories”, it’s by violating one of the ten commandments.
So frankly… if conservatives have to lie their asses off to get their “victories”, I think that’s a sign that in the long run we’re gonna make it. As the man said (badly paraphrased) “the moral arc of history is long, but it bends towards justice”.
posted by Lori Heine on
“But it seems whenever they *do* get their ‘victories’, it’s by violating one of the ten commandments.”
That is, indeed, an inescapable conclusion. Which makes me wonder why they make such a production out of publicly displaying those Commandments. Maybe they just think they look pretty.
More likely, it is simply the same sort of “identity politics” that conservatives never notice–except in those on the left.
posted by Jorge on
We gay people have been thrown under the bus enough times to know what that’s like. To turn around and do the same to trans people is disgusting.
That depends on whether the bus is made of several tons of aluminum or just a few pounds of paper.
There has been more knowledge and more information that has brought to light the “so what?” behind transgender-acknowledging protections that was not present even a decade ago. There are problems that cannot be ignored. I do believe it is reasonable to say that problems should be solved as we come to see the necessity for solving them.
posted by Tom Jefferson III on
The defeat of the Houston HERO bill seems to have been based on very similar arguments used to defeat local gay rights bills in the 1970s. I guess “the more things change, the more they stay the same…” is an accurate saying in this case.
I do think that their is a different between tossing the ‘T’ under the proverbial bus, which I oppose, and acknowledging the fact that sometimes passing civil legislation is a gradual process. A process that sometimes may involve getting civil rights for gays and lesbians for transgender people.
To the people that are eager to toss the ‘T’ under the bus, I ask you two questions; (1) will a sexual orientation-only bill get approved, or will it be shot down like a more inclusive bill. (2) if it is going to require more time and resources to advance transgender rights, are you going to make the commitments?
posted by Mike in Houston on
The opponents of HERO used the trans community as the targeting mechanism to take out the whole LGBT community… that was their aim. The anti-LGBT movement absolutely needed the win in Houston and they found a way to get it.
Perversely, it allowed them to also stiff-arm black, latino & asian communities’ civil rights (with the willing assistance of a coterie of black churches)… a win, win, win in their circles.
Sigh. Back into the trenches… we still have a mayoral & city council run-off to get through and we have to make sure that the right candidates win to be able to bring HERO back.
posted by Tom Jefferson III on
People on the ground in Houston say that HERO still would have been bitterly opposed by the same (well financed and well connected groups), if it avoided dealing with gender identity all together.
I am not familiar with Houston or Texas political culture, except from reputation (and watching television shows, like “King of The Hill”).
When HERO — or something similar — comes up again in Houston, hopefully its supporters will be (a) better funded and (b) be able to effectively/clearly articulate why the “bathroom” concerns are not legitimate.
From my own experience, I can say that funding for LGBT rights groups at the State or local level, is (especially within more rural and or conservative climates) very much neglected. Money is not the only requirement to win a campaign, but it is certainly an important tool.
posted by Tom Scharbach on
Maybe that works in some schools (Chapman cites some evidence to that effect), but there are times when penises in the girls’ locker room (or womens’ locker rooms, regarding public pools and saunas) is going to be a legitimate issue.
I suppose, but the issues can be avoided with a little common sense and planning. I understand, for example, that modern high schools have private shower stalls (unlike when I was in high school fifty-plus years ago, and mass showers were the norm), and young transgender women who have not yet completed can certainly wear a towel to the shower. I imagine that adults can figure out similar common sense solutions for public pools and saunas. I am not suggesting that accommodating transgender people in schools, pools, saunas and bathrooms won’t require minimum thought and common sense, but I am suggesting that solutions don’t require a rocket scientist to solve.
Conservatives who focus entirely on the physical anatomy of a transgender person miss the point — anatomy doesn’t change gender identity. A transgender woman who is transitioning to her female gender-based anatomy is a woman, regardless of anatomy, and a transgender man who is transitioning to his male gender-based anatomy is a man, regardless of anatomy.
I know two transgender women reasonably well. I knew one back when she was a “male” (we went to high school together) and the other I met about five years ago in the Wisconsin LGBT Caucus, when we worked together to get “We support marriage equality …” into the state party platform. I assume, but don’t know for sure, that my high school friend has completed her anatomical transition. I think, but again don’t know for sure, that my LGBT Caucus friend is still in the process. It makes no difference. Both are women.
What I find fascinating about the conservative argument is that it is so unwittingly dependent upon traditional gender roles — women as the “weaker sex” to be protected against any upset (real or imagined), and men as “deal with it” tough, kind of like Ford trucks. How else to explain that much fuss is made about “penises in women’s locker rooms” (and bathrooms) but nothing is ever said about vaginas in men’s locker rooms and bathrooms?
I don’t suppose that “stop, think, breathe” will have any impact on conservatives, but it would be nice, if just this once, conservatives didn’t fly off into a panic, and actually thought the problem through.
posted by JohnInCA on
Conservatives don’t *miss* the point, they *deny* the point.
Look at all the anti-hero rhetoric, both in Houston, and online and elsewhere. A lot of the people opposing it don’t acknowledge that trans* folk exist at all, insisting that they’re just mentally ill self-harmers.
posted by Tom Scharbach on
Conservatives don’t *miss* the point, they *deny* the point.
You are probably right. Take this quote from the Weekly Standard link from Stephen:
In other words, transgender people are pretenders.
Conservative Christians (and, for that matter, most social conservatives) take a similar position on homosexuality, denying that there is such a thing as sexual orientation. In their eyes, we are equally pretenders, straights who are too weak-minded to be straight.
Conservative Christians have an obsession with anatomy. If you have a dick, you are male, straight and supposed to act like a dick, asserting your God-given lordship over women. If you don’t have a dick, but a dick-dock instead, you are supposed to submit. It is all real simple. And fucked up.
posted by Jorge on
“High school locker rooms are not places kids go to feel comfortable and relaxed.”
Wow. All of a sudden, I don’t care. Life’s full of fitting square pegs into round holes.
There’s a little voice in my head telling me there’s a transgender bullying and suicide risk. Okay, now I don’t care in the other direction. If we can legislate morality, we certainly can legislate evil for the common good, too.
If you can treat men and women differently and it’s not always sex discrimination, then it seems to me that you can treat transgender people differently and it’s not always gender identity discrimination. I really wish my state would repeal or overrule that law that says it’s legal for women to walk barechested in public. But at the end of the day, is it really that important to do so?
(1) will a sexual orientation-only bill get approved, or will it be shot down like a more inclusive bill.
The former.
(2) if it is going to require more time and resources to advance transgender rights, are you going to make the commitments?
That depends on how dangerously close denying the rights in question comes to denying the right to life.
The right to life should not be compromised or bargained with (yeech! I think I just justified the Black Lives Matter movement). In my opinion, the most gain should always be sought. I favor seeking the most gain in the short-term, by asking for everything and enacting a progression.
Conservatives don’t *miss* the point, they *deny* the point.
I think they do neither: they *dispute* the point.
posted by JohnInCA on
“Dispute” implies conversation, dialogue, exchange.
Based on how no one could get the anti-Hero folk to address transmen in the women’s restroom, I don’t think “dispute” is the right term.
posted by Jorge on
The defeat of the Houston HERO bill seems to have been based on very similar arguments used to defeat local gay rights bills in the 1970s. I guess “the more things change, the more they stay the same…” is an accurate saying in this case.
I almost forgot.
When a minority community encounter a problem, it considers several different ways to remake society so that the problem is solved.
So that today, we have gay marriage, gay families–almost always headed by couples–protected by anti-discrimination law and more common social customs. We certainly haven’t seen the institution of marriage overthrown, and while the sexual revolution hasn’t died…
In time I would like to be able to see a differentiation between moderate, radical, and conservative transgender rights goals, or at least several different directions that are possible, because that will be a sign that some change has happened and more change is possible.
Conservative Christians have an obsession with anatomy. If you have a dick, you are male, straight and supposed to act like a dick, asserting your God-given lordship over women. If you don’t have a dick, but a dick-dock instead, you are supposed to submit. It is all real simple. And fucked up.
I still say Michelle Bachman is right that submission means respect.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cBWe4LIX7fU
It’s true! My agency’s most recent training materials on domestic violence say that an effective way to engage male batterers toward change is to ask them about their cultural role models that both support violence against women and that contradict violence against women–and that these opposing models exist in every culture.
But because political disputes rarely align between good and evil, it is difficult for a losing side to play a meaningful part of an approaching reform when doing so requires purging itself first.
posted by Lori Heine on
Some feminine perspective here.
Respect has to be earned. Men who earn it generally get it. If not, then the women they married are jerks and they should divorce them.
The notion that they automatically deserve some sort of deferential treatment just because they’re men is what lies behind the notion of “submission.” The “respect” part of it–which social conservatives always bring up–does not need to be legislated if it’s earned. And if it isn’t earned, then it isn’t deserved.
Tom S. is right — these people are obsessed with anatomy. They believe that everyone is bound to behave according to their anatomical features, with no regard for human value or quality of life in any other terms.
I believe that absolutely every form of power or authority must be earned. It must be accounted for. I think my perspective as a woman actually had something to do with why I became a libertarian, because that’s what libertarians believe. All power should be accountable, or it should be taken away.
If people need to have a national soapbox to preach to the country about how other people should “submit” to certain authorities, then those authorities are likely to very often be abusive, irresponsible and bogus.
Hope that helps.
posted by Jorge on
Your thinking is a little novel to me. It will take a few repetitions.
posted by Houndentenor on
These are the times when I side with the libertarians. People have a right to live as they choose. Obviously there are limits, but those involve infringing on the rights of others. Caitlyn Jenner wants to live as a woman. I don’t know how that causes any hardship or problem for me. It doesn’t infringe on my rights in any way. As far as I’m concerned there is no problem. So why are people so freaked out about this? Because they can’t make other people live according to their rules? The same rules, btw, that they don’t actually live by either. So what they really want is for us to all be hypocrites. That’s a horrible way to live and if you ever wondered why so many social conservatives seem so miserable, there’s your answer.
posted by Mike in Houston on
Sometimes Jorge, I REALLY don’t know what you are talking about.
“Conservative” transgender rights goals? Defined by whom? The conservative wing of the Christian right equates being transgender with “disordered”, “mentally ill”, “self-mutilating” “perverts” — basically people who have transgressed against (their) God’s plan by not sticking with what the sex they were assigned at birth.
Every transgender person that I know — and through the battles for HERO, I’ve met and been befriended by many more — want the following simple (modest) things:
To be able to live their lives authentically as their innate gender identity demands – and that includes using an appropriate restroom in peace like everyone else and not being the subject of violence or the threat of violence (physical or emotional)
Be able to be productive members of society – get & keep a job, housing, etc.
Have access to necessary health care — before, during & after transitioning.
And most of all, they would like for everyone to quit focusing on what is or isn’t happening between their legs… oh, and to not misgender them by using the wrong pronoun — especially when they’ve told you how they would prefer to be named.
Radical, I know. Kind of like that whole golden rule thing that Jesus kept blathering on about.
posted by Jorge on
Sometimes Jorge, I REALLY don’t know what you are talking about.
That surprises me. I was making an interpretation on the history of the gay rights movement that is not uncommon, at least on this website, and saying I would like history to repeat.
“Conservative” transgender rights goals? Defined by whom?
That’s a very good question that different people will come to different answers about even with gay rights.
Every transgender person that I know . . . want the following simple (modest) things:
To be able to live their lives authentically as their innate gender identity demands – and that includes using an appropriate restroom in peace like everyone else and not being the subject of violence or the threat of violence (physical or emotional)
Question: do they all have the same definition of what living their lives authentically means? That strikes me as extremely subjective and open to artificial social influence, no less than the differentiated and non-differentiated social roles of gender.
Be able to be productive members of society – get & keep a job, housing, etc.
Have access to necessary health care — before, during & after transitioning.
And most of all, they would like for everyone to quit focusing on what is or isn’t happening between their legs… oh, and to not misgender them by using the wrong pronoun — especially when they’ve told you how they would prefer to be named.
Radical, I know.
Not really. There’s a progression of priorities, and you said nothing about method.
Kind of like that whole golden rule thing that Jesus kept blathering on about.
Most non-transgender people, not being conscious that they are the recipients of protections based on gender
….
Most non-transgender men and probably a minority of non-transgender women, not being conscious that they are the recipients of protections based on gender, find no internal inconsistency with expecting other people to be treated the same way. The Golden Rule gets defined strangely these days.
posted by Tom Jefferson III on
I really have to wonder exactly what the opposition to the HERO bill had in mind. Transgender people have to use the “WC’, just like everyone else and we cannot realistically expect them to only use the WC in their residence.
The opponents seem to be implying a man should use the men’s room, even if he dressed as a woman and even if he is going through the sex change surgery process.
Yet, something tells me that many of the {male) opponents of the Hero civil rights bill would be outraged if a “cross-dressing” male used the men’s room, when they (the opponents) were also doing so.
I realize that insisting on any sort of consistent rationale is probably a pointless exercise, but the more that I think about the “bathroom” issues, the more I have to opponents of HERO would allow transgender people to use ANY bathroom anywhere, except the one in the transgender person’s home?