For the past eleven years New York legislature failed to pass the Gender Expression Non-Discrimination Act…
In 2002 Sexual Orientation Non-Discrimination Act (SONDA) was passed, gender identity and expression was part of the bill but backroom deals dropped gender identity from the bill with the promise to pass GENDA the next year. Which turned into next year, next year, and next year and now it is another “next year.”
In 2011 in Massachusetts backroom deals dropped “public accommodation” from their gender identity/expression non-discrimination bill… we’ll come back next year… and next year… and next year.
It has to be all or nothing!
In Congress the Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA) has passed the Senate but in a backroom deal they added a broad religious exemption that many feel unacceptable. In all the other non-discrimination laws you have to work in a religious job to be exemption such as a church’s bookkeeper, but the exemption in ENDA you could be fired if you were a gay janitor working in an apartment building owned by a church.
ENDA would weaken Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the EEOC has ruled that trans-people are protected under Title VII and the religious exemption is limited religious jobs. A transgender nurse would be protected if she was working in a religious owned hospital, but ENDA with strip that protection.
There is a court case where a gay man is suing his former employer for firing him because he is gay. He claims that Title VII also protects him because “sexual stereotypes” which the Supreme Court said was prohibited in the Price Waterhouse case. If he wins his case it make passing ENDA irrelevant, but if ENDA passes it will weaken Title VII protection.
When it comes to human rights we cannot allow any more Three-Fifths Compromises. We cannot compromise our human rights away.
GOP-led N.Y. Senate blocks reparative therapy ban, transgender protectionsThe bill passed the Assembly but for the seventh time died in the Senate.
LGBTQNation
Staff Reports
Sunday, June 22, 2014
ALBANY, N.Y. — The New York state Senate adjourned Friday without calling a vote on two LGBT-related bills passed by the Assembly — one that would ban reparative therapy for minors, and another that would have added gender identity to the state’s non-discrimination laws.
GOP Senate leaders blocked the two bills from going to the Senate floor for a full vote, where advocates said both measures had the votes needed to pass, according to the Empire State Pride Agenda.
In 2002 Sexual Orientation Non-Discrimination Act (SONDA) was passed, gender identity and expression was part of the bill but backroom deals dropped gender identity from the bill with the promise to pass GENDA the next year. Which turned into next year, next year, and next year and now it is another “next year.”
In 2011 in Massachusetts backroom deals dropped “public accommodation” from their gender identity/expression non-discrimination bill… we’ll come back next year… and next year… and next year.
It has to be all or nothing!
In Congress the Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA) has passed the Senate but in a backroom deal they added a broad religious exemption that many feel unacceptable. In all the other non-discrimination laws you have to work in a religious job to be exemption such as a church’s bookkeeper, but the exemption in ENDA you could be fired if you were a gay janitor working in an apartment building owned by a church.
ENDA would weaken Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the EEOC has ruled that trans-people are protected under Title VII and the religious exemption is limited religious jobs. A transgender nurse would be protected if she was working in a religious owned hospital, but ENDA with strip that protection.
There is a court case where a gay man is suing his former employer for firing him because he is gay. He claims that Title VII also protects him because “sexual stereotypes” which the Supreme Court said was prohibited in the Price Waterhouse case. If he wins his case it make passing ENDA irrelevant, but if ENDA passes it will weaken Title VII protection.
When it comes to human rights we cannot allow any more Three-Fifths Compromises. We cannot compromise our human rights away.
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