We Lost One

A number of years ago a Canadian court ruled we could be in the Miss Universe Pageant, so did Spain, Mexico, Thailand, and Panama but here in the U.S. a court said no.

Senior United States District Judge who was appointed by George W. Bush ruled against Ms. Green who appealed the decision and she appealed her case to the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals which issued its ruling on Thursday.

Court rules beauty pageant can exclude transgender women
A pageant rule that only “natural born” women qualify to compete will remain in place.
The Hill
By Brooke Migdon
November 3, 2022


Story at a glance

• The Miss United States of America pageant may continue excluding transgender contestants through the enforcement of a rule that only “natural born” women qualify to compete.
• Anita Green, a transgender woman, sued the pageant in 2019 when it rejected her application because of her gender identity.
• The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals this week ruled that forcing the pageant to allow transgender women to compete would infringe on its ability to express “the ideal vision of American womanhood.” 

Green has previously competed in pageants including Miss Montana, a contest within the Miss America system. She filed a complaint in federal court in 2019 against USOA operators in Oregon, where she is from, claiming that the pageant’s policy allowing only “natural women” to compete violated a state anti-discrimination law that bars discrimination based on gender identity in public accommodations. 

[…]

On Wednesday, a three-judge panel agreed, ruling that forcing the pageant to allow transgender women to compete would infringe on its ability to express “the ideal vision of American womanhood.” 

“Miss United States of America expresses its message in part through whom it chooses as its contestants, and the First Amendment affords it the right to do so,” Circuit Judge Lawrence VanDyke, a Trump-appointee, wrote Wednesday for the majority. 

“Given a pageant’s competitive and performative structure, it is clear that who competes and succeeds in a pageant is how the pageant speaks,” VanDyke wrote. “Put differently, the Pageant’s message cannot be divorced from the Pageant’s selection and evaluation of contestants.” 

In a dissenting opinion, Circuit Judge Susan Graber, appointed by former President Bill Clinton, wrote that the court should have first established whether the state’s nondiscrimination law applies to the pageant operators at all.

The dissenting judge wrote:

“The majority opinion marks a radical departure from the well-settled principle that we should consider non-constitutional grounds for decision before reaching constitutional issues – the doctrine of constitutional avoidance,” Graber wrote Wednesday. 

According to Graber, the state’s nondiscrimination law neither compels the pageant operator’s speech nor violates its freedom of association, meaning the case “cannot prevail on the merits of an as-applied First Amendment claim.” 

“Because the majority opinion inappropriately seeks to have it both ways, and does so without first determining which option is the legally correct one, I must dissent,” she wrote. 

Trump judges and judges appointed by the Republican's ignore precedent set by previous rulings.

Now you know why yesterday’s were so important to the LGBTQ+ community with the Senate election still a toss-up if the Republicans win control of the Senate they will probably block all President Biden’s court appointments like they did with President Obama.

With the Republicans controlling the House look for a slew of Biden impeachments and probably even his son being indicted 

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We also had a major loss in Israel with the election win of the far-right candidate Netanyahu. USA Today reported,

The party is known for its anti-LGBTQ policies and hard line against Arab-Israelis and Palestinians, and it could affect Israel’s relations with the U.S., its most important ally

[...]

Israel has made significant progress on LGBTQ rights in the past couple of years, thanks to left- and right-wing secular parties, allowing gay couples to jointly adopt and legally access surrogacy, as well as being home to one of the most famous annual Gay Pride parades in the world.

But with Religious Zionism in power, hateful rhetoric against the LGBTQ community is becoming an increasingly accepted part of Israeli society.

Party leader Betzalel Smotrich declared himself a “proud homophobe” and has made a number of derogatory comments against the LGBTQ community, saying homosexuality isn’t “healthy for society” and comparing recognition of the community to “driving through a red light.”

Ofer Neumann, CEO of Israel Gay Youth, said he believes the “darkness” Religious Zionism brings into the LGBTQ community comes from its rhetoric rather than what it can actually achieve politically.

The world is getting to be an ugly place for us.