EMAIL SIGN UP!
Most Popular This Week
Popular content
Today's Top News
Many In Bay Area Call Anti-Bias Measure An Act of Betrayal
National civil rights organizations are celebrating the passage by the House of legislation that would add "sexual orientation" to a list of federally protected classes, but some San Francisco groups refuse to take part in the party.
The vote Wednesday on the Employment Non-Discrimination Act, also known as ENDA, postponed several times, was ultimately revised to remove protection for transgender workers, which upset gay rights groups here and across the country. Democratic leaders said the removal was necessary to get the act passed. But more than 300 lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender leaders opposed the exclusion, saying it is unfair and sends the wrong message.
"People are livid," said John Newsome, co-founder of And Castro for All, a bias awareness group. "If the first step out of the gate leaves people behind, it is an ill-conceived first step."
The Human Rights Campaign, the NAACP, the Anti-Defamation League and the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights supported the revised bill, saying an incremental approach is sometimes necessary, and that the move marks a step forward.
"We are happy for our lesbian and gay brothers and sisters and understand that we are making legislative progress, but we feel that there is a lot of work still to be done," said Cecilia Chung, deputy director of San Francisco's Transgender Law Center. "We are disappointed that this version is not all-inclusive."
The act, which passed 235-184, makes it illegal for employers, except for churches and the military, to make decisions about hiring, firing, promoting or paying an employee based on sexual orientation. Its chief proponent is Rep. Barney Frank, D-Mass., a gay rights advocate. The 1964 federal civil rights law already bans discrimination based on race, color, religion, gender or national origin.
"I thought it was a morally bankrupt decision for them to go forward," said Robert Haaland, a transgender person and co-chair of Pride at Work, an LGBT labor organization. "More than 300 organizations opposed this strategy. It is incredibly patronizing and shows that Barney Frank doesn't particularly care about transgender people. Our community should be one."
Nineteen states and the District of Columbia already have laws against discrimination based on sexual orientation, and nine of those states, including California, protect transgender workers.
Though Human Rights Campaign President Joe Solmonese said the revised law could pave the way for legislation that covers transgender workers, advocates disagreed.
"Bush has said he won't sign the bill, so how does it set a principle or pave the way?" asked Newsome. "This incrementalist version embraces more mainstream gays and lesbians while it continues to leave transgender Americans vulnerable to discrimination."
On Wednesday, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-San Francisco, applauded the bill, saying discrimination has no place in America.
"As someone who has looked forward to this day, it is a joyous occasion," she said, but added that she shared the disappointment that transgender workers were not included.
Rep. Lynn Woolsey, D-Petaluma, said the bill is a good start but just the beginning.
"I share the concern that it does not protect transgender people," she said.
"Ultimately, we wish it had been stronger and not left out members of our community," said Jere Keys, a spokesman for Out & Equal Workplace Advocates, a nonprofit that works with employers to eliminate barriers to LGBT equality in the workplace.
Kate Kendell, executive director of the National Center for Lesbian Rights, called the vote a "shell of a victory."
"Today's passage is bittersweet, and as we look ahead we intend to transform the many promises made today on the House floor for a fully inclusive ENDA into reality."
E-mail Leslie Fulbright at lfulbright@sfchronicle.com.
© 2007 The San Francisco Chronicle
Comments
Note: Disqus 2012 is best viewed on an up to date browser. Click here for information. Instructions for how to sign up to comment can be viewed here. Our Comment Policy can be viewed here. Please follow the guidelines. Note to Readers: Spam Filter May Capture Legitimate Comments...
9 Comments so far
Show Allall people should enjoy all civil rights...the transgendered community should, however, begin their own separate campaign--with the support of all other minorities and majorities--to pass legislation to end discrimination...
the transgendered community is NOT part of the lesbian/gay community unless we are taling about humankind in general....
i know this does not sit well with some, but as a lesbian, i have felt this way for many years......
Fact is, the bill is not gonna hold up without Trans protection.
Now employers will say, "I didn't fire her because she was gay, I fired her because she acted like a man."
This inshrines into law that even gay people act like a certain sex classification, and if you don't then you can get fired for it...
A stand like this defies the entire reason people started asking for gay rights, way back when this started...
Those who believe that politics is all about process, compromise, and "the art of the possible" will insist that the glass is now half-full.
Those who believe that process is subordinate to principle must consider the decision to abandon the trans-gendered appalling, insofar as it expressly yields to the ugly prejudice that the trans-gendered are so insignificant and unpopular that they deserve to indefinitely remain "untouchables". If the glass is half-full, it's half-full of something contaminated and toxic.
I didn't watch Barney Frank's reportedly emotional speech, which presumably extolled the half-full qualities of his accomplishment. I might've watched if he'd strolled out in a tux, top hat, and cane, and tapdanced while singing:
You've got to ac-cent-u-ate the positive;
E-lim-inate the negative;
Latch on to the affirmative--
And don't mess with Mister In-Between!
With all due respect, jade, you're right.
"Separate but equal" does not sit well with me. It's a superficially seductive concept, because it seems to support the goal, or outcome, of equality. But it's another variation of "the end justifies the means". As a straight man, I have felt this way for many years. ;)
I am not ojne and hence cannot understand what impels some whose biological bodies are of one gender to want to switch to the opposite gender. However, i have encountered two or three of these individuals in my lifetime and they did not behave, dress, or speak in any bizare way. (Which is more than I could say for so many participants in gay pride parades who nevertheless are given the opportunity to indulge their eccentricities without legal sanction.)
Go look at the picture of those transgendered people that accompanies this article--why should they be assigned second class citizen status? Of all the people who should "get it" surely Barny Frank and the rest of the gay mmebers of congress and the Bush adminstration should be at the front of the line on this one.
"On Wednesday, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-San Francisco, applauded the bill, saying discrimination has no place in America"
As always with the Democrats, watch actions and don't listen to the words. What Ms. Pelosi and the Democrats just said through their 'actions' is that discrimination against some people is acceptable and they just gave a big green light to it.
The nature of freedom is that to have it, you must defend the freedom of everyone. Because as soon as you start saying its ok to discriminate and attack this group or that group because they aren't popular, then you've opened the door for discrimination and attacks against anyone who isn't popular. And that's always a slippery slope. Because the line can keep moving and the bar for how unpopular a group has to be to be attacked can keep being lowered.
Hatred and bigotry against any persons or groups of people is not acceptable. And that's what should be the law. The law should be that basic and shouldn't list any groups by name. The same protections should apply to everyone.
But not in Democratland. The most disgusting thing is that its so obviously a political calculation. The Democrats feel they'll be hurt politically if they come out in favor of trying to stop discrimination and attacks on an unpopular group. So for their own narrow and selfish political interests they are willing to exclude some groups from the protection of the law while including others. That's my basic problem with the Democrats. They stand for nothing other than their own election to office. Anything and everything can be jettisoned to reach that goal. Thus they are always leading us down some very slippery slopes. And they don't give a damn what that does to the country or to our basic rights and freedoms as long as they can get elected.
I guess the argument is that being gay or lesbian is not a choice ( a HUGE step forward BTW) physically changing your gender is a choice.
However, I dont see how cutting off ones junk and having breast implants affects ones work....(or cutting off ones breasts and having some junk fabricated, whatever)...I thought the workplace was supposed to be sex free.
I have seen some damn ugly trans...but have also seen far uglier non-trans people. How thois all relates to ones ability to make french fries is beyond me...
Perhaps we should be looking here for some guidance:
http://www.gidreform.org/
To quote their site:
difference is not disease;
nonconformity is not pathology;
uniqueness is not illness
To me it seems that as long as identifying as transgender or transexual is still classified as a pathological disorder by the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM), published by the American Psychiatric Association, it will be really difficult to pass any legislation protecting people from being fired. Some of you may remember that homosexuality was classified as such until 1986 when it was entirely removed publications list of mental "disorders".
Should we be putting more pressure on the medical and psychatric community to reverse this ruling? You betcha. We need their support and advocacy along with LGBT persons and community allies to fight this battle.
Just some thoughts...
Jade,
How can you claim that the transgender community is not part of the lesbian and gay community?
How can you make this distiction on behalf of millions of people?
How can you claim to even separate the two, as though there are no trans lesbians nor any other miriad of combinations that come with the complexities of human life?
And how can you forsake the history of struggle for gays and lesbians, rights that were literally fought for, bled for, and died for by trans, lesbian, gay... all of us?
When the cops busted gay folks in the bars of New York City, it was often for too many articles of clothing of the "wrong" gender. When lesbian and gays face discrimination in the world it is overwhelmingly because of their gender presentation within their culture, not because someone actually caught them in the act of having sex. It's because they are peceived as not being "right" in some way: because of their dress, their body, their speech, their walk, their physical contact with another.. the list could go on. And who finally fought back in the Stonewall Rebellion? You bet trans people were there: transvestites, lesbians, gays, drag queens, and many poor folks of color too while were at it. Queer people -- all manner of people who's lives have always defied segmentation and labeling. That's why so many of us identify with the word 'queer' because it symbolizes that unity, not the divisions between us. It symbolizes a different way of looking at the world and the struggle for equality.
Civil rights for all will not be enjoyed until we dispell this idea that this unity is less important than increased power in the institutions that created and maintain these divisions.