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WATCH: Fired for Rejecting Trans Boy, Houston Daycare Workers Vow to Sue
WATCH: Fired for Rejecting Trans Boy, Houston Daycare Workers Vow to Sue
Two women fired by a Houston-area daycare say their rights were violated when they were terminated for refusing to accept the transgender child of a gay couple, and ProjectQ reports they’re threatening to file a federal lawsuit.
Madeline Kirksey (pictured above, center) and Akesha Bogany Wyatt are represented by notoriously antigay attorneys Briscoe Cain and Andy Taylor, the latter of whom led the legal fight to overturn Houston’s nondiscrimination ordinance, notes ProjectQ.
On Tuesday, the attorneys held a news conference to announce the filing of a complaint with the federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, alleging that the Children’s Lighthouse Learning Centers in Katy, Texas had violated the religious rights of their clients. During that conference, Taylor publicly dismissed the wishes of both the child and his parents by repeatedly referring to him as a girl:
“A little 6-year-old is not yet ready to make those types of choices. At that age, they are still trying to decide what kind of ice cream and what kind of breakfast cereal they enjoy. Their opinions on things change not only on a daily basis but an hourly basis. And so to empower and indeed to inflict upon a little 6-year-old girl the heavy decision of their sexual identity is nothing short of child abuse.”
Taylor argued that the firings violated the Constitutional rights of the women, and hinted that the EEOC complaint would allege the firings were illegal based on religious, gender and age discrimination, according to ProjectQ.
“Madeline Kirksey and Akesha Wyatt stood up not only based on their own faith, their religious convictions, but they stood up for this little girl and they said ‘not so fast,'” Taylor said.
ProjectQ identified Taylor (pictured above, right) as an antigay activist who challenged HERO in court, lost, and then won in a Texas Supreme Court decision that prompted the November 3 referendum that resulted in HERO’s defeat. Cain (pictured above left) is also an attorney as well as a failed politician who was endorsed by antigay activist Steven Hotze, a Houston doctor who funded the repeal effort. Cain told reporters he sees this case as part of the religious right’s larger struggle:
“There is an agenda going on right now in the country and that agenda has no concern with the health or welfare of children or the moral consciences and the religious beliefs of others. It is concerned with one thing and that is to change, fundamentally, the fabric of our culture.”
Kirksey, who said she was a manager at the Children’s Lighthouse Learning Center, told Houston TV station KRIV that the child’s parents gave the school little advance notice of their son’s transition, and cut his hair short. When she lobbied school administrators to inform the parents of all students that the child was transgender, she and Wyatt were fired, she said.
The women were dismissed the same day HERO was defeated. The ordinance protected 15 classes of citizens — including LGBT people — from discrimination. Taylor helped lead the vastly outspent opposition to victory with one misleading, provably false transphobic scare tactic that ultimately became a memorable and successful slogan: “No men in women’s restrooms.”
Taylor repeated that theme at Tuesday’s news conference:
“Can you only imagine the reaction of a couple of dozen 6-year-olds when they learn that Sally all of the sudden is Johnny? They may think this is a cruel game of Opposite Day where whatever they feel like they can say they are the opposite gender of who they really are. Are we going to have little girls running into boys’ restrooms and little boys running into girls’ restrooms?”
“This isn’t a problem that is just limited to Katy, Texas. This is a problem that can happen to every parent of a child in a school setting whether it’s public or private in every state of our fine nation. And so it’s time to take a stand and to push back and to say, you know what, we’re not going to allow little girls to be humiliated and attacked in a school setting simply because their gay parents declare, suddenly, that they are a little boy.”
Dawn Ennis
www.advocate.com/families/2015/11/11/watch-fired-rejecting-trans-boy-houston-daycare-workers-vow-sue
Sandra Bullock Wants More Than Just Equal Pay For Women
Sandra Bullock Wants More Than Just Equal Pay For Women
Sandra Bullock knows that closing the wage gap is just one step towards gender equality.
In Variety’s cover story this week, Bullock talked about why more than equal pay is necessary to truly level the playing field for women in Hollywood. “It’s a bigger issue than money,” she said. “I know we’re focused on the money part right now. That’s just a byproduct.”
Bullock said there’s a big difference in the way actresses and actors are described in the news, with women constantly being “mocked and judged.”
“I keep saying, ‘Why is it that no one is standing up and saying you can’t say that about a woman?'” she told Variety. “I always make a joke: ‘Watch, we’re going to walk down the red carpet, I’m going to be asked about my dress and my hair while the man standing next to me will be asked about his performance and political issues.’”
She said that we need to treat women like they’re equals in order for issues such as the wage gap to fall in place and ultimately fix itself. “Once we start shifting how we perceive women and stop thinking about them as ‘less than,’ the pay disparity will take care of itself. There’s a much bigger issue at hand. I’m glad Hollywood got caught,” Bullock said, referring to the Sony hack that revealed A-list actresses like Jennifer Lawrence and Charlize Theron were being paid less than their male coworkers.
Bullock said that she knows it’s going to be hard to explain the issue to her now 5-year-old son, Louis. “How do you explain to your son that the ERA hasn’t passed? I want him to think I’m the boss and women are equal, but I can’t really support that in the outside world,” she said. “I hope in my lifetime, for him, everything is a level-playing field.”
We hope so too, Sandra.
Head over to Variety to read more from Bullock.
Also on HuffPost:
— This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.
Several GOP Candidates Join Anti-LGBT Rally; Supports ‘Death to Gays’ Pastor
Several GOP Candidates Join Anti-LGBT Rally; Supports ‘Death to Gays’ Pastor
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Over the weekend, several Republican candidates spoke at the National Religious Liberties Conference, a meeting led by anti-LGBT Pastor Kevin Swanson.
HRC.org
Straight Man Considers “Becoming Gay” After His Girlfriend Cheats On Him, Fears He’ll Never Trust Again
Straight Man Considers “Becoming Gay” After His Girlfriend Cheats On Him, Fears He’ll Never Trust Again
A 22-year-old Botswana man is seriously considering “re-orienting” his sexual orientation after his girlfriend cheated on him not once, not twice, but multiple times.
In a letter to advice columnist Gasegale Sengwaketse (try saying that three times fast!) at The Voice BW, the troubled young man writes: “I’m a 22-year-old guy who is heartbroken because my girlfriend cheats on me. I forgave her more than once but she keeps on repeating although she had said it was a mistake the first time it happened.”
Related: Straight Man Seeks Advice After Sleeping With His Married Boss
“I feel very sad because of what she’s doing to me and I’m beginning to lose trust in women,” the man continues. “I’m scared that even if I find another woman she would also cheat on me.”
“Should I become gay or what?” he wonders.
Sengwaketse wastes no time getting to the heart of the matter.
“Should you ‘become gay’?” he writes. “What a question!”
Related: Bi Guy Writes For Advice After Doing The Nasty With His Fiancee’s Father
“Being gay is not something that you can just wake up one day and choose to ‘become’; and besides, even gay people have cheaters among them.”
“What if you ‘become’ gay and your partner cheats on you, what would you do?” Sengwaketse asks. “Would you then lose trust in men and go back to dating women?”
The bottom line,Sengwaketse says, is this: “You can’t just switch on and off between being heterosexual and homosexual.”
He concludes by telling the young man he should “seek counseling” for his “constant heartbreak.”
We say forget counseling, dump your girlfriend then give us a [email protected]!
Related: Straight Man Unsure About His Buddy’s Shower Room Butt-Slapping Antics
Graham Gremore
Rick Scarborough: We’ll Find A Cure For AIDS If the U.S. Rejects Homosexuality and Repents – VIDEO
Rick Scarborough: We’ll Find A Cure For AIDS If the U.S. Rejects Homosexuality and Repents – VIDEO
Anti-gay pastor Rick Scarborough–who back in July promised to set himself on fire if same-sex marriage became legal–has said that AIDS is God’s judgement on sin.
He also claimed that a cure for AIDS would be found by “some sharp probably Christian or Jewish researcher” if the U.S. repented for tolerating homosexuality.
RELATED: Evangelical Blowhard Rick Scarborough: Gay Parents Damning Their Children to ‘An Early Grave Called Hell’ – VIDEO
Right Wing Watch notes that Scarborough–who later back-tracked on his promise of self-immolation–was speaking at a “Prayer For Our Warriors Conference” at Harvest Christian Fellowship in Arizona.
Playing the victim card, he added that gay rights groups have “subverted the truth” by attacking “those of us who stand for God and country without apology.”
Back in 2014, rabid Scarborough said that god should punish the U.S. because Barack Obama appoints gay ambassadors.
Watch a clip of Scarborough’s speech below.
The post Rick Scarborough: We’ll Find A Cure For AIDS If the U.S. Rejects Homosexuality and Repents – VIDEO appeared first on Towleroad.
Michael Fitzgerald
Rick Scarborough: We’ll Find A Cure For AIDS If the U.S. Rejects Homosexuality and Repents – VIDEO
President Obama Is Not My Ally
President Obama Is Not My Ally
This morning, I read that OUT Magazine named President Obama as its LGBT “Ally of the Year.” Literally one minute later, Chelsea Manning called me from prison.
Hearing Chelsea’s voice was a powerful reminder: President Obama may talk a good talk when it comes to gay rights, but his Administration’s policies speak louder than his speech-writer’s words, and they’re detrimental to LGBTQ+ people around the world.
Chelsea is the Wikileaks whistleblower who exposed some of the U.S. government’s worst abuses in Iraq and Afghanistan. She’s also a transgender woman. The Obama administration has aggressively prosecuted her, held her in conditions that the UN considers to be torture, and locked her away for a 35 year sentence in an all male military prison.
Chelsea was calling to give me an update about her current legal battle with Obama’s Justice Department over something that seems simple: the right to grow her hair to the length of her choice. Military officials are currently requiring her to cut her hair to the Military’s “male” standard, despite the fact this goes against recommendations from medical professionals regarding Chelsea’s gender-related health care needs.
The Obama administration has previously supported appropriate treatment for transgender people in prison, but it appears as though they’re actively reversing that position in order to single out and punish Chelsea. It’s just the latest in a series of blatant attempts by the U.S. government to harass her and silence her important voice.
Thinking about Chelsea fighting for her basic human dignity from inside a sterile military facility, it was hard to swallow the parade of social media posts and headlines about the OUT Magazine cover. A heroic yet sensitive grayscale photo of the President graced the front page, and the article inside lauded his administration’s support for the repeal of “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell,” and for stricter hate crimes legislation.
It went on to call Obama’s “evolution” on marriage equality “something to behold,” quickly glossing over the fact that he maintained throughout his first term that marriage should be between a man and a woman.
Much has been written about how the mainstream gay rights movement’s focus on marriage, the military, and tougher hate crimes is continuously failing to address the needs of the most marginalized LGBTQ people, especially trans women of color, queer youth, homeless folks, immigrants, poor people, and people in prison.
But what I find most concerning about gay rights advocates putting President Obama on the “ally” pedestal isn’t what his administration has failed to do, but what it’s actively doing every day: pushing for foreign and domestic policies that endanger LGBTQ people, deepen our oppression, and contribute to the violence enacted against us.
The Obama Administration’s foreign policy continues the work of the Bush Administration to expand U.S. imperialism and global dominance. In the process, it aids and abets some of the most repressive government regimes in the world, including many with deplorable human rights records, like Saudi Arabia, where LGBTQ people have essentially no protections.
Meanwhile, the President has thrown his full weight behind the massive Trans-Pacific Partnership agreement (TPP), a secretive global deal containing massive policy handouts for pharmaceutical companies that groups like Doctors Without Borders say will be devastating for global access to HIV medication and affordable healthcare, disproportionately affecting LGBTQ people in impoverished countries.
Finally, this administtion has dramatically expanded the U.S. government’s mass surveillance programs, which pose a grave threat to the future of freedom of expression in general, but also amplify the oppression of people with marginalized gender and sexual identities for whom privacy is a matter of survival.
The juxtaposition of Obama’s actual policies with all the buzz about his “historic” photo-op on the cover of the nation’s most popular gay magazine underscores the reality that the mainstream gay rights movement does not speak for, or represent the interests of, the vast majority of LGBTQ people in the world.
As long as Chelsea Manning sits in prison; as long as the U.S. government continues to prop up dictatorships and push for economic policies that exacerbate global inequality; as long as the police and FBI show us again and again that Black Lives don’t matter, that trans lives don’t matter, that we don’t matter; President Obama is not my ally.
— This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.
HRC Foundation Staff Honored for HIV & AIDS Advocacy Work
HRC Foundation Staff Honored for HIV & AIDS Advocacy Work
Last night, HRC Foundation’s Senior Specialist for HIV & AIDS Noel Gordon was honored at the Whitman-Walker Health (WWH) Gala with the Impact Award.
HRC.org
Gay Guy Scores $15 Million Jackpot, But How Much Will His Homophobic Parents Get?
Gay Guy Scores $15 Million Jackpot, But How Much Will His Homophobic Parents Get?
Short answer: not much.
A Reddit user who goes by the name IDontWantToGiveItUp has posted to an advice sub with his seriously first-world problem.
After winning a huge lottery jackpot, he isn’t sure how much of his hard-won cash his parents, who essentially shunned him for being gay as an adolescent, deserve to see.
He writes:
Hey everyone, I’m was told that I should bring my problem to reddit to see what people have to say. But before I do, I feel the need to say that I know it’s a privileged problem to have and I’m not falling all over the place in tears about it. It’s just emotionally weighing on me.
So! I’m a 29yr old guy and I won the lottery. And it’s enough that I don’t have to work ever again if I don’t want too (over 15m). My plans are to take some finance/business courses over a period of time so I can be smart about investments and be responsible with the money. I am terrible at money management. I want to turn it into more money and hopefully get involved in charity. Altruistic I know, but I have always volunteered and it’s part of me.
My problem? My family, mainly my parents, feel they are entitled to 1/4 of the amount. I offered to pay off their mortgages and give them a little sum but that’s not good enough once they found the total amount. My family and I have a cordial relationship but I moved an hour away to get away from my oppressive mother and distant father. My sisters are nice people but we don’t really have a relationship. The definition of distant white middle class family. Boohoo, I know.
When it comes down to it, I don’t feel like they are entitled to anything and I’m being as generous as I can be (which I never said to them, but retrospectively I guess it’s implied). The conversation got ugly and when my mom said, “we raised you”, I immediately thought about how both my parents didn’t talk to me for 5yrs (ages 15-20), when they found out I was gay. And I almost failed highschool because of it. Is that raising someone? Obviously I have hangups.
How do I explain to them what my plans are again and how it doesn’t involve them? Should I speak to a lawyer about it just in case? I can’t see them suing but money makes people do dumb things. I don’t want to ruin the relationships but I feel like the damage is done. I feel like a lot of people are going to say “Fuck them”.
Many echoed the “fuck them” mentality, citing the borderline child abuse in his formative teenage years.
Related: $590 Million Lottery Winner Will Share Massive Winnings Exclusively With Gay Son
One commenter had a much more practical suggestion:
Here is my suggestion: figure out how much it cost to raise you from birth to 15 eg room, food, clothes, health care, school fees, etc. Come up with an amount. Take said amount and donate 10 percent to your favorite charity in their name (they get the tax break), take the rest and put it in a trust that they get when they reach retirement age. They took care of you before you could work, so take care of them after they can’t. Of course speak to an attorney about this.
I agree with most other comments that your parents aren’t great but they are still your parents.
You have a full life ahead of you with one of life’s major concerns taken care of. Enjoy your life, do the things that you love, and be inspirational. I now have to go buy a lottery ticket.
What advice would you give him?
Dan Tracer
Wedding Bells Ring in Trailer for ‘Transparent’ Season 2: WATCH
Wedding Bells Ring in Trailer for ‘Transparent’ Season 2: WATCH
Fans of the hit show Transparent won’t have to wait much longer for the highly anticipated season 2.
To help quench the thirst of the show’s followers, Amazon yesterday released a new teaser trailer that shows the Pfefferman family in its usual state of hilarious dysfunction. From The Verge: “The whole family’s trying to get together for a wedding photo — it looks like Sarah (Amy Landecker) is one of the two brides — but it’s quickly submarined when the photographer calls Maura (Jeffrey Tambor) ‘sir.’”
Transparent returns online for your binging pleasure on December 11.
Watch the trailer, below:
The post Wedding Bells Ring in Trailer for ‘Transparent’ Season 2: WATCH appeared first on Towleroad.
Sean Mandell
Wedding Bells Ring in Trailer for ‘Transparent’ Season 2: WATCH
