Ireland Moves to Protect Gay Teachers in Religious Run Schools

In a move that needs to replicated in the United States, Ireland is moving forward legislation that would grant employment protections to gay, lesbian and bi-sexual teachers even in schools run by religious institutions.  The move is yet another resounding slap in the face to the Roman Catholic Church which for decades - if not centuries - put protecting predators and sadist above protecting children.   Here in America, such religious affiliated schools typically enjoy tax-exempt status and in some instances receive state funds.  To continue to receive these benefit - which I personally would like to see eliminated all together - at a minimum the simple quid pro quo is that such institutions should be required to apply non-discrimination policies to all teachers, gay or straight.  Sadly, it will not happen any time soon give the GOP's self-prostitution to the "godly folk" best known for hatred towards others and wearing ignorance as a badge of honor.  But back to Ireland.  Here are details from The Advocate:

Ireland’s government this week passed an amendment to the Employment Equality Act that would allow LGB employees working in religious-run organizations, such as schools and hospitals, to be out at work without fear of being fired, according to Irish LGBT site The Out Most.

The bill, which on Tuesday passed the first half of the two-chamber Irish legislature, the Seanad, still has to still pass the final stage in the Dáil before it can become law.

Leaders of the INTO LGBT Teachers’ Group cheered the amendment, telling reporters it will have a hugely positive effect on gay, lesbian, and bisexual teachers.

“LGB teachers can be secure in the knowledge that speaking about our families and our relationships, in the same way as our colleagues, and that being gay or lesbian will have no bearing on job security or on prospects for promotion,” said Anne Marie Lillis, the chairwoman of the INTO LGBT Teachers’ Group. “When signed into law this legislation will end the threat of discrimination in primary schools based on sexual orientation.”


Minister of State for Equality Aodhán Ó Ríordáin promised his offices are "working hard" to ensure the measure is enacted before the new school year begins in September. Gay and lesbian workers in other professions have had legal protections from discrimination since the 1990s.  

Exxon Mobil Finaslly Adds Employment Protections for Gays

Before it was acquired by Exxon, Mobil Oil had a full compliment of pro-LGBT polices.  All of those went away after Exxon took control and for years Exxon resisted reinstituting the policies.  Now, perhaps pushed by Barack Obama's non-discrimination executive order applying to all federal contractors, Exxon-Mobil has at last restored LGBT employment protections.  Think Progress has details.  Here are highlights:

For over a decade, ExxonMobil shareholders and company officials have repeatedly voted against extending corporate policy to protect LGBT people from discrimination, earning it the Human Rights Campaign’s lowest ranking for LGBT inclusion among the country’s largest businesses. That reputation just came to an end, as the company has officially added “sexual orientation” and “gender identity” to its officially protected classes.

The company’s newly updated Standards of Business Conduct confirm that the inclusive language is now present. Both sexual orientation and gender identity are explicitly included as protected statuses for both its Equal Employment Opportunity Policy and Harassment in the Workplace Policy.

An ExxonMobil spokesperson confirmed to ThinkProgress that the policies had been updated, adding, “ExxonMobil’s policies prohibit all forms of discrimination in any company workplace, anywhere in the world. ExxonMobil supports a work environment that values diversity and inclusion, and has numerous inclusive programs and policies that help make ExxonMobil a great place to work.”

The policies indicate that they have been “modified for application in the United States.” This suggests that ExxonMobil made the change specifically because of President Obama’s executive order last summer requiring that all contractors of the federal government must have policies protecting their LGBT employees. ExxonMobil was undoubtedly the largest such contractor without a policy.

A suit accusing ExxonMobil of discriminating against gay candidates for job openings in Illinois is ongoing.

LGBT workplace protections are but one factor that the Human Rights Campaign considers on its corporate scorecard, which means ExxonMobil’s rating will not immediately be salvaged by the change.

Far Right in GOP And Christofascists Attack Obama for ENDA Executive Order

The text of President Barack Obama's proposed executive order barring employment discrimination against LGBT employees has not even yet been released and already the Christofascists and their political whores in the GOP are shrieking and carrying on.  Senator Orrin Hatch of Utah is demanding that any executive order contain a religious exemption that is so broad that it is tantamount to a grant of special rights to Christofascists.   The Washington Blade looks at the exemption that Hatch supported in the Senate version of ENDA:

Under the current version of ENDA before Congress, religious institutions, like churches or religious hospitals and schools, could continue to discriminate against LGBT workers in non-ministerial positions even if the bill were to become law. The religious exemption is broader than similar exemptions under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 for categories of race, gender, religion and national origin. 

In my view, the larger problem with such an exemption is that it bears no relation to the intention behind the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution which sought to guarantee that no citizen would (i) be forced to support a religion that they did not adhere to or (ii) find limitations placed on their right to freely worship.  In fact, an exemption such as what Hatch wants would allow the Christofascists to trample of the religious freedom rights of LGBT citizens who have a constitutional right to NOT adhere to Christofascist and far right Muslim beliefs. 

Meanwhile, the hate merchants at Family Research Council are beside themselves over Obama's partial end run around the bar to ENDA that their boot licking GOP members of the House of Representatives have maintained to date.  Right on cue, FRC is whining that the proposed executive order is an attack on Christians and an attack on free speech.   As is ALWAYS the case with FRC it wants special rights for Christofascists.  Here is a sample of the disingenuous drivel and lies on its blog page:

[T]he detrimental impact on employers' and employees' constitutional freedoms of religion, speech, and association.  

Today's announced executive order will give activists a license to challenge their employers whenever they feel aggrieved, exposing those employers to threats of costly legal proceedings and the potential of jeopardizing future contracts. Furthermore, by requiring federal contractors to consider characteristics and behaviors related to a person's sexual orientation or gender identity, this policy will make contractors liable for protecting actual or perceived self-disclosed and fluid identities that may not even be known.  

I'd suggest that if FRC doesn't want protections for LGBT employees, let's open the door for employers to fire far right Christians because  their behavior is clearly a "choice" and is not an immutable characteristic.    Let's treat the "godly folk" the same way that they demand to be allowed to treat others.  I may sound peevish, but I am SO OVER the undeserved deference that religion is afforded even though it has caused more wars, deaths and unbridled hatred than almost any other thing across history.

 

Obama to Sign LGBT Nondiscrimination Executive Order

With ENDA blocked in the House of Representatives, Barack Obama has finally indicated that he will sign an LGBT nondiscrimination executive order applicable across the federal government and federal government contractors.   In my view, the move is long over due and, the cynic in me suspects that Obama has finally made this move in the hope of re-energizing LGBT voters - and donors to the Democratic Party - in the run up to the 2014 midterm elections.  Sadly, it is a pattern that we have seen before with Obama.    Meanwhile, it goes without saying that the Christofascists will be wailing and letting out spittle flecked shrieks that Obama is destroying America.  MetroWeekly looks at this new development.  Here are excerpts:

President Barack Obama will take executive action to prohibit federal contractors from LGBT workplace discrimination.

According to a White House official, Obama has directed his staff to prepare an executive order for his signature prohibiting federal contractors from discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity — a move long sought by LGBT-rights advocates that builds upon Obama’s legacy as the strongest LGBT ally to ever occupy the White House.

“The action would build upon existing protections, which generally prohibit federal contractors and subcontractors from discriminating in employment decisions on the basis of race, color, religion, sex, or national origin,” the White House official told Metro Weekly. “This is consistent with the President’s views that all Americans, LGBT or not, should be treated with dignity and respect.”

For more than two years Obama’s White House has been forced to defend a broken campaign promise made by Obama when he was a candidate for president in February 2008. It was then that Obama filled out a presidential-candidate questionnaire for the Houston GLBT Political Caucus indicating he would support a nondiscrimination policy that includes sexual orientation and gender identity for federal contractors.

At the beginning of this year Obama announced a shifting strategy to use his pen to take executive action when Congress won’t act. While that strategy has been applied to minimum wage, with Obama signing an executive order to raise minimum wage for federal contractors while the White House still pushes for federal legislation raising the minimum wage for all Americans, and to narrowing the income gap between genders, the White House has found itself in a contradictory position on the executive order for LGBT federal contractors.

The Senate approved ENDA 64-32 last November, but the the bill has languished in the Republican-controlled House of Representatives where Speaker John Boehner has voiced his opposition to the bill and refused to allow it to come up for a vote, although the bill has continued to gain bipartisan support as recently as last week.

It is not yet clear when Obama will sign the executive order, but with an appearance scheduled Tuesday at the Democratic National Committee’s LGBT gala in New York City and the White House’s annual LGBT Pride Month reception set for June 30, it seems likely Obama will address his decision to sign the executive order in the coming days.

When Obama does attach his signature to that executive order, it will further cement his legacy on LGBT rights. The first sitting American president to openly endorse same-sex marriage, he has all but ensured that a Democrat will never again be able to run for the White House without supporting marriage equality.

I do appreciate what Obama has done.  I simply find it disheartening that on every advancement, he has needed to be dragged forward instead of demonstrating leadership. 

Virginia Chief Justice Kinser to Step Down

Kinser with George Allen - 2011

Virginia Chief Justice Cynthia Kinser has announced that she will step down from the court this year.  Kinser, who was a law school classmate appointed to the court by our mutual classmate, George Allen, proved herself to be no friend of LGBT equality when I argued before the Court in Moore v. Virginia Museum of Natural History and, indeed seem outraged by my suggestion that anti-gay discrimination should be ruled illegal under Virginia's laws banning employment discrimination based on religious belief.  As the plethora of same sex marriage cases have made clear, the sole motivation to discriminate and against gays always proves to be religion.  Sadly, Kinser displayed a mindset much like that of the members of the Virginia Supreme Court who twice upheld Virginia's ban on interracial marriage before the U.S. Supreme Court stepped in an struck down the law in Loving v. Virginia.  Virginia has a long history of being on the wrong side of history and Kinser maintained that tradition during her tenure on the Court.  Here are highlights from the Washington Post:

The first female chief justice of the Virginia Supreme Court plans to retire this year.

Justice Cynthia D. Kinser — first appointed to the state’s high court in 1997 and elected by her peers as chief justice in February 2011 — announced in a news release that she intends to step down from her post this year. Kristi S. Wright, a court spokeswoman, said Kinser wants to spend more time with her husband and travel.

Kinser, a Lee County, Va., native who received her law degree from the University of Virginia, was the first woman to be selected as chief justice of Virginia’s Supreme Court. She worked previously as a federal magistrate judge and as the commonwealth’s attorney for Lee County.

The Court continues to be reactionary overall and one can only hope that Gov. McAuliffe will nominate a replacement who understands that Virginia needs to move forcefully into the 21st century rather than try to maintain the 19th century.

Chrysler Joins Push for LGBT Non-Discrimination Protections

Based on Chrysler's announcement that it is joining with  Michigan's two largest regional chambers of commerce to push for expanded non-discrimination protections for LGBT Michigan citizens, it is safe to predict that the hate group American Family Association and its putative One Million Bitches Moms will be launching a boycott against the auto manufacturer.  Yet, Chrysler is not apologizing and has stated that expanded non-discrimination protections for LGBT citizens are a business issue. Just as noted many times on this blog, the lack of such protections impedes the ability of businesses, cities and states to attract the best and brightest talent.   Here are highlights from Gay South Florida:

MACKINAC ISLAND, Mich. -- Chrysler and Michigan's two largest regional chambers of commerce on Thursday joined a business-backed push for an update of state law to prohibit discrimination because of sexual orientation or gender identity, an issue Gov. Rick Snyder said lawmakers should consider later this year.

"It's a business issue," said Rick Baker, president and CEO of the Grand Rapids Area Chamber of Commerce. "We've had companies in our area express concern about their ability to attract and retain talent. We wanted to address their concerns ... and create a climate where everyone feels welcome in Michigan."

The announcement at the Detroit Regional Chamber's Mackinac Policy Conference was no accident. The annual gathering attracts more than 1,500 of the state's top business, political and civic leaders, and Snyder — in his strongest comments to date — said he opposes discrimination and urged legislators to consider the issue later this year.

Read more here: http://miamiherald.typepad.com/gaysouthflorida/2014/05/chrysler-joins-push-to-bar-anti-gay-discrimination.html#storylink=cpy

Under Michigan law, it is illegal to discriminate based on religion, race, color, national origin, age, sex, height, weight, familial status or marital status. Efforts to add sexual orientation and gender identity to the list have stalled because of Republicans' concerns about infringing on employers' religious freedom.

Read more here: http://miamiherald.typepad.com/gaysouthflorida/2014/05/chrysler-joins-push-to-bar-anti-gay-discrimination.html#storylink=cpy

Earlier this month, AT&T, Blue Cross Blue Shield and other companies launched the coalition to push for adding legal protections for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people. Those who signed on Thursday on Mackinac Island also include Kellogg, Pfizer and other businesses.

Brad Williams, vice president of government relations for the Detroit Regional Chamber, said it is time to address the law that people view as discriminatory.

"We know that the Legislature needs to hear from the business community to push this issue up to the top," he said. "We plan on spending the summer talking to them a lot on the issue, and we're hopeful that come fall we'll be able to take it up and get the issue off the table."

Sadly, no matter how much common sense LGBT employment protections make from a business point of view, the Christofascist will never willingly support them because an inherent part of the Christofascist mindset is a perverse sick need to condemn and discriminate against others.   Simply put, they are not nice or decent people.

Read more here: http://www.miamiherald.com/2014/05/29/4144638/chrysler-others-join-effort-to.html#storylink=cpyS

Read more here: http://www.miamiherald.com/2014/05/29/4144638/chrysler-others-join-effort-to.html#storylink=cpy

Read more here: http://miamiherald.typepad.com/gaysouthflorida/2014/05/chrysler-joins-push-to-bar-anti-gay-discrimination.html#storylink=cpy

 

Past Government Efforts to Drive Gays From Jobs

In their ridiculous brief in the Pennsylvania marriage case, defenders of state sponsored anti-gay discrimination made arguments that gays don't face discrimination and/or, that if they do, things are getting better,  Therefore, banning same sex marriage is fine. Obviously, the authors of the brief either were outright lying - a common Christofascist phenomenon - or their are trapped in the alternate fantasy world of the Christofascists to whom they are prostituting themselves.  Gays DO face ongoing discrimination, especially on the work front.  A piece in the New York Times looks at past government efforts to weed out and fire LGBT employees.  Behind it all, as always is ultimately hate filled religious belief akin to that which used the Bible to justify slavery and later segregation.   Here are some article highlights:

Days after President Lyndon B. Johnson’s election to his first full term, an administration official asked a subordinate to explain the policy on firing gays. In particular, he wondered whether someone with a history of gay liaisons could, through years of marriage, be “rehabilitated” into a trustworthy civil servant.

The response came quickly, and in language that would be shocking by today’s standards. Technically, rehabilitated gays could keep their jobs. But John W. Steele, a staff member of the Civil Service Commission, which handled personnel matters for the government, said that seldom happened.

“Some feel that ‘once a homo, always a homo,’ ” Mr. Steele wrote. He added, “Our tendency to ‘lean over backwards’ to rule against a homosexual is simply a manifestation of the revulsion which homosexuality inspires in the normal person.”

It was November 1964. Four months earlier, the president had signed the landmark Civil Rights Act banning discrimination on the basis of race, religion, sex and national origin. The policies laid out in Mr. Steele’s memo would continue for more than another decade.

[D]ocuments newly obtained by a gay-rights group offer new details about the views that drove the government’s sometimes obsessive effort to identify and fire gays in government jobs.

Memos like Mr. Steele’s, and formerly classified documents on an F.B.I. program called Sex Deviate, provide stark evidence of how for decades the government considered gay men and women to be immoral, and not to be trusted with even the most mundane bureaucratic tasks.

“These memorandums were not meant for the outside world to see,” said Charles Francis, a gay-rights advocate with the Mattachine Society of Washington. “It’s a tide of human indignation.”

For the past two years, Mr. Francis has been collecting documents on the government’s anti-gay policies, filling a gap that he sees in the archives of the gay-rights movement.

“There were two obsessions at the F.B.I. One was communism. The other was gays,” said Douglas M. Charles, a Pennsylvania State University professor who is writing a book on the F.B.I. and gays and who independently reviewed some of the same documents that Mr. Francis examined.

Under Mr. Hoover’s Sex Deviate program, the F.B.I. collected information on people suspected of being gay and passed it on to government agencies and, sometimes, the news media. The F.B.I. had a network of informants, including doctors, helping alert the authorities to what was seen as a growing national security threat, Dr. Charles said.

[T]he F.B.I. incinerated 330,000 pages of documents related to the program in 1977, leaving behind only a few scattered records. So efforts by people like Mr. Francis to make public the remaining documents, along with documents from elsewhere in government, are invaluable to historians and researchers, he said.

In 1975, in the face of lawsuits and protests, the government rescinded its policy that being gay, by itself, was enough to justify being fired. Today it is unlawful for the federal government to fire employees based on sexual orientation.

There is, however, no federal law prohibiting discrimination by private employers. Advocates have pushed for such a measure for years and repeatedly have called on President Obama to ban, by presidential decree, discrimination against gays who work for federal contractors.

Read the entire article.  It is  very sad that so many lives were damaged or ruined because of bigotry stemming ultimately from religious belief.   So many men and women were deprived of their dignity and their livelihoods - also that ultimately the "godly folk" could smugly feel superior and good about themselves.  Religion is truly evil in general and the evil done in religion's name far outweighs and positive outcomes. 

Gay Rights Push Shifts Focus to the South

One of the most anti-gay parts of the country is the South where racism, Bible thumping and dislike of anyone "different" tends to be the norm, especially in regions like Southwest Virginia where it's as if a frightening time warp exists and it's still the early 1950's.  Things are even worse in Alabama, Mississippi and parts of other southern states.  Hence, it is no surprise that belatedly Gay Inc. is finally shifting its attention to area where anti-gay animus tends to be the norm, all too often fanned by fundamentalists and Southern Baptists.  The New York Times looks at this shift in focus which for many LGBT individuals cannot come soon enough.  Here are excerpts:

The country’s leading gay rights groups and donors, after a decade focused on legalizing same-sex marriage, are embarking on a major drive to win more basic civil rights and workplace protections in Southern and Western states where the rapid progress of the movement has largely eluded millions of gay men and lesbians.

The effort will shift tens of millions of dollars in the next few years to what advocates described as the final frontier for gay rights: states like Mississippi, Georgia, Arkansas and Texas, where Republicans dominate elected office and traditional cultural views on homosexuality still prevail.

The new strategy reflects the growing worry within the movement that recent legal and political successes have formed two quickly diverging worlds for lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender Americans: one centered on the coasts and major cities, and another stretching across the South and up through the Rocky Mountains, in states where gays enjoy virtually no legal protections against discrimination.

“We can’t allow two distinct gay Americas to exist,” said Tim Gill, a Colorado philanthropist whose foundation is putting about $25 million into a handful of mostly conservative-leaning states over the next five years. “Everybody should have the same rights and protections regardless of where they were born and where they live.”

The push is likely to encounter resistance. Gay rights groups will be engaging in communities where churches and other religious institutions are tightly woven into daily life, and where efforts to expand civil rights protections to gays are sometimes viewed as an attack on people of faith.

One early test of the new effort will come in Houston next month, when the mayor, Annise D. Parker, will seek to pass an ordinance forbidding businesses and city agencies to discriminate against residents based on sexual identity, race or gender.

In some states, organizations like the Human Rights Campaign, the American Civil Liberties Union and groups Mr. Gill helps fund plan to lobby for nondiscrimination ordinances in housing and employment and for legislation allowing gay parents to adopt. In other states, they are building new grass-roots organizations and pushing for the election of openly gay and lesbian officials where there.

In a nod to the dominant political culture in the South and West, the effort will rely heavily on outreach to Republicans and clergy, as well as to African-American civil rights organizations. Gay rights leaders are also quietly forging partnerships with major corporations based in Southern and Western cities, hoping to leverage their ties to Republican officials. 

“The prevalence of the closet presents a challenge far greater than what we’ve seen in the other regions of the country,” said Chad H. Griffin, president of the Human Rights Campaign, which is opening up field offices in Mississippi, Alabama and Arkansas in an effort to build stronger ties to schools, religious institutions and political cultural leaders. “You risk being kicked out of your home. You risk discrimination on the job or being fired. You risk rejection at your place of religious celebration.”

Gay rights leaders are also worried that future court victories could leave gay men and lesbians in some states mired in a legal paradox: They might be free to marry but could still lose their jobs in the 29 states where it remains legal to fire employees for their sexual orientation.

Yes, as always seems to be the case, religion and professional Christians milking the ignorant for money via gay bashing will be the primary obstacles.  Ironically, some of the Christofascists have recently described gays as "leeches," yet if there is any parasite it's the folks like Tony Perkins, Maggie Gallagher, Brian Brown and Victoria Cobb who suck money from those who are often least able to pay.

 

Can Democrats Force an ENDA Vote in the House of Representatives?

John Boehner - Anti-gay douche bag

Poll after poll shows that a significant majorities of Americans support employment non-discrimination protections for LGBT employees.   Perhaps equally significant is the fact that a majority of Americans think such protections are already in place even though in 29 states no such protections exist.  Yet despite this reality Republicans in the House of Representatives intent on prostituting themselves to Christofascist extremist have consistently killed efforts to pass the Employment Non-Discrimination Act.  Since the Senate passed the bill last year, the ever despicable John Boehner will not allow the bill to even come up on the floor for a vote.  Now, a move may be a foot by Democrats to force a vote despite GOP intransigence.  Here are highlights from MetroWeekly:

With congressional Democrats seeking to force a vote on immigration reform in the Republican-controlled House of Representatives through the use of a discharge petition, the White House indicated Wednesday its openness to using a similar strategy to pass LGBT workplace protections.

Earlier Wednesday, House Democrats launched a discharge petition on immigration reform. A rare legislative maneuver that requires 218 signatures to be successful, a discharge petition would allow Democrats to bypass Republican leadership and bring immigration reform to the House floor for a vote. Few, however, are predicting the chamber's 199 Democrats will be able to secure enough signatures from their Republican colleagues to force a vote on an immigration-reform bill that mirrors one passed by the Senate last year. Still, the move did draw headlines and praise from President Barack Obama.

Asked if Obama would support a similar strategy for approving the Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA) — another bill that achieved bipartisan Senate approval before being blocked by Republican leadership in the House — a White House spokesman said the administration would welcome any efforts to secure a vote on ENDA.

Using a discharge petition to force a House vote on ENDA, which would prohibit most employers from discriminating in hiring on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity, has been a strategy mentioned by ENDA supporters long before the Senate approved the measure last November. And much like immigration reform, ENDA supporters on and off Capitol Hill have voiced confidence that if House Speaker John Boehner were to allow ENDA to come for a vote, the bill would pass.

But while Republican votes might be there in the House, that doesn't necessarily mean those potential "Yea" votes would sign a discharge petition. During a roundtable discussion with a small group of reporters the day before the Senate passed ENDA, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid dismissed the possibility of a discharge petition, noting that Boehner has reined in his caucus from participating in such a legislative maneuver before.

"The work ahead of us is to get to 218 members, from both parties, on the record supporting ENDA," said Human Rights Campaign Vice President Fred Sainz. "We're keeping our eye on that prize."

I for one will not be holding my breath waiting for a discharge petition to succeed.  Sadly, I will not be holding my breath waiting for Barack Obama to grow a spine and sign an ENDA executive order.   In fact, my response to Democrats seeking campaign contributions is that I will consider donating as soon as Obama signs such an executive order.   My location of the LGBT ATM is closed.

Virginia Senate Democrats Announce Push to Expand Gay Rights

If there was any question as to which of the two main political parties supports equality for gay Virginians and which one wants to keep gays inferior - if not outright criminalized - this session of the Virginia General Assembly should make the contrast between the Democrats and the GOP crystal clear.  As Virginia Senate Democrats announce a push for making Virginia less vitriolically anti-gay, over in the GOP controlled House of Delegates anti-gay Republicans are stating that they will kill any effort to begin the repeal of the Marshall-Newman Amendment this legislative session.  The Richmond Times Dispatch looks at the announced Democrat initiative.  Here are highlights:

Just two days after fellow party members were installed as governor, lieutenant governor and attorney general, Virginia Senate Democrats unveiled a legislative agenda to expand gay rights in the commonwealth.

Proposed legislation would codify nondiscrimination laws protecting gays in the state workforce, and allow public colleges, universities and localities to extend benefits to same-sex partners.

Lawmakers also propose an amendment to the Virginia Constitution that would repeal the 2006 Marshall-Newman amendment. It underpins Virginia's ban on same-sex marriages.

“Clearly the tide of history is on our side, the moral arc of the universe is bending in our direction,” Sen. A. Donald McEachin, D-Henrico told reporters at a news conference at the Capitol announcing what the caucus termed its “Equality Plan.”

McEachin's Senate Bill 248 would codify the executive order new Gov. Terry McAuliffe signed on Saturday providing workplace protections. Senate Bill 252 would allow partners benefits to public employees.

The senator said 21 states have employment discrimination protection for gays, a position endorsed by the Northern Virginia Technology Council.

Sen. Adam Ebbin, D-Alexandria, announced SJ1, which would repeal the marriage amendment passed in 2006 by Del. Robert G. Marshall, R-Prince William and Sen. Stephen Newman, R-Lynchburg.  “Our marriage laws are becoming more antiquated every day,” said Ebbin, who described the current amendment regulating marriage as between a man and a woman, a “stain” on the constitution at odds with federal laws and the policies of neighbors like Maryland and the District of Columbia.

Making history this legislative session, however, is likely to be extremely difficult. A 2-1 Republican majority in the House of Delegates presents steadfast opposition to much of the agenda the Democrats announced Monday.

Several children wearing badges identifying themselves as members of the socially conservative Family Foundation, which opposes gay marriage, occupied seats at the news conference.

Passage of the some of the proposed legislation in the Virginia Senate, however, could put pressure on House members to cast votes in committee against bills for which a majority of Virginians have indicated support in surveys.

Two things outside the legislative realm would help further gay rights in Virginia: (i) the Southern Poverty Law Center needs to designate The Family Foundation as a hate group and (ii) the IRS needs to revoke The Family Foundation's tax exempt status.  The Family Foundation is 100% involved in politics and advocates for and against legislation - something forbidden by the Internal Revenue Code.

Terry McAuliffe Bans Discrimination Against LGBT State Employees

Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe on Saturday signed an executive order banning discrimination against LGBT state employees. (Photo by Bob Brown/Richmond Times-Dispatch)

Remaining true to his word Terry McAuliffe made signing an Executive Oder banning discriminating against gays by state agencies and departments his first act after being sworn in as Governor of Virginia today.  While the action may be more symbolic than anything else in light of the Virginia Supreme Court's conduct in the case of Moore v. Virginia Museum of Natural History, McAuliffe's approach to gay rights and gay equality is 180 degrees opposite of that to now former Governor Bob "Taliban Bob" McDonnell.  The Washington Blade looks at McAuliffe making good on one of his port elections promises (I'm sure that gnashing of teeth and flying spittle were the order of the day at The Family Foundation, a Richmond based hate group affiliated with Family Research Council and Focus on the Anus Family):

RICHMOND, Va.—Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe on Saturday signed an executive order that bans discrimination against LGBT state employees.

“An open and welcoming state is critical to the 21st century economy, but it’s also imperative for justice and fairness,” said McAuliffe during his inaugural address he gave after officially taking office.

McAuliffe repeatedly promised during his campaign against then-Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli that the first executive order he would sign as governor is a ban on anti-LGBT discrimination against state employees. Former Gov. Bob McDonnell did not issue such a mandate, but U.S. Sens. Tim Kaine and Mark Warner as governor banned discrimination against state employees based on their sexual orientation.

Julian Walker of the Virginian-Pilot reported gender identity and expression for the first time was included in the anti-discrimination order.

McAuliffe also publicly supports marriage rights for same-sex couples.

His inauguration took place against the backdrop of two federal lawsuits challenging Virginia’s constitutional amendment that bans gay nuptials.

It remains unclear whether the former Democratic National Committee chair and Attorney General Mark Herring will defend the ban that Virginia voters approved in 2006 by a 57-43 percent margin.

McAuliffe will face fierce opposition from the GOP controlled House of Delegates but it will be a refreshing change to have a governor who sees all Virginians, gay or straight, worthy of equality under the civil laws.

Where Does the Gay Rights Movement Go in 2014?

A new year dawns over Hampton Roads harbor - Norfolk Naval Base is right of center

In many ways, 2013 was a momentous year for gay rights with the addition of more states granting marriage equality and, of course the ruling in United States v. Windsor, which has led to the federal government and its agencies recognizing gay marriages regardless of couples' state of residence.  Here in Virginia November saw the election of a slate of Democrats to statewide office all of whom endorse full gay marriage.  Yet in 29 states, LGBT citizens can still be fired at will from their jobs and left with little legal recourse.  Here in Virginia, even state employees continue to lack statutory protections from summary firing.  And we continue to see anti-gay bullying fully sanctioned by numerous hate groups masquerading as "family values" organization underscoring the fact that religion - fundamentalist religion in particular - in general remains the enemy of LGBT equality.   Socially, in urban areas, gays are increasingly accepted as demonstrated by the neighborhood New Year's Eve party we attended along with a dozen other gays (some Republicans at the party were brutal in their comments on the Christofascists).  So where do things go from here?  A piece in The Daily Beast ponders on this question.  Here are excerpts:

“On one level, our movement has been a staggering, if controversial, success; yet on another level, gay and lesbian people remain profoundly stigmatized, struggling against the same crises—in health, violence, discrimination and social services—that have plagued us for decades.”

These words were written not in 2013 but in 1995, in Virtual Equality: The Mainstreaming of Gay and Lesbian Liberation, a seminal text by prominent activist and intellectual Urvashi Vaid.  But the words ring true today.  Here we are, ending what some are calling “the greatest year in gay rights”—and yeah, it’s been a big year from the unprecedented legal breakthroughs, especially in marriage equality, to the cultural markers of more and more celebrities and sports figures coming out of the closet. And yet it’s not just that declaring victory in the culture war, or even in skirmishes, feels premature—as though minimizing the enduring and infectious influence of the right-wing backlash. Even more, with 2013 over, we should ask whether all the achievements so far—and the path on which the LGBT movement is headed—indeed add up to true equality and liberation.

I always thought I was fighting for the right to be different from straight folks, not the same—that the quest of liberation meant that I should have equal rights and treatment regardless of those differences, rather than accessing basic rights and equality only if I conformed to a heterosexual norm.  In other words, my family should be recognized and respected whether my partner and I get married or not.

[T]he more interesting question at this juncture is whether the attainment of hetero-normative rights leads to homo-liberation and social justice more broadly.  On the one hand, ending bans on gay folks in the military is arguably a form of co-optation that serves to reinforce a military-police industrial complex that has historically been hostile toward “deviant” sexuality. . . . On the other hand, does the lovable mainstream Ellen DeGeneres being on television make it possible for the trans actress Laverne Cox to be on television?  Arguably.  And arguably both make it easier for LGBT folks across the country and around the world to express their identities and their desires. 

We should certainly celebrate the great leaps forward for gay rights in 2013, in marriage equality but also with cultural markers and especially polls showing that the public is becoming more accepting. But in 2014, we must revisit the guiding philosophy of the gay movement and whether our strategies and tactics are pursuing liberation for all—gay and straight, black white and brown, women and men and trans—or merely some. . . . . If 2013 was the year that Americans of all stripes and social movements joined the careening bandwagon for gay rights, may 2014 be the year in which the LGBT movement returns the favor with a vision of liberation for all.

Here in Virginia huge amounts of work needs to be done.  Homophobia remains rampant in the black community and in rural areas.  Virginia still lacks any meaningful anti-bullying laws.  And the foul hate group, The Family Foundation, continues to push the Virginia GOP to oppose rights and dignity for LGBT Virginians.