Last month, a video clip of a 12-year-old girl coming out as gay in front of her Mormon church in Utah went viral. Her parents were supportive of her, but her story was interrupted when the microphone was shut off. The church leader then asked the girl, Savannah, to sit down.

After that, a lot of people took Savannah’s side, commending her for her courage and criticizing the church for silencing a child who spoke of something that is so important to her. Last month, she was interviewed in an episode of the Mormon gay podcast “I like to look for rainbows.” Her situation highlights a problem that many people face–how to balance being LGBT with their faith.

But Savannah’s story hasn’t quieted down. Last week, Mormon blogger Scott Gordon criticized Savannah and her parents for giving the speech during the weekly testimony meeting. He wrote that the media is wrongly trying to paint the church leader who interrupted her as the bad guy. Gordon wrote:

This isn’t about whether a girl is struggling with her sexuality, or about how a Church leader handled it. This is a clear case of hijacking a meeting, promoting false teachings, and exploiting a child’s inexperience to create a media event.

Savannah’s mother, Heather Kester, said that those words hurt. But she hopes that in the long run, her daughter’s speech could help bring about some positive change in the church. Savannah said she wanted to support other LGBT Mormons. “There’s been a lot of homicides or deaths, and a lot of them have been kicked out from their house because they have not been accepted by their parents, and that’s really hard,” she said.

The Mormon Church differentiates between “having homosexual feelings,” and acting on those feelings. According to a column on the website of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, “People who experience same-sex attraction or identify as gay, lesbian, or bisexual can make and keep covenants with God and fully and worthily participate in the Church.” However, as soon as they act on those feelings, they commit a sin.

Last fall, the Mormon Church added a web page to its official website, in support of people that are Mormon and identify as LGBT. But the site still carries the same message; that being gay is wrong. It states that a marriage is to be between a man and a woman and that “will not change,” and warns that sexual desire can be fluid, so that young people shouldn’t rush to conclusions about their sexuality.

Many gay Mormons say this approach is not good enough. As recently as 2015, the church adopted a new policy that said same-sex couples who are married are to be seen as apostates. They could be forced to undergo disciplinary hearings and could be kicked out of the church. Children of a same-sex couple could not join the Mormon church until after they turn 18, and only after moving out from their parent’s home and publicly disavowing same-sex marriage.

This little girl is so brave. I think we can all learn something from her. Great job Savannah. ️‍https://t.co/qlaWuYQtsf

— Ally ️‍ (@ALeeStevens) June 18, 2017

“No part of me is a mistake. I do not choose to be this way, and it is not a fad,” Savannah said in her speech. This is a very brave thing to say when you are 12 years old. And she doesn’t seem to regret it, it even though the leader of the church cut her short by switching off the microphone.

“I think they did that because they didn’t want my message,” Savannah said on Wednesday. “I don’t want to be mean to them if this isn’t true, but I felt like they were scared of me and what I was saying.”

Emma Von Zeipel

Emma Von Zeipel is a staff writer at Law Street Media. She is originally from one of the islands of Stockholm, Sweden. After working for Democratic Voice of Burma in Thailand, she ended up in New York City. She has a BA in journalism from Stockholm University and is passionate about human rights, good books, horses, and European chocolate. Contact Emma at EVonZeipel@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Mormon Church Cut Off Microphone When Young Girl Came Out as Gay appeared first on Law Street.

He is often caricatured as an iron-fisted, shirtless, horseback-riding, murderous regime-supporting paragon of machismo. But Russians also have a sense of humor. So in 2013, during gay rights protests, an image of Russian President Vladimir Putin made up as a clown with mascara, long eyelashes, and lipstick became a popular symbol of resistance.

On Wednesday, Russia officially banned the image, calling it a form of “extremism.” It is illegal to share the image on the internet, because it implies “the supposed nonstandard sexual orientation of the president of the Russian Federation.” Naturally, Twitter had a field day:

Sharing this illegal picture of Putin as a gay clown. #ThingsIWontApologizeFor pic.twitter.com/KiaIbJW6nX

— Allensaurus Rex (@allenrw81) April 6, 2017

Oh no! It’s Putin the Gay Clown!!! Why doesn’t Putin like this image, he looks so pretty!#theresistance #russiagate pic.twitter.com/dVf75py21c

— Queen du Tout (@Gravityisback1) April 6, 2017

It is now illegal in Russia to share an image of Putin as a gay clown.

Guess what motherf*ucker America is still a free nation… for now. pic.twitter.com/xsG0Nma7KA

— Impeach Donald Trump (@Impeach_D_Trump) April 6, 2017

In the summer of 2013, Russians took to the streets to protest Russia’s homophobic laws and repression of the gay community. Wielding the Putin-as-a-pretty-clown meme, protesters opposed Russia’s new laws banning the propagandizing “nontraditional sexual relations” to children. Russian officials beat and arrested scores of protesters.

The LGBT community in Russia suffers from a variety of oppressive, draconian laws. In January 2015, a law passed that made it illegal for transgender people, or others with “disorders,” to operate a vehicle. In October of that year, the Russian government proposed a law that would deem public displays of non-heterosexual orientation–kissing or holding hands, for instance–a criminal act.

While the new Kremlin directive does not explicitly name a single image, it casts a wide net, banning pictures of a Putin-like figure “with eyes and lips made up.” One Russian news outlet suspects a meme of Putin and Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev, both with make up, clutching a bouquet of flowers, is the banned image:

В РФ признали экстремистским плакат с накрашенными Путиным и Медведевым https://t.co/HhJvROd6Bl

— Gordonua.com (@Gordonuacom) April 5, 2017

To clear up any confusion, this Twitter user compiled all of the potentially banned images in one handy tweet:

Did anyone get the meme-o on which gay-clown images #Putin has banned in Russia? Was it any of these? #stophomophobia pic.twitter.com/ljrUm7Pmo8

— Jason ’Toole (@jayrotoole) April 6, 2017

Alec Siegel

Alec Siegel is a staff writer at Law Street Media. When he’s not working at Law Street he’s either cooking a mediocre tofu dish or enjoying a run in the woods. His passions include: gooey chocolate chips, black coffee, mountains, the Animal Kingdom in general, and John Lennon. Baklava is his achilles heel. Contact Alec at ASiegel@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Russia Outlaws Images Depicting Putin as a Gay-Friendly Clown appeared first on Law Street.

Taiwan is poised to become the first country in Asia to legalize same-sex marriage. Lawmakers from the country’s ruling Democratic Progressive Party are working on three marriage equality bills at the moment, one of which is expected to pass within the next few months.

Relative to the rest of Asia, Taiwan is progressive in its social attitudes. Polls suggest most citizens, especially young people, support same-sex marriage, and President Tsai Ing-wen, Taiwan’s first female leader, is a marriage equality advocate as well. “Every person should be able to look for love freely, and freely seek their own happiness,” she said at the gay pride parade in Taipei, the largest in Asia, last year. This year’s parade drew thousands of people.

Taiwan has a vibrant LGBT community. Unlike some other Asian nations, same-sex intercourse is legal in Taiwan, as is sexual reassignment surgery. Discrimination based on sexual orientation is banned in workplaces and schools. Taipei has a “gay village,” with gay bars and shops. McDonald’s aired a commercial in Taiwan in which a son tells his father he is gay (over a McCafe coffee). The video came out on YouTube in March, and has garnered over two million views and thousands of likes.

If Taiwan legalizes same-sex marriage over the next few months, it will become the first Asian nation to do so (including the Middle East), and will join a list of over 20 countries that have done the same. Taiwanese citizens seem to support marriage equality, including 80 percent of people ages 20 to 29, according to one recent study.

A 2013 poll found that 53 percent of Taiwan supports gay marriage, with Catholics and Protestants as the main opposition, though both groups combined only account for six percent of the entire population. LGBT people still struggle with coming out to their parents and grandparents, as homosexuality is still a taboo among older generations.

Friction exists among lawmakers as well. Some members of the main opposition Nationalist Party’s Central Standing Committee oppose same-sex marriage. In 2013, they helped halt a bill that would have legalized same sex marriage. But as the effort is gaining support among the public and the Legislative Yuan (Taiwan’s lawmaking body), same-sex marriages will likely be a reality in Taiwan soon enough.

President Tsai would certainly like to lead her country in that direction. “In the face of love, everyone is equal,” she said.

Alec Siegel

Alec Siegel is a staff writer at Law Street Media. When he’s not working at Law Street he’s either cooking a mediocre tofu dish or enjoying a run in the woods. His passions include: gooey chocolate chips, black coffee, mountains, the Animal Kingdom in general, and John Lennon. Baklava is his achilles heel. Contact Alec at ASiegel@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Taiwan Set to Become First Asian Nation to Legalize Same-Sex Marriage appeared first on Law Street.

Before choosing a college or university, many LGBTQ students, staff, and faculty consider how many resources–or the lack thereof–a school has for them. This scrutiny is a necessary part of researching schools because there are many legal barriers to LGBTQ students’ safety on college and university campuses. So what are some of these legal hurdles that LGBTQ students face and try to change on campus?

Challenges Facing LGBTQ Students

LGBTQ students–particularly LGBTQ students of color–face tremendous (and often violent) barriers on college campuses. Lacking a federal legal incentive to protect LGBTQ students on the basis of their sexual orientation or gender identity, college administrations often allow unsafe conditions for LGBTQ students who are constantly subjected to both everyday microaggressions and harassment on campus. LGBTQ students face threats and harassment from other students on campus at a disproportionate rate, including many gay students reporting the use of gay slurs against them while walking alone on campus. A full third of LGB students and staff on college campuses have considered leaving their institution due to campus environments that perpetuate homophobia. Because of these kinds of hostilities, more than half of all LGBT students and staff hide their identity to avoid discrimination and harassment. Even this measure does not even help, however: online forms of harassment, including public outing, contribute to gay students committing suicide, often embodied by the famous case of Tyler Clementi at Rutgers several years ago.

Obstacles for Transgender Students 

Transgender students face a series of unique challenges. Due to the immense legal obstacles (which vary state by state) to obtaining the legal name changes that allow transgender students’ identities to match the names on their ID cards, class rosters, certificates, and school email addresses, many colleges leave transgender students open to being outed on their first day of class as professors read out rosters with students’ incorrect name listed. Without implementing streamlined policies that allow students to enter their preferred name instead of their legal name on all public campus documents, colleges subject transgender students to the kind of unsafe conditions that lead to all sorts of discrimination and harassment.

For transgender and gender nonconforming students in particular, the administrative and legal obstacles to staying safe on campus–even in states that already prohibit discrimination based on gender expression and identity and sexual orientation–are immense, and include daily struggles from consistent misgendering to threats of violence when students simply need to use the restroom. As one transgender student, Zo Anthony Shay, a fourth-year student at UCLA, says, “Every time I took a piss [on campus], I need to look around so I don’t have my face smashed into a wall…We’re fighting for our lives.”

Some states like Kentucky and Texas, are considering criminalizing transgender people who use the restroom that matches their gender identity. This will pose a tremendous problem to campuses in those states, and increases the impetus for LGBT campus activists to ensure that their schools have gender-neutral restrooms to ensure that transgender and gender non-conforming students will not risk severe health issues and violence  for simply using the restroom. This has the potential to be a particular problem for transwomen at women’s colleges in states that do not protect people on the basis of gender identity and expression.

According to Genny Beemyn, the director of the Stonewall Center at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst,

Trans students and allies have been working now for a number of years at many schools to create gender-inclusive bathrooms and gender-inclusive housing options, because those are pretty basic – to have a place to sleep and a place to pee…They’re looking now to address other important issues, and so gender in name documentation, hormones and surgeries are coming up more and more frequently for schools that have really begun to address transgender issues.

The hormones and surgery coverage that Beemyn refers to brings into question the kinds of health care plans that colleges provide to students and college employees. While only 63 colleges and universities across the country cover transgender-related health care for students, including therapy, hormones, and gender affirmation surgery, even fewer (39 schools) offer these necessary health resources to college employees. These resources are not only vital to the health of many transgender people, but things such as therapy and hormone treatment are generally mandated by state law in order for a transgender person to obtain legal documentation that reflects their proper name. By not granting insurance coverage to students and employees for these medical costs, most colleges and universities across the United States actively bar transgender students and employees from receiving necessary health care.

Lack of Legal Protections

According to a 2010 survey conducted by the Q Research Institute for Higher Education (an initiative of the advocacy group Campus Pride), LGBTQ students–especially all transgender and gender nonconforming students and particularly students of color–face discrimination and harassment on college campuses at more than double the rate experienced by straight, cisgender students. The Chronicle of Higher Education summarized the report as such:

About a quarter of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and queer students and employees said they had experienced harassment, as did more than a third of transgender and “gender nonconforming” respondents, compared with 12 percent of heterosexuals.

Seventy percent of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and queer students and employees felt comfortable with the overall campus climate, the report says, a rate that was higher than that among transgender and gender-nonconforming respondents but lower than that of heterosexuals. Lesbian, gay, bisexual, and queer students who were also members of racial minority groups felt less comfortable in their classes than did their white counterparts, and faculty members were more likely than were students and staff members to have considered leaving their institutions, the report says.

Currently, federal non-discrimination statutes do not directly protect LGBTQ individuals on college campuses on the basis of their sexual orientation or gender identity.

The Senate recently voted down an amendment designed specifically to protect elementary and secondary school LGBT students from legal discrimination across the country. However, a recently introduced bill might offer a legal remedy to that lack of protection. According to Buzzfeed News, the bill, which Democratic supporters have dubbed the “Equality Act,” would expand the Civil Rights Act of 1964 to include protections against discrimination for gender identity and sexual orientation. This would impact higher education by amending Title IV to protect LGBTQ people from discrimination at education institutions receiving federal funding.

Though this Equality Act has the potential to provide legal protections for people using public restrooms that match their gender identity–a huge and dangerous obstacle for students on college campuses–it is unlikely that the bill would be able to provide any immediate relief for students who experience violence and discrimination. For example, even though the NYC Commission on Human Rights has already stated that any user of New York City public restrooms cannot legally be stopped and/or asked to present ID for using the restroom that matches their gender identity, this discrimination is still common practice in New York City. However, in terms of legal precedent, this change could potentially go a long way toward securing broad LGBTQ legal rights on college campuses.

Conclusion

While many, if not most, college campuses do not have provisions to offer legal and day-to-day structural protections for LGBT students, most if not all colleges do have at least informal, active student groups of LGBT students that offer each other support throughout their college careers. The schools that are the most structurally supportive of LGBT students can be found through Campus Pride’s “Campus Pride Index,” and state-by-state regulations that affect school policies are listed at Lambda Legal’s guide here. While some of these schools do an excellent job of welcoming LGBTQ students, more work needs to be done across the board to ensure that everyone is able to have a safe college experience.

Resources

Campus Pride: Q Research Institute for Higher Education

Lambda Project: State Regulations

Buzzfeed: Democrats Plan to Introduce Sweeping LGBT Rights Bill in Congress this Week

Lambda Legal: In Your State

Inside HigherEd: Broadening the Transgender Agenda

Chronicle of Higher Education: Gay Students and College Employees Face Significant Harassment, Report Says

Education Week: Senate Votes Down ESEA Amendment Designed to Protect LGBT Students

The Washington Free Beacon: Feds: Transgender Bathroom Choice a Matter of ‘Health and Safety’

NASPA Student Affairs Administrators in Higher Education: LGBTQ Issues on Campus: What’s Changing?

Jennifer Polish

Jennifer Polish is an English PhD student at the CUNY Graduate Center in NYC, where she studies non/human animals and the racialization of dis/ability in young adult literature. When she’s not yelling at the computer because Netflix is loading too slowly, she is editing her novel, doing activist-y things, running, or giving the computer a break and yelling at books instead. Contact Jennifer at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post LGBTQ College Students: Legal Hurdles and Rights appeared first on Law Street.

Much ado has been made about the potential impacts of gay marriage on immigrants, and the potential impacts of comprehensive immigration reform on LGBTQ people. But what does all that mean? How do laws aimed at immigrants and laws aimed at LGBTQ people impact those who are both immigrants and LGBTQ? Read on to learn about the different difficulties of LGBTQ immigration, what progress is being made, and what problems still exist.

“Don’t Separate my Family”: Marriage and Immigration

When people hear about immigration and gay rights together in mainstream media sources, chances are that the conversation is about the impacts of gay marriage on immigration policy and individual couples in which one partner is an immigrant and the other is a citizen.

In the build up to the Supreme Court’s 2013 decision in United States v. Windsor, which provided full federal recognition of legally married same-sex couples by striking down a critical component of the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA), many couples in which one partner was not a citizen were featured in efforts of advocacy for gay marriage. A perfect example is the couple featured in the YouTube clip above. In the aftermath of federal recognition of same-sex marriage, a good deal of media coverage focused on long-term lesbian and gay relationships in which one of the partners was granted legal immigration status through marriage to a citizen partner. This New York Daily News article, for example, frames the triumph of gay marriage advocates in New York through the lens of immigration, discussing same-sex marriage as a win for a binational couple’s ability to obtain a green card for one of the partners.

Legal recognition for same-sex marriage has somewhat been a boon for proponents of more accessible immigration. LGBTQ couples no longer need to live in fear that they will not be able to live together in the U.S. because their marriage isn’t recognized: after the DOMA decision, same-sex couples have the right–as straight couples do–to have an immigrant partner obtain a green card through their marriage to a citizen spouse. Prior to the DOMA decision, no federal rights of marriage, including federal taxes and federal benefits, were afforded to same-sex couples, even if they were married in a state where it was legal. There was a lack of ability to obtain a green card for an immigrant partner in a binational couple; these rights are now assured. Transgender immigrants in a binational marriage, rest assured–whether you’re in a straight or  gay/lesbian relationship, the DOMA decision ensures that you or your partner can qualify for a green card.

New Concerns After the DOMA Decision

After the DOMA decision, however, concerns remain for LGBTQ immigrant couples. For example, investigative reporter Seth Freed Wessler writes for Colorlines.com that,

The parts of the marriage-based visa process that include investigation by federal immigration officers into the validity of a marriage… [can pose a problem for] LGBT couples who may not be out to their families, communities, neighbors or bosses, the prospect of a United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) officer showing up at their apartment building or calling their mother to ask about the relationship poses a pretty serious risk.

This is indeed something to be concerned about, and it may well bar access to green cards for many LGBTQ immigrants. Yet it is precisely this articulation of the U.S. as a liberal bastion and safe-haven for LGBTQ people–juxtaposed against “homophobic” countries–that causes many LGBTQ people to critique the entire framing of same-sex marriage as a vehicle for positive immigration policy.

Many LGBTQ people argue that fighting for marriage takes away attention, energy, and resources (millions and millions of dollars worth) from addressing the underlying issues of structural racism, state oppression and heteronormativity that shape anti-immigrant and anti-LGBTQ attitudes to begin with. Queercents writer Yasmin argues that marriage “being presented as THE immigration cause for LGBT people” detracts crucial attention away from comprehensive immigration reform, which she and many others assert should be the focal point of immigration efforts. Responding to American Apparel’s same-sex marriage-inspired “Legalize Gay” shirts Yasmin writes that:

Do people wearing this t-shirt have a clue what it really means to be illegal? To be, for instance, an ‘illegal alien’ who gets swept up in an Immigration and Customs Enforcement raid and be deported soon thereafter? To not be able to travel freely because they lack the proper documentation? To pay for their school tuition and rent in cash because they lack social security numbers? [And i]t’s not just the undocumented whose lives are effectively erased by this t-shirt, but the millions who are being funneled into the prison industrial complex in order to increase its profits.

Even if an undocumented immigrant who is LGBTQ is familiar with the fears and oppressions discussed here, they may not have marriage available to them–or may not desire marriage–if they want a green card.

Executive Action and Legal Challenges

President Obama’s executive action in November 2014 that attempted to grant relief from deportation for millions of undocumented immigrants is being legally challenged by 26 states. These legal challenges have left millions of people in limbo, without knowing their status or rights, because the parents of U.S. citizens and families who were protected from deportation under his executive orders now must wait to learn what courts will decide about the legal challenges.

The impacts of Obama’s exercise of executive power (and, then, the impacts of the legal challenges to this power) for LGBTQ people have been much debated in LGBTQ communities. Staff correspondents Rachel Roubein and Lauren Fox argue in the National Journal that Obama’s actions on immigration were a tremendous help to LGBTQ people. They cite, among other things, the life-saving potential of prosecutorial discretion in immigration cases, which can prevent many LGBTQ people from being deported.

Other critics are less optimistic about the potential of Obama’s executive action to serve as the immigration overhaul that many desire, even if the cases against it are unsuccessful. Colorlines.com reporter Julianne Hung reminds her readers that:

The terms [of the action] are stringent: It will apply only to those who have been in the U.S. for five years or more; those who came to the country as young teens; and parents of U.S. citizen children and green-card holders. People with various criminal violations on their records will be barred from relief.

While these familial provisions were portrayed as being meant to keep families together, they do not grant access to many of the 267,000 undocumented LGBTQ adults who will not qualify for relief under Obama’s action because they lack these kinds of familial connections. These stringent terms may be particularly prohibitive for many of the 20,000-50,000 undocumented transgender immigrants in the country, for whom accessing potential relief will likely be particularly difficult due to virulent institutional transphobia that trans immigrants face.

“Mass Incarceration of Immigrants”

Currently, there’s a “mass incarceration of immigrants” in which the state and prison corporations generate many billions of dollars of profit from privately run and revenue-generating facilities that lock up people who are immigrants. In light of that, many LGBTQ immigrants are concerned about prisons generally, and the ways transgender people are targeted for especially horrific treatment in prisons and immigration detention centers. When the Department of Homeland Security came out with new immigration detention policies in 2014 that were aimed at preventing sexual abuse in immigration detention facilities, many lauded the changes as a victory. LGBTQ immigrants in these centers often experience much higher rates of abuse than their non-LGBTQ peers, so the changes were often welcomed by LGBTQ immigration advocates.

However, transgender immigrants did not receive adequate protections under the new guidelines. National Center for Transgender Equality director of policy Harper Jean Tobin referred to the new policies in the following way:

A tremendous missed opportunity which adds urgency to ending our multibillion-dollar mass incarceration of immigrants… The lack of adequate protections for transgender immigrants in particular makes it clear that these vulnerable individuals are not safe in detention facilities and should no longer be detained.

Many transgender asylum seekers are detained in the wrong facilities, particularly women being placed in all-male facilities, making those women targets of extreme sexual violence in immigration detention facilities.

This kind of abuse is experienced at higher rates by transgender immigrants, but LGB immigrants also are sexually abused at 15 percent higher rates than their non-LGB peers in detention facilities.

Organizations like the National Center for Transgender Equality, the National Immigrant Justice Center, and the Sylvia Rivera Project’s Immigrant Rights Project work at the intersections between immigration and LGBTQ justice. They operate in ways that attempt to make detention safer for LGBTQ immigrants specifically while also working to make detention and deportation non-existent for all immigrants.

Conclusion

For immigrants who are LGBTQ, obstacles to obtaining a green card and safety from deportation can be much greater than for immigrants who are not LGBTQ, though the obstacles and the stakes are quite high for all immigrants. Same-sex marriage may chip away at these obstacles for some LGBTQ immigrants in binational, married relationships, but more overarching reform of the system of detention and deportation of immigrants may be a more holistic way forward for LGBTQ immigrants.

Resources

Primary

Oyez: United States v. Windsor

Additional

National Immigrant Justice Center: Stop Abuse of Detained LGBT Immigrants

Sylvia Rivera Law Project: Immigrant Rights Project

National Center for Transgender Equality: Our Moment For Reform

ABC News: DOMA Ruling Could Mean Green Cards for Gay Immigrants

Colorlines: LGBT Immigrants Could Face Hard Road Applying for Green Cards

Washington Post: Gay Marriage Fight Will Cost Tens of Millions

MakeZine: Is Gay Marriage Racist?

Queercents: Legalize Gay: Or, So You Think You’re Illegal?

Queercents: Uniting American Families Act: Fact, Fiction, Money, and Emotions

Immigration Policy Center: A Guide to the Immigration Accountability Executive Action

AlJazeera: 26 States Sue Obama Over Immigration Plan

National Journal: In Immigration Action, the LGBT Community Once Again Feels Left Behind

Feministing: Is Mass Incarceration and Detention of Women Becoming the New Normal?

Center for American Progress: Dignity Denied: LGBT Immigrants in U.S. Immigration Detention

Jennifer Polish

Jennifer Polish is an English PhD student at the CUNY Graduate Center in NYC, where she studies non/human animals and the racialization of dis/ability in young adult literature. When she’s not yelling at the computer because Netflix is loading too slowly, she is editing her novel, doing activist-y things, running, or giving the computer a break and yelling at books instead. Contact Jennifer at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post LGBTQ Immigration: Not Just About Marriage appeared first on Law Street.

At this year’s Academy Awards broadcast, winners and presenters called our attention to more than one political issue, including racial equality and gay rights. (If you say you weren’t tearing up after Graham Moore’s speech you are LYING.) One of the most memorable moments, and one of the first, was Patricia Arquette’s call to action:

To every woman who gave birth to every taxpayer and citizen of this nation we have fought for everybody’s equal rights. It is our time to have wage equality once and for all and equal rights for women in the United States of America.

As you can imagine, my reaction–and that of many others–was “YEAH! YOU GO GIRL!” I mean, anything that makes the great Meryl Streep react like this is truly amazing.

Yes. Everyone pretty much agreed that it was a fantastic acceptance speech.

However, after the show in the press room, Arquette expanded her speech, and with it ended up rubbing some people the wrong way.

So the truth is, even though we sort of feel like we have equal rights in America, right under the surface, there are huge issues that are applied that really do affect women. And it’s time for all the women in America and all the men that love women, and all the gay people, and all the people of color that we’ve all fought for to fight for us now.

What quite a few people are pointing out is that “all the gay people” and “all the people of color” still don’t have equal rights either, yet Arquette called them out to fight for women.

People of color and gays, it seems we owe Patricia Arquette for “fighting for us.” Did anyone capture any footage of said fight?

— jamilah (@JamilahLemieux) February 23, 2015

when you wake up in the morning and find out what else patricia arquette said pic.twitter.com/Edu5dUWXR4 — Anne T. Donahue (@annetdonahue) February 23, 2015

stop cheering for #PatriciaArquette, the feminism she advocates isn’t intersectional and that in itself is really rude

— Jocelyn Jones (@j_abriaaa) February 23, 2015

Maddening that even in a speech that screamed “pay attention to women!” some women are overlooked. http://t.co/5xkzzo7P74 — Latoya Peterson (@LatoyaPeterson) February 23, 2015

After the backlash, Arquette came back with responses on Twitter to try and explain her speech.

Wage equality will help ALL women of all races in America. It will also help their children and society.

— Patricia Arquette (@PattyArquette) February 23, 2015

I have long been an advocate for the rights of the #LBGT community. The question is why aren’t you an advocate for equality for ALL women? — Patricia Arquette (@PattyArquette) February 23, 2015

Clearly what we have here is a case of a well-intentioned woman expressing herself the wrong way. Taken at face value, her speech in the Oscar press room truly does alienate women of the LGBT and racial minority communities. In my opinion, she meant to convey the fact that equal rights for all women will affect these communities as well. Equal pay is just one topic in the broader spectrum of equal rights, but you have to start somewhere.

So, should her original, Meryl-Streep-cheered-for-it speech be ignored because she didn’t explain herself well enough? Definitely not. If anything, her comments should incite more action in women–and men–of every race and orientation.

Morgan McMurray

Morgan McMurray is an editor and gender equality blogger based in Seattle, Washington. A 2013 graduate of Iowa State University, she has a Bachelor of Arts in English, Journalism, and International Studies. She spends her free time writing, reading, teaching dance classes, and binge-watching Netflix. Contact Morgan at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

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Happy almost Valentine’s Day, my lovelies!

How many of you are planning to spend this Saturday with your wonderful, Cupid-bestowed, significant others?

Awesome. All of the single people want to punch you lovebirds in the face.

But, despite the wave of existential dread this holiday brings to single people everywhere (#foreveralone, am I right?), SCOTUS seems to be in a weirdly lovey mood. In what can only be interpreted as an early Valentine’s Day gift to coupled-up gay people nationwide, SCOTUS dropped a solid hint on Monday that it’ll be making gay marriage a nationwide reality soon.

Early Monday morning, SCOTUS refused to extend the stay on a lower court’s decision that declared Alabama’s ban on gay marriages unconstitutional. Basically, that means that SCOTUS is allowing gay marriages to happen in Alabama right now, despite the fact that the constitutionality of state-level gay marriage bans isn’t on deck to be decided upon until later this summer.

Folks, this is a big fucking deal for gay marriage.

The validity of state-level gay marriage bans are currently under SCOTUS’ consideration, and it’s uncertain which way the court will rule. Will SCOTUS decide that individual states totally have the right to ban gay marriage? Will it decide that that’s bullshit, and all of the states have to allow marriages of all people, regardless of the couple’s gender pairing?

Basically, until this summer, the answer on that is TBD.

With that understanding, SCOTUS could do well to allow states that currently have gay marriage bans to continue on with their marriage banning. If these states were forced to allow gay marriages during this current limbo period—and if SCOTUS ultimately decided that state level marriage bans were A-OK—then a whole mess of married couples would suddenly find themselves in a legal quagmire.

So, why create all that mess? It would make more sense to wait until the decision is final, and then marriages can proceed or not, depending on the official decree.

But that’s the opposite of what SCOTUS did on Monday morning!

The justices ruled, without further comment, that the federal district court in Alabama’s ruling could go forth, allowing thousands of gay couples in the state to get married.

Why would SCOTUS do that if it was planning to uphold the constitutionality of gay marriage bans this summer?

Monday’s decision strongly suggests that, come summertime, SCOTUS will rule that state-level gay marriage bans are unconstitutional, and unfettered gay marriage will reign throughout the land.

I’m really hoping that decision comes through in time for Gay Pride. Can you imagine the parties? GOOD LORD. I’m already excited.

For marriage equality advocates across the nation, SCOTUS’ decision Monday morning comes as a welcome victory. Gays in Alabama are happily marrying, and most likely, all of the gays in all of the states will be able to follow suit very soon.

Hurray for all the gay couples who want to get married, for lots of totally valid reasons! Tax benefits, inheritance, hospital visitation rights, health insurance sharing, co-parenting and custody benefits, and citizen sponsorship are just a few of the myriad benefits that legal marriage affords to couples. Signing your name on that dotted line is a huge deal for a lot of people, and it’s a right that tons of people—many of whom I personally know and love—are fighting really hard to secure.

However.

Let’s not forget that marriage is a discriminatory and problematic institution. It’s not the magical cure-all for the LGBT community’s marginalization and disenfranchisement. It’s not even the most pressing issue on our list of things to fix, despite what organizations like the HRC and Lambda Legal might have you believe.

Violence, poverty, unemployment, criminalization, and homelessness are all issues that are—or should be—more highly prioritized on the docket of LGBT issues than gay marriage. Because let’s face it—while well-to-do gay couples are busy planning their weddings, queer youth of color are dying in the streets.

Literally. I’m not exaggerating. Nearly half of the homeless population is comprised of LGBT kids. Trans women of color are getting murdered left and right. This shit is real.

So, while I’m totally enthused about SCOTUS’ hat tip this week in favor of the gay marriage fight, I’m not waving the rainbow flag of victory just yet. No matter which way their final decision goes this summer, we’ll still have a lot more work to do before the queer community can live safely and equitably in American society.

So Happy Valentine’s Day, lovelies! You might be able to get married soon. And then, after your wedding bells have died down, we’ll all have to keep working towards real justice.

Hannah R. Winsten

Hannah R. Winsten is a freelance copywriter, marketing consultant, and blogger living in New York’s sixth borough. She hates tweeting but does it anyway. She aspires to be the next Rachel Maddow. Contact Hannah at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Happy Valentine’s Day! Gay Weddings May Soon Be Sanctioned by SCOTUS appeared first on Law Street.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 10th Circuit recently ruled that states cannot deprive a person of the fundamental right to marry simply because he or she chooses a partner of the same sex. This marked the first time that a federal appeals court has weighed in on the matter, and the early thinking is that the Supreme Court may take this case. Finally, marriage equality in all 50 states, right?

This is all good, yeah, woohoo! (Sidenote: my gaydar sucks big time. Straight guys are gay, gay guys are straight. Hell, lesbians are twinks and vice versa, but I thought I had developed a fail-safe. To determine if a guy is family, I simply look down at his ring finger. Last week, I caught myself doing this. I looked down at this dude’s finger, which indeed was adorned with a ring. Done — he’s straight. Then I remembered the whole marriage equality thing: he’s gay! But, as he opened his clearly European mouth and uttered something about the weather, his Belfast burr turning “air” to “ire,” I remembered the Euro-metrosexual-monkey-wrench! Gay or straight, damnit?! Alas, I resigned myself to utter cluelessness.)

Courtesy of Quick Meme

In all seriousness, it’s really awesome that the lines between gay relationships and straight relationships are increasingly blurry. That’s not the endgame, though. Even if the Supreme Court takes this Utah case and sides with the 10th Circuit about the fundamental right to marry (big assumptions with the Roberts Court), it won’t affect other types of discrimination against the LGBTQ community. Marriage equality is only the opening salvo in a still-uphill battle for full equality. We ought not lose sight of that.

Don’t get me wrong, ever the Machiavelli in me says sure, get to marriage equality by any means necessary. Those means, under the reasoning of the 10th Circuit, would be the Fourteenth Amendment’s Due Process Clause. That is, if the Supreme Court rules favorably in this case, and on due process grounds, it would mean that no person, gay or straight, can be deprived of the right to marry. But due process deals only with “fundamental rights.” What about laws that discriminate against gay men in blood donation? What about workplace discrimination?

Courtesy of Matt Buck via Flickr

A decision on due process grounds would not touch these other types of discrimination, but a ruling under the Fourteenth Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause would. That would deal with all manner of discrimination against the LGBTQ community, including marriage equality.

Brief Equal Protection primer: Under the Fourteenth Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause, laws that single out a specific group for differential treatment or disproportionately impact that group, if challenged, are subject to judicial review. If the law discriminates on the basis of a suspect classification, such as race, it must satisfy the most exacting degree of review — strict scrutiny. Thanks to second-wave feminism, discrimination on the basis of sex/gender is subject to intermediate scrutiny. As it stands now, discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation is subject to the lowest, most deferential level of judicial review — rational basis review.

Blah, blah, blah, I’m losing you so let me get to the point. Until the Supreme Court rules on equal protection grounds rather than due process that sexual orientation-based discrimination merits a higher level of judicial scrutiny, discriminatory laws will continue to receive minimal judicial scrutiny.

I’m glad that marriage equality is sweeping across the country, and that the Supreme Court may finally have occasion to legalize it nationwide. Indeed, by no means would this be a pyrrhic victory. However, it would only nominally affect other issues of discrimination against the LGBTQ community, issues that are arguably more important than marriage equality.

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Chris Copeland (@ChrisRCopeland) is a staff attorney at a non-profit organization in the Bronx, a blogger, and a California ex-pat living in Brooklyn. When he’s not reading, writing, or watching horror, he explores the intersection of race and LGBT issues with Law Street.

Featured image courtesy of [Victoria Pickering via Flickr]

Chris Copeland

Chris Copeland is a staff attorney at a non-profit organization in the Bronx, a blogger, and a California ex-pat living in Brooklyn. When he’s not reading, writing, or watching horror, he explores the intersection of race and LGBT issues with Law Street. Contact Chris at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Due Process is the Red Herring in the LGBTQ Movement appeared first on Law Street.

Happy Thursday, folks!

It’s been a crazy couple of weeks for women out there.

First—as I’m sure you recall—SCOTUS ruled in favor of Hobby Lobby, giving employers the right to deny workers birth control coverage because of religious exemptions, and essentially giving douche-wad bosses everywhere the potential to control their employees’ uteruses.

Awesome.

And now, things are getting much, much worse.

Following the Hobby Lobby decision, religious institutions, religiously-run corporations, and basically anyone who is a fan of Jesus and also has some modicum of control over other people’s lives, are filing for the right to discriminate against people under religious exemptions.

Say good-bye to your civil rights, folks.

A group of 14 religious leaders wrote a letter to the Obama administration asking for the right to discriminate against LGBTQ people in closely-held corporations. George Fox University demanded a religious exemption that would allow it to bar a transgender student from living on campus, and the Department of Education granted it.

The Hobby Lobby ruling, not even a month old, is already proving to be disturbingly broad. Ruth Bader Ginsburg warned us about this in her dissent—that granting religious exemptions for IUDs and Plan B would be like opening a Pandora’s Box of discrimination potential—but did anyone listen to her?

And so here we are, with religious zealots breathing down the necks of the Supreme Court and of the President—and they have legal precedent to back themselves up.

Loves, this shit is scary. And not fear-monger-y type scary. Legit disturbing.

When the Hobby Lobby decision first came down it signaled yet another chip away at civil liberties and women’s rights in this country. One more piece of legal bullshit that diminishes a woman’s right to control her own body. One more reminder that women aren’t seen as real people or full adults in the United States, but rather as wards of the state, our spouses, our fathers, or apparently, our employers.

But as awful as that is, the asshat Justices who voted for this decision assured us that the Hobby Lobby ruling would end there. It would be a narrow ruling, applicable to only this situation, and that feminists would only have to fight against this one, single issue. Access to birth control regardless of what your boss’s religious beliefs are.

Justice Ginsburg called bullshit, and now I’m calling that she was right.

This ruling is not narrow. We can no longer be solely concerned with its reversal because women deserve the right to control their own goddamn bodies.

Nope. Instead, it’s turning out to be frighteningly broad, as the Supreme Court demands reviews of similar cases in lower courts and considers handing out more religious exemptions based on the precedent that Hobby Lobby’s now set.

Where does this end? There’s really no way to know just yet, but the possibilities are kind of endless.

Don’t want to hire women at your company? Sure thing, buddy! Claim that doing so would place an undue burden on you as a result of your religious beliefs and you’re good to go.

Don’t want to hire black people at your company either? No problem. Religious exemptions all around.

Can’t stand the thought of your female employees having consequence-free sex? Awesome. Religious exemption and boom! You just gained control over your workers’ uteruses. Don’t you feel better knowing your vagina-laden employees aren’t sleeping around (at least, not without feeling extreme anxiety about their reproductive systems)?

And maybe you don’t want to pay LGBT people the same amount of money as your straight employees. Or maybe you don’t want to hire them at all! Cool, dude. Religious exemption.

This shit is ridiculous. With the Hobby Lobby ruling, the Supreme Court just created a loophole for every piece of non-discrimination legislation ever enacted. Civil rights of all kinds—not just for women—are at serious risk. If anyone feels like they want to engage in some good, old-fashioned discrimination, they can pretty much do so! They just have to make a case for getting a religious exemption first.

And clearly, based on the fact that Hobby Lobby won its case, despite building it on a foundation of craptastic non-science, that’s not super hard to do.

So, way to go, SCOTUS! You really fucked things up for all of us, this time. Not only have you created an environment where everyone can be their own law book, but you’ve sent us down a path that will undoubtedly be littered with regressive politics.

The fight for personhood just got that much harder, lovelies.

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Hannah R. Winsten (@HannahRWinsten) is a freelance copywriter, marketing consultant, and blogger living in New York City. She hates tweeting but does it anyway. She aspires to be the next Rachel Maddow.

Featured image courtesy of [Daryl Clark via Flickr]

Hannah R. Winsten

Hannah R. Winsten is a freelance copywriter, marketing consultant, and blogger living in New York’s sixth borough. She hates tweeting but does it anyway. She aspires to be the next Rachel Maddow. Contact Hannah at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post WARNING: The Christians Are Coming for Your Civil Liberties appeared first on Law Street.

“Gay really is the new black,” proclaimed Daily News columnist John McWhorter in a recent article. John McWhorter is über insightful and I always enjoy watching him on Melissa Harris-Perry, but as Rosa Parks so eloquently said, “No.” No, gay is not the new black.

Courtesy of the Daily Californian

America’s legacy of racism is vastly different from its history of sexual-orientation discrimination and homophobia. The struggle for racial equality is also inapposite to the gay rights movement. The twenty-first century world in which the gay rights movement has so rapidly progressed has itself become a rapid place. Instant gratification is no longer instant enough. “Attention span” has become a sort of a misnomer, suggesting that our attention lasts long enough to actually span. Once upon a time, the adult attention span was somewhere around twelve minutes; that is, the average adult could stay focused on a task for twelve minutes without becoming distracted. Today, however, it’s dropped to five minutes. Some reports even claim that the average attention span on the Internet is two and a half seconds.

Courtesy of David Goehring via Flickr

That’s just ridic. Alas, these are the times in which we’re living. This wasn’t always the case.

Change used to happen at a snail’s pace and the civil rights movement reflects as much. Understanding then that “the arc of the moral universe is long but bends toward justice,” as Martin Luther King, Jr. put it, civil rights lawyers like Thurgood Marshall employed a strategy of chipping away at Plessy v. Ferguson’s wall of segregation. They slowly and methodically attacked the system piece by piece. After more than fifty years, the chipping-away strategy culminated with the Brown v. Board of Education cases in 1954 and 1955, reducing the wall of segregation to a pile of rubble. The gay rights movement on the other hand has bulldozed its way toward some semblance of equality. It was just the mid-1980s when the Supreme Court gave us Bowers v. Hardwick — when it upheld the constitutionality of a state sodomy law that criminalized private, consensual oral and anal sex between two gay men.

In Lawrence v. Texas in 2003 the Court overruled its decision in Bowers. And in the ten or so short years since Lawrence, discriminatory laws across the country have fallen at a neck-breaking pace. Now, I’d probably be hard-pressed to find many people who’ve even heard of Bowers v. Hardwick.

I’ll concede, the reasons the LGBTQ community has accomplished so much so fast are far more complex than I’ve intimated. Somewhere in the mix of reasons is necessarily that the world itself is a faster place today. But who the hell has the time or attention span to delve into all those complexities? Maybe I do? After all, I did spend oodles of time before and during law school thinking about all this stuff. So, after much thought and deliberation about this topic, I’ve come to the conclusion t–

What were we talking about again?

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Chris Copeland (@ChrisRCopeland) is a staff attorney at a non-profit organization in the Bronx, a blogger, and a California ex-pat living in Brooklyn. When he’s not reading, writing, or watching horror, he explores the intersection of race and LGBT issues with Law Street.

Featured image courtesy of [Andy Smith via Flickr]

Chris Copeland

Chris Copeland is a staff attorney at a non-profit organization in the Bronx, a blogger, and a California ex-pat living in Brooklyn. When he’s not reading, writing, or watching horror, he explores the intersection of race and LGBT issues with Law Street. Contact Chris at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Gay is NOT the New Black appeared first on Law Street.

RANT WARNING: Be advised, this post may cause bouts of annoyance, defeatism, and pessimism.

Courtesy of Wifflegif

Initially, I planned to write an upbeat post about the recent celebrations of pride happening across the country: the Puerto Rican Day Parade, LGBT Pride, America’s success in the World Cup, and the Fourth of July, to name a few. I thought it would be interesting to extrapolate from these events a larger analysis of celebrating (or not) one’s identity. And then damn Hobby Lobby happened. Womp womp.

Last week, the Supreme Court held in two cases collectively referred to as Hobby Lobby that for-profit corporations are exempt from complying with the Affordable Care Act’s contraception mandate on the basis of religious beliefs. Specifically, the Court found that the ACA’s contraception mandate was not the “least restrictive” way for the government to implement this law and thus it created too substantial a burden on the religious freedoms of the companies at issue. In reaching this conclusion, the Court pointed to a less restrictive workaround in the ACA for nonprofits: If there are religious objections to a medical treatment, third parties will provide coverage to the employees.

More broadly, as Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg argued in her 35-page, no-I’m-not-retiring-yet-assholes, dissenting opinion, Hobby Lobby stands for the principle “that commercial enterprises, including corporations, along with partnerships and sole proprietorships, can opt out of any law (saving only tax laws) they judge incompatible with their sincerely held religious beliefs.”

That’s right: corporations are indeed people. Those legal entities (which, by the way, are created for the purpose of separating the individuals involved from the corporate entity so that those individuals may be shielded from legal liability) apparently eat, sleep, breath, love, and pray? They sound more human than Darth Vader Cheney.

And as persons, corporations can also speak freely (i.e., wholly bankroll political campaigns) and freely exercise their religion (i.e., infringe on a woman’s reproductive rights).

Hell, with the direction in which this Court is taking corporate personhood, businesses — like any actual individual person in this country — may be able to discriminate on a wider scale. What happens when a business owner’s religious beliefs clash with, say, Title VII’s ban on discrimination in employment? What happens when a business owner acts on his belief that being gay is a sin? In answering these questions, I keep seeing the Jim Crow days when business owners were free to discriminate on the basis of race; I keep seeing the 1980s when they were openly homophobic and sexist. That idea is indeed what makes this “a decision of startling breadth,” as Justice Ginsberg put it.

Sure, I understand that slippery-slope, parade-of-horribles arguments are necessarily illogical. But tell that to African Americans who lived through the aftermath of Plessy v. Ferguson’s separate-but-equal holding. Yes, Justice Samuel Alito, writing for the majority in Hobby Lobby, did promise that the ruling would not open the door to discrimination (exemptions to our anti-discrimination laws). Call me cynical, call me a blasphemer, but frankly I don’t have a whole lot of faith in this Court’s word — this Court that has been so adept at totally flouting precedent and stare decisis when it suits its political ends. Remember Citizens United? Bush v. Gore anyone?

Courtesy of DPMS via Flickr

In fact, we need look no further than last Thursday. Just days after the Court issued its Hobby Lobby ruling, it granted an unsigned emergency order in a new case involving Wheaton College, finding that the very workaround it had hailed as a less restrictive means by which the government could implement the ACA was also unconstitutional — that it substantially burdened the religious freedom of religious employers. What on Earth?! In the span of less than a week Hobby Lobby has already gone further than Hobby Lobby!

So now I sit here wondering what’s next. I wonder how far down this road the Supreme Court will take us. Debbie Downer over here, I know. But this is seriously like the worst season finale ever.

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Chris Copeland (@ChrisRCopeland) is a staff attorney at a non-profit organization in the Bronx, a blogger, and a California ex-pat living in Brooklyn. When he’s not reading, writing, or watching horror, he explores the intersection of race and LGBT issues with Law Street.

Featured image courtesy of [American Life League via Flickr]

Chris Copeland

Chris Copeland is a staff attorney at a non-profit organization in the Bronx, a blogger, and a California ex-pat living in Brooklyn. When he’s not reading, writing, or watching horror, he explores the intersection of race and LGBT issues with Law Street. Contact Chris at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Down the Hobby Lobby Rabbit Hole: Are Federal Anti-Discrimination Laws Next? appeared first on Law Street.

NFL prospect Michael Sam revealed to the public this week that he is gay. Sam’s decision is undoubtedly brave; if drafted (and he probably will be), he will be the first openly gay male professional athlete in a sport that manufactures traditional male stereotypes. But Sam is no stranger to bravery or to breaking stereotypes. Michael Sam was the first member of his family to attend college, and one of the few children of JoAnn Sam not to clash with law enforcement. Since Sam is used to breaking molds, he may not have needed legal protections to come out. But if we want to enable his choice in more workplaces, two laws could prompt similar behavior.

1. The Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA): ENDA is a federal bill that would prohibit employment discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity by employers with at least 15 employees. If enacted, ENDA would prohibit employers, employment agencies, and labor unions from using an individual’s sexual orientation or gender identity for decisions such as hiring, firing, promotion, or compensation (read the Human Rights Campaign’s breakdown of the law here). Despite the growing support for ENDA, Govtrack.us gives the bill only a 14 percent chance of becoming law.  Without it, many LGBT employees could face the painful dilemma of lying to co-workers about their identities or risk losing their employment (although it’s worth noting that 21 states plus the District of Columbia have adopted similar laws). ENDA does have friends in Washington however, and is rumored to become law for federal contractors through executive order.

2. Workplace Bullying Legislation: This type of legislation is another means to combat discrimination at work and thus possibly encourage LGBT employees to be comfortable at their own jobs. Unlike ENDA, workplace bullying laws may provide private claims for employees against other employees who bully or create toxic working environments through bullying. Some state legislatures have proposed insulating employers who act responsibly to thwart workplace bullying. Despite the growing trend of anti-bullying laws being passed on behalf of public schools, workplace bullying legislation has not been enacted in any U.S. State or at the Federal level. The lack of seriousness regarding workplace bullying laws may soon be a thing of the past, however. Sixteen states have proposed workplace bullying laws since 2009, and the high profile case involving the alleged harassment in the Miami Dolphins locker room may push this issue to the forefront.

Michael Sam’s revelation fortunately lacked the backlash that many expected. Sam’s former teammates on the Missouri Tigers supported him when he privately came out, and several prominent athletes showed support for Sam when he  revealed the news publicly. But tolerance can be fleeting, and Sam’s journey is just beginning.  With laws in place to protect LGBT individuals from workplace discrimination or harassment, his journey is more likely to have a happy ending, and more likely to prompt others to follow in his cleat prints.

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Andrew Blancato (@BigDogBlancato) holds a J.D. from New York Law School, and is a graduate of the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. When he’s not writing, he is either clerking at a trial court in Connecticut, or obsessing over Boston sports.

Featured image courtesy of [Wikipedia/Marcus Qwertyus]

Andrew Blancato

The post 2 Laws That Could Encourage More Michael Sams to Come Out appeared first on Law Street.

I love the Olympics. I always have. Summer or winter, it doesn’t matter. I will dutifully watch hours of Olympic coverage, get weirdly into obscure sports (curling!!!!!!) and stay up until ridiculous hours to watch my favorite games. That being said, the Olympics aren’t just all about fun. Over the years, the games have served, often unwillingly, as a backdrop for powerful political statements. For example, the American 1980 Summer Games boycott and resulting Soviet Union 1984 Summer Games boycott were both obviously politically motivated. Individual athletes can also turn the Olympics political — the 1968 Olympic Games Black Power salute by Tommie Smith and John Carlos made headlines and eventually got the two spectacular athletes banned from that year’s Olympic games.

Controversies in the Olympics are common, but this year’s games in Sochi seem particularly fraught. Here are the five most important political and social reasons to care.

5. Stray Dogs

Sochi is home to a lot of stray dogs. Nice, stray dogs, like peoples’ abandoned pets, or the offspring of those pets. According to passersby, most of the dogs seem quite friendly.  But I guess it looks bad to just have stray dogs wandering the Olympic grounds, so the Russian government paid a firm to have them rounded up and killed. The firm hired to do so called the dogs “biological trash.” This move sparked international outrage, people are now trying to adopt these dogs, and a Russian billionaire and big time Putin supporter is actually donating a ton of money to save the dogs.

Now I have…conflicting thoughts on the issue. Don’t get me wrong, I was incredibly outraged by the attempt to kill the dogs. I love dogs — they’re hands down my favorite animal, and come on, how can you resist a face like this?

I’m horrified that they would try to kill the dogs, and I would love for those dogs to be saved, but there is something amazing about the global reaction to Russia’s attempt to kill the stray dogs. This Guardian piece sums it up well, but case in point is that people do seem to care more about dogs than humans. There have been numerous stories of human rights abuses, yet this Sochi-stray-dogs story has made tons of headlines. I love the dogs too, and it breaks my heart that any would be killed, but it’s concerning that people are so focused on this issue. My best guess is that it’s easier to take a stand against animal abuse than more contentious political issues, such as…

4. The Ukraine Conflict 

While the Olympics happen, everyone is kind of tacitly ignoring the fact that there’s a major civil conflict going on essentially next door in the Ukraine. For all intents and purposes, Russia’s next step in the conflict has been on “hold” — most pundits are speculating that they will wait until the games are over to make a big move. So far, the entire conflict has been thoroughly messy though, and not just in the Ukraine. It’s become an almost miniature proxy war between the US and the EU and Russia. And believe me, both sides have the potential to play dirty. Russia is the most likely culprit to have leaked an incredibly embarrassing voicemail from a US diplomat dissing the EU. It seems like as soon as these Olympics end, things will start getting global in the Ukraine.

I think it actually says a lot about the symbolic power of the Olympic games (especially games set in Sochi) that Russia, the United States, and others, are willing to put some political maneuvers on hold.

3. Irina Rodnina 

Irina Rodnina was a prolific figure skater when she was younger, and now she is a Russian political figure. As one of the country’s most recognizable winter athletes, she was a seemingly natural choice to light the torch. But after Rodnina’s name was announced, it came to light that she had retweeted this disgustingly racist and obviously doctored photo this fall (as seen below in journalist Terry Moran’s tweet).
https://twitter.com/TerryMoran/statuses/431870114258878464

Rodnina wouldn’t even apologize at first. She just said that “Freedom of speech is freedom.” More recently, she claimed that she was hacked, although she had never said so in the past. But even after the tweet was discovered, Russia made no effort to get her to apologize or remove her from the torchbearer’s post.

2. The Economy

As much as I love the Olympics, this is a point that I will make every time the Games occur in a non-major city (and sometimes even when they do occur in a big city). Before any Olympic games, the infrastructure gets ridiculously built up, and often after the Olympics end, the new buildings, hotels, and stadiums are abandoned. Here is an incredibly creepy collection of pictures from abandoned Olympic villages.

The Olympics provide a big economic boost, but after that, nothing. That’s a facet of every Olympic games. But the Sochi games have taken extravagance to a whole new level, and in a medium-size city like Sochi (52nd largest in Russia), things had to be built completely from scratch. Supposedly protected natural habitats of animals were destroyed, and an entire village had to be relocated. Like I said, I love the Olympics, but the pragmatist in me wonders if the cost is worth it, and I have never wondered about that more so than during the Sochi games.

1. Gay Rights

This shouldn’t come as a surprise, but obviously Russia’s attack on gay rights is the biggest political story of these Olympics. As has been demonstrated over the last few months, being gay in Russia is incredibly difficult and oppressive. We’ve heard these stories for a long time, but the international spotlight on Russia this winter has given them a particularly haunting voice. President Obama and Vice President Biden, French President Hollande, and Canadian Prime Minister Harper, among others, have all declined to attend. In general, the Olympic games in Sochi have shed light on the human rights violations that occur there, and led to international pressure, but so far there’s been no real tangible signs of change. If the international community, the United States included, is serious about helping the very real problems of the LGBT community in Russia, the pressure on the country needs to increase substantially. Otherwise, the issue will be forgotten, as so many international causes have, and that’s just not acceptable.

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Anneliese Mahoney (@AMahoney8672) is Lead Editor at Law Street and a Connecticut transplant to Washington D.C. She has a Bachelor’s degree in International Affairs from the George Washington University, and a passion for law, politics, and social issues. Contact Anneliese at amahoney@LawStreetMedia.com.

Featured Image Courtesy of [U.S. Army via Flickr]

Anneliese Mahoney

Anneliese Mahoney is Managing Editor at Law Street and a Connecticut transplant to Washington D.C. She has a Bachelor’s degree in International Affairs from the George Washington University, and a passion for law, politics, and social issues. Contact Anneliese at amahoney@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post The Top 5 Reasons to Care About the Sochi Olympics appeared first on Law Street.