California

Anti-LGBT lobby goes after EQCA legislation

Now Announcing… Capitol Resource Institute versus EQCA!!

Arch-conservative anti-LGBT lobbyist Capitol Resource Institute is all in a tizzy over EQCA-sponsored legislation. Their Legislative Scorecard is much like EQCA’s own guide.

But it’s an uncanny mirror image in terms of values and priorities, scoffing at the real needs of our community and describing LGBT people in offensive, retrograde terminology.

Their framing is really quite breathtaking in its bald defamation.

Wanna go for a spin?

Now Announcing… Capitol Resource Institute versus EQCA!!

HIGHLIGHTS:

  • Laird’s Civil Rights Act of 2007 which expands existing nondiscrimination protections to include LGBT people: “Changes over 50 areas of state law to grant privileged status to homosexuals.”
  • Leno’s groundbreaking marriage bill, AB 43, which made California’s the first legislature in the country to grant the freedom to marry: “Legalizes homosexual marriage. Bypasses the people's decision in 2000, via Prop 22, to preserve marriage between one man and one woman.”
  • Levine’s AB 394, which prohibits discrimination and provides resources for education about LGBT people: “monitoring of student attitudes on sexual orientations.”
  • Leno’s Harvey Milk Day Bill: “A resident of the infamous Castro district in San Francisco, Milk was one of the first homosexual elected officials in America, and is considered a martyr for the homosexual cause.”
  • Migden’s Senior healthcare bill which helps address some of the unique concerns facing LGBT seniors: “establishes a special class of patients based on sexual choices.”
  • And the granddaddy of them all, Safe Schools legislation, the target of a pending federal lawsuit, the alleged ban on “Mommy and Daddy” in public schools, Kuehl’s SB 777, which actually is a relatively minor clarification of existing laws:”normalizes homosexuality, bisexuality, and transsexuality in public and private schools. Bans all teaching and activities that ‘promote a discriminatory bias against’ these lifestyles. Likely to impact textbooks, instructional aids, restroom use, gender-specific sports teams, and more.”

I get it, LGBT people are SICK, and public schools should let them know it. In fact, schools have no obligation to protect students from discrimination or bullying. Maybe teachers should take the first swing? Sheesh…

What this all begins to show is that for our detractors, it’s NOT just about marriage, and marriage is not where they’ll stop. They want to round it out by taking away jobs, civil rights, proper healthcare, safe schools, you name it. Know thy enemy.

Marriage is such a hot topic right now that these other sorts of bread and butter issues often get left out of the discussion. EQCA’s legislation isn’t about wheeling and dealing at the Capitol, but about problems facing real LGBT Californians.

The guide also includes some bizarre objections to sensible legislation protecting youth, saying that a ban on cell phone use by teen drivers “Suggests that the state sees itself as better equipped than parents to make family decisions” and that a bill to prevent minors from going to cancer-causing tanning salons “displaces their parents with a ‘nanny government’.”

Wingnuts. I’d love ‘em if they weren’t so dangerous.

–Reposted from The Ripple Effect