Opinion

LGBTQ+ rights improving, more work to be done

By Rebecca Baumler, for the Muleskinner

In honor of National Coming Out Day on Thursday, I think it’s a good time to step back and take a look at the current goings on in the LGBTQ+ community.

In recent years (following the legalization of gay marriage), there has been an increase in the acceptance and tolenrance of the LGBTQ+ community from mainstream society and so there has been less of a necessity for some of what that community has historically provided.

But there are still several areas that are lacking when it comes to LGBTQ+ rights. There are three very important court cases that have been ruled on by the Supreme Court thus far in 2018 that are important in shaping queer rights: Masterpiece Cakeshop v. the Colorado Civil Rights Commission, EEOC v. R.G. & G.R. Harris Funeral Homes, and Doe v. Boyertown Area School District.

Masterpiece Cakeshop v. the Colorado Civil Rights Commission is a court case where a gay couple sued a cake shop that refused to make their wedding cake. In June, the Supreme Court ruled in favor of the baker, but he is yet to be done with the courts as he is suing the state for religious-based discrimination after refusing to bake a cake for a transgender woman, which the Colorado Civil Rights Commission ruled was discrimination. The Masterpiece Cakeshop case highlights the discrimination that the queer community still faces in America and how often the lack of LGBTQ+ rights is glossed over. If gay couples are able to get married, they should just as easily be able to get a cake to celebrate that milestone, too.

The next court case is EEOC v. R.G. & G.R. Harris Funeral Homes. This case features a transgender woman who sued the funeral home she was working for after she was fired for coming out as transgender and presenting as a woman. The Supreme Court ruled in her favor, stating she was discriminated against and transgender people are protected by sex discrimination laws. Religious beliefs are not grounds to discriminate against transgender people. This court case is a major milestone for LGBTQ+ workplace rights.

The last court case is Doe v. Boyertown Area School District. In this court case, a Pennsylvania school district was sued by an anonymous cisgender student for defending trans students’ rights to use the bathroom of the gender with which they identify. This court case is a step forward for transgender rights because the courts ruled against the anonymous student’s claim that sharing a public locker room with transgender students was a violation of privacy, suggesting that transgender students are of no harm to cisgender students.

America still has room for growth when it comes to the queer community in terms of rights and overall acceptance. This Coming Out Day, we should all remember the importance of having a strong LGBTQ+ community and, as author JK Rowling said, “Nobody should ever have to live in a closet.”

One Comment

Carol Atkinson

Hmm, clicked on a link to what I thought was a Grant Curtis story…this is a little different from what I expected. Not sure who Rebecca is. And is this a commentary?

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