Political Punch
Power, pop, and probings from ABC News Senior White House Correspondent Jake Tapper
Jake Tapper is ABC News' Senior White House Correspondent based in the network's Washington bureau. He writes about politics and popular culture and covers a range of national stories.
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The debate over crossdresser workplace protections
October 04, 2007 8:58 PM
Should cross-dressers receive workplace protections? Should transsexuals? Transvestites?
Believe it or not, these questions are among the most heated being debated right now on Capitol Hill -- even though the arguing is being kept far away from reporters and the cameras.
The fight is over the Employment Non Discrimination Act, which would ban employment discrimination because of a person's homosexuality, bisexuality, heterosexuality, and/or gender identity.
The bill was supposed to be reported out of the House Education and Labor Committee this week. But a significant number of conservative and moderate Democrats said they wouldn't vote for the bill if it included "gender identity," i.e., cross dressers or people who have had or are in the midst of having sex change operations.
That's where social conservatives had focused their attention, certainly. Warned the conservative Traditional Values Coalition, (LINK) "If passed and signed into law, ENDA will force businesses with 15 or more employees to accommodate homosexuals, drag queens, transsexuals, and even she-males in their employment practices and facilities."
So in the last few days this became an issue of pragmatics. Democrats had the votes to pass ENDA, but only without protections for gender identity.
So Rep. Barney Frank, D-Mass., who is openly gay, removed "gender identity" from the bill.
"One of the problems I have found over the years of discussing this is an unwillingness on the part of many, including leaders in the transgender community, to acknowledge a fact," Frank wrote (LINK), "namely that there is more resistance to protection for people who are transgender than for people who are gay, lesbian, and bisexual."
Frank said not only would the "trans-inclusive" bill not pass, but, he wrote, "it became clear that an amendment offered by Republicans either to omit the transgender provision altogether or severely restrict it in very obnoxious ways would pass.”
The bill still would constitute the first workplaces protections for gays, lesbians and bisexuals. So the Human Rights Campaign seemed to reluctantly and tacitly support the compromise. As did Frank.
But then every gay and lesbian rights group except for the HRC protested.
"We are one community, and we demand protections for all of us, and nothing else will suffice," said Matt Foreman of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force.
The committee hearing was postponed, as was the vote on the bill.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., committee chairman Rep. George Miller, D-Calif., Frank and others are giving activists approximately two weeks to lobby Congress to include the T in the LGBT.
The debate is dividing the gay and lesbian community -- "When did transgendered people become part of our community?" many ask -- and it is pushing the limits of how far Democrats are willing to go on this issue.
No Democratic leader wants to make a cause out of workplace protections for transsexuals, or transvestites.
Writes the gay newspaper Bay Windows: "This is madness. the House is on the verge of passing groundbreaking workplace protections for millions of Americans. ...This petulant insistence on purity, principle and perfection is a hallmark not just of the LGBT community, but of American politics in general."
Another gay journalist says ENDA has been "trans-jacked."
Counters Foreman, "Discrimination at work hits transgender people particularly hard. A survey conducted in Washington, D.C., shows that 60 percent of transgender respondents report either no source of income or incomes of less than $10,000 per year, a clear indication of the desperate need for employment protections for transgender people. Employment discrimination undeniably erodes the freedoms of transgender people, and all the rest of us, to live as we know we must."
What do you think?
--jpt
October 4, 2007 | Permalink | User Comments (8)
I like your presentation very much,as it is informative and very useful.
Miss Shaktidivya
Posted by: Miss Shaktidivya | Aug 4, 2008 8:08:33 AM
Jake, I've been on vacation the past ten days in your hometown and haven't been keeping up with the news. So, tell me, what did Congress resolve to do with all the other issues of vital importance it surely must have decided to deal with before tackling this one. What is going to happen in Iraq? On the budget? In Palestine? In Darfur? With illegal immigrants? Oh, you mean to say that nothing's been decided on those issues, and Congress, in its infinite wisdom, decided to tackle this pressing issue first? There's a word for such people as they are: schmucks!
Posted by: chuck | Oct 16, 2007 3:14:20 PM
For the record . . . the term "She Maler" is the most derogatory phrase one could insult a Transsexual with! Furthermore, the surgery is called "Gender Reassignment Surgery" . . . not "Sex Change Operation". Transsexuals are also not Crossdressers. We are born with the brain of one gender, and the body of another gender. Male to Female (MtF) Transsexuals are born with female brains and male bodies. We are WOMEN! We have been WOMEN since birth! WE are just trying to get our brain and our bodies in harmony. We are your sisters . . . your aunts . . . your nieces . . . we are WOMEN!
Regarding "Cross Dressing: Genetic WOMEN have been "Cross Dressing" (and XCtross Dressing at work) since the dawn of World War II, when women went to work in factories, and began wearing pants. Genetic WOMEN wear T-Shirts (a traditional male under garment), tank tops (a traditional male undergarment), pants, jeans . . . and "The Men's Wear Look for Her" to work, to stores, to restaurants, etc. Society does not punish women for going back and forth on the gender spectrum of attire . . . why should it punish men? Men in Colonial times wore wigs, make-up, lace, and carried purses! Thjese MEN were our founding fathers! Where has "The Men's Movement" gone over the last several hundred years? Nowhere! Men refuse to complain in open forum . . . Hence, change never occurs for them! Ironically, the modern day "Men's Suit" was first designed by the French Sabots, several hundred years ago. Thjey cvhose a dark grey or navy suit . . . to thumb their noses at the Aristocracy . . . who wore lace, bright colors, and make-up! This "Suit" has stuck ever since! Watch the Morning News sometime . . . Women wear "Cute Outfits" (sometimes low cut or revealing). Men wear "Suits" and layers of wool. Masle anchor men remind me of Alkida women . . . all you can see is their "talking head" and fginger tips". Whereas, the female anchors look like trhey are about to go on a "clam dig" at the beach!
Dana
Posted by: Dana Michelle Scruggs | Oct 12, 2007 1:02:20 PM
"When did transgendered people become part of our community?" I have 1 word for the people who are asking that question- Stonewall.
Posted by: Jonni | Oct 5, 2007 2:58:57 PM
All of this "inclusiveness" is what is killing off the gay rights movement and straight folks tolerance. When I was young it was gay men, lesbians, and bisexuals. Now it's those three *plus* transgendered, cross-dressing, "questioning" [***?] and it seems any and everything that isn't straight. While it does seem right that everyone should have some legal protections as a default, why the gay "community" [no such thing] has to be so "inclusive" still makes me wish I could be a Republican [wink].
Of course, I still rail against the fact that Pride Parades showcase the drag queens and the leatherfolk as what we're all about ... and they're so not what we're all about. We're just plain folks people with this one difference yet it's our exceptions that make the most noise and garner the most [negative] attention.
More than anything, gay bi straight black white latino or whatever I just wish people would mind their own business and leave everyone else alone. Live and let live and do no harm. To me, that's what it's supposed to be about, no matter what -ism -ology or sexuality you proclaim.
Posted by: Marty | Oct 5, 2007 1:44:59 PM
No where in the Constitution does it give these rights period. If someone gets sex change are they not the new sex. so they then they have those protections. Until then they have a choice on how they want to dress!
Posted by: spock | Oct 5, 2007 11:04:40 AM
Shirley, you jest.
Posted by: WooWooWoo | Oct 5, 2007 7:59:47 AM
Giuliani should be big supporter of this legisaltion considering all the times he has cross dressed in public .
Posted by: Reba Shimansky | Oct 5, 2007 3:05:01 AM
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