9 replies to this topic

[Jasi]

ENDA is a bill that looks to add sexual orientation and gender identity to the list of things a United States employer may not base a discrimination against employees (that sentence was really hard to form; apologies if it's still clunky), along with things like race and gender. ENDA and bills like it have been given to Congress in the past but have continued to fail due to (mainly conservative) opposition. Finally, last Thursday, the Senate approved the current version of ENDA.

 

But we're not out of the woods yet, since the Republican-controlled House still needs to vote on it. Surprisingly, many Republican leaders are using appeals to small business owners, not appeals to religion, as their primary excuse for not supporting the bill. Opponents are concerned about a rise in frivolous litigations against employers if this bill passes. Supporters of the bill say that there are already very few "frivolous litigations" that occur due to discrimination in the categories of race and gender, so why would this be different?

 

Thoughts? Personally, I find the opposition's position to be quite thinly veiled; I don't believe this is truly their primary concern. I find it very unlikely that a significant enough number of frivolous lawsuits would arise to impact small businesses on a large scale. There may be non-frivolous lawsuits as a result, to which I say, "Good." Or are all LGBT lawsuits "frivolous"? Besides, protecting marginalized minorities ought to be more important than protecting small businesses, in my opinion.

Edited by Jasi, 08 November 2013 - 10:26 AM.

[Delphi]

Honestly I'm just appalled this hasnt been put into law sooner. My favorite boss I ever had was openly gay and it saddens me that he could be let go and have no protection against it just because of his orientation. he's a fantastic worker and understands how to cultivats the best from his workers as a manager. However, many people wouldnt give him or someone like him a chance. It's just as bad as racism and sexism in my eyes.

People might go "I don't want to hear about his gay life style! I'm going to be sexually harassed!" but it wasnt ever brought up at work. We were friends outside of work and that's how I found out. He aws always a professional at work and the only time it came up is when it was just him and I working and I broached the subject first and I made it clear I was comfortable with his attraction to men and didnt feel harassed. With other LBGT people they have been just as professional because, and I know this must be "shocking", they are just people looking for an honest day's work.

Now there may be some LGBT people who seek to make people uncomfortable but just as many or more straight people do the same tning. Just as I see with race, it doesn't matter what color you are there jerks and saints everywhere and that particular bit of a person *is* a choice.

Tl;dr: Peace, love your neighbor, be nice to everyone spiel.

[Mark]

Now there may be some LGBT people who seek to make people uncomfortable but just as many or more straight people do the same tning. Just as I see with race, it doesn't matter what color you are there jerks and saints everywhere and that particular bit of a person *is* a choice.

 

A while ago I started work in a particular buisiness where the long-time big boss was a gay guy (and flamboyantly so), and it was just so that ~40% of the people there were also LGBT.

hmmm.

 

In so far as people are encouraged to employ others only based on relevant skills I dont mind.

not that it always happens, but the idea is encouraging.

[deep]

Just last year I too started to work at a business where all the long-time administration were, without fail, flamboyantly straight.

 

It just so happened that the overwhelming majority of the people who worked there, including myself, were also straight.

 

Hm.

[Sir Deimos]

Just last year I too started to work at a business where all the long-time administration were, without fail, flamboyantly straight.
 
It just so happened that the overwhelming majority of the people who worked there, including myself, were also straight.
 
Hm.

[Nevermind]

My newest employee calls herself pansexual and is as married as possible to another young lady. As they left the other day, they were holding hands and I noticed a mother and daughter see it and give weird looks as they left. This kind of angered me a little inside and I wasnt super friendly to them, cos this girl is so fuckin cool and doesnt deserve looks like that.

Umm, so....we dont discriminate in any way when we hire, I guess?

[Jasi]

I feel like everyone is on board with not discriminating. I guess what I found shocking/discussion-worthy about this is that the Republicans are saying that it shouldn't be supported in order to protect businesses from frivolous lawsuits. 

[Egann]

It really depends on the business. Somebody like McDonalds obviously doesn't need the protection, but I can think of several semi-religious small businesses around here which could be outright destroyed by a discrimination claim because they've got all of four employees from a local evangelical church. It'd be practically impossible for them to defend against a discrimination claim even if it is frivolous.

 

Personally, though, discrimination and frivolous lawsuits are apples and oranges. They're both bad, but if I had to pick one and both are going to be kept within reasonable bounds, discrimination is probably the worse evil most of the time.

 

Not to offend anybody, but anecdotes of discrimination are basically irrelevant (and fighting discrimination by legislation is a bad idea, anyway, because it's likely to make people resentful and worsen problems.) I'm skeptical of if this will do anything one way or another. I've never seen a job application which asked me what my sexual orientation was. I expect the legislation itself is almost completely ineffective (and by extension, harmless). I don't think the bill does enough to warrant political discussion one way or the other, and I expect the parties are just finding excuses to circle the wagons.

Edited by Egann, 13 November 2013 - 12:22 PM.

[Delphi]

Protect from frivolous law suits. HA! That's hillarious, says the girl who works in medical care.

Frivolous lawsuits have become a way of life here and it saddens me greatly but that's another kettle of fish.

Correct me if I'm wrong, though, but I feel like this argument was used before with a women's equality in the work place thing. Seems like their go to argument.

EDIT: And can I say how much I hate that we still ask for race and ethnicity for jobs and health records and such? I know for someone personal medical file it can be relevant because of things like health risks but everything else seems stupid to me and here's my personal reason why.

I dont think racism and such will die until we stop putting labels on people. It's probably just a weird quirk of mine but I from my point of view, labeling races and having people list their sexual preferences and so forth just emphasises the Us vs Them mentality, whoever the Us happens to be.

Probably just me who thinks that way but it makes me wonder how things would be without the labels.

Edited by Delphi, 13 November 2013 - 12:32 PM.

[Jasi]

I'm skeptical of if this will do anything one way or another. I've never seen a job application which asked me what my sexual orientation was. I expect the legislation itself is almost completely ineffective (and by extension, harmless). I don't think the bill does enough to warrant political discussion one way or the other, and I expect the parties are just finding excuses to circle the wagons.

 

It's not concerning just job applications, but your actual working environment—so, it probably would come out at some point that a person is gay if they work there for long enough. As it is, a person could be fired quite explicitly for their sexuality and the law would do nothing to help them with that. 

 

And can I say how much I hate that we still ask for race and ethnicity for jobs and health records and such? I know for someone personal medical file it can be relevant because of things like health risks but everything else seems stupid to me and here's my personal reason why.

I dont think racism and such will die until we stop putting labels on people. It's probably just a weird quirk of mine but I from my point of view, labeling races and having people list their sexual preferences and so forth just emphasises the Us vs Them mentality, whoever the Us happens to be.

Probably just me who thinks that way but it makes me wonder how things would be without the labels.

 

Aren't those things typically optional, outside of health forms? At any rate, I don't think we can get rid of labels, and that there is value to differentiating cultures from each other, just as long as it doesn't then lead to hatred, discrimination, etc. I'm not a fan of the "let's just erase all differences" approach because it usually implies "let's all get whiter" and I don't see anything wrong with people celebrating their distinct cultures.

[Fin]

Aren't those things typically optional, outside of health forms? At any rate, I don't think we can get rid of labels, and that there is value to differentiating cultures from each other, just as long as it doesn't then lead to hatred, discrimination, etc. I'm not a fan of the "let's just erase all differences" approach because it usually implies "let's all get whiter" and I don't see anything wrong with people celebrating their distinct cultures.

This is one of those times when I really want a like button.

[Delphi]

I have a difficult time putting into words what I mean when this comes up so I will do my best to.not.sound like an idiot.

I guess my issues is with the rigid labels we place on races that people use as a replacement for education. I do agree with you that cultural differences should be celebrated and enjoyed and that's part.of what I mean by not seeing labels as you are correct when you mention the white washing.

One of the main issues I have is that labels for race or gender/oriententation are limited.

For the US census we have five limited categories:
White (Caucasian)
Black/African American
Asian
Native Hawaiian/Other Pacific Islander
American Indian/Alaskan Native

In some places you can choose "Other" but some have done away with that. Now my issue is that five small categories without additional options is far too limited to.accurately portray the human race yet here we are.

On top of that, people that I'm sad to say I've met use those categories to apply to their culture as a whole.

I'll use Asian for example. I don't know how many people assume Asian culture is "Chinese" food, kimonos and short people with "slanted eyes" and black hair. Now I'm going to assume we're aj enlightened enough community here to see how asinine that is. Yet I've met people who believe themselves to be tolerant that think that is Asian culture. That is one of my major pet peeves with the races labels. In some places, I really see them foster ignorance and avoids the celebration of cultures.

I guess I'm trying to say humanity is too diverse and changing to those rigid types of labels at and that's what bothers me. Can't we appreciate each other without forcing people into little labeled boxes?

Edited by Delphi, 14 November 2013 - 11:48 AM.

[Jasi]

I feel like that's probably based on traditional conceptions of races (biological, to do with physical characteristics) vs. ethnicities (cultural)—within which the divisions are admittedly a result of our social constructs. But the idea is that biologically there are basically only between 2 and 6 groups depending on who you ask, although ethnically there are innumerable groups.

 

It's true that the differences between races are pretty much cultural and not terribly empirical. But I'm just saying that's where they're coming from. It is definitely problematic when people conflate race and ethnicity and think that everyone with the same racial characteristics share anything beyond skin color, hair color, etc.

[Fin]

My own experience with labels (particularly of the sexual orientation variety) has been pretty positive. The discovery of a label I'd never heard of before was remarkably freeing and really helped me figure out that there was nothing wrong with me. It didn't mean forcing myself to fit into a box that wasn't a perfect fit, it meant giving me a vocabulary to help me better figure out exactly how my sexuality worked.

I've found labels can be useful tools to help you figure yourself out. They don't have to be rigid and so long as there's recognition that people who fall under the same label don't necessarily experience that thing the exact same way, and we allow people the right to self-determination, I think the value of labels far outweighs the potential harm their misuse can cause.

[Delphi]

I do get some of the reasons for labeling races as a cultural construct but the issue I have is still so many people believing that there are hard genetic differences in races beyond just the phenotypes. But theres so much variation within races that you cant really make blanket statements. And that's what scares me. That's when people start talking about getting rid of undesirable traits. And then the issue of what's an undesirable trait. We can probably all agree that traits that promote cancer proliferation are bad but then what about left handedness (I'm not kidding about that one. I saw a measure in my home town someone wanted to pass to force all left handed people to switch to right handed and weed out unddesirables)

Back on topic, it's disheartening to see someone terrified that they've been outted and then just hope their boss sees them for their work and not their orientation. It echoes a lot of what I remember my grandma talking about being a teacher in the 50s as a woman. A lot of the fear about things beyond her control. There's enough things to worry about at a job. Worrying that something personal if possibly discovered could jeopardize your livelihood is ridiculous and shouldn't factor in to your performance. These are people just like anyone else just trying to make an honest living. No reason to fearmonger about lawsuits. The people who would sue aren't like that because of their orientation. They're like that because of their personality.

[Selena]

 

A while ago I started work in a particular buisiness where the long-time big boss was a gay guy (and flamboyantly so), and it was just so that ~40% of the people there were also LGBT.

hmmm.

 

 

Damnation! You have discovered the existence of Operation Viral Rainbow.

 

This was a wide-scale conversion operation designed by the Gay Brotherhood and the League of Extraordinary Lesbians. Each organization inserts a charismatic gay person into a workplace, and, over time, slowly converts heterosexual breeders into gay recruits. From there, we can mold them into effective frontline agents. Our efforts have been growing exponentially due to the stunning success of our gay rights campaigns. Soon, the entire world will be ours! The human race will cease to procreate, and we will start a new empire where we genetically engineer super-powered gay children.

 

And then, one fateful day, the Gay Brotherhood and the League of Extraordinary Lesbians will do battle for total control of the planet. It shall be Gay Ragnarok.

 

There can be only one gender.

[Delphi]

[Sir Deimos]

Gay-gnarok if you will.

[deep]

Aw c'mon. I already addressed how ridiculous what he said was in a glib manner. Then you had to go gay it up and make it Glee levels of production.

Edited by deep, 14 November 2013 - 04:39 PM.

[Selena]

Don't be silly, I didn't include a musical number.

 

 

 

But I could.

[Nevermind]

I was thinking it. I had to say it. Im sorry.









Fagnarok.

Armagayddon.

[Mark]

.....

 

 

\:-|

[Sir Deimos]

FAGNAROK. I LOVE IT.

[Fin]

Lena I thought you weren't allowed to talk about the gay agenda what the hell

[wisp]

But the Gay Agenda has already been leaked!

[Jasi]

Hahah wisp that rules.