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 |  Subject: Suck it up, commie-faggots: 'State of crisis': Advocates warn of 'unprecedented' wave of anti-LGBTQ bills  Sun May 02, 2021 9:57 pm | |
| Eight of these bills have already been enacted and 10 more are on governors’ desks, according to the Human Rights Campaign.
Hundreds of bills that target LGBTQ people have been filed in state legislatures, creating a “state of crisis,” advocates say.
The bills “attempt to erase transgender people and attempt to make LGBTQ people second-class citizens,” Alphonso David, president of the Human Rights Campaign, said during a news conference Thursday.
David said the number of bills, particularly those targeting transgender young people, is “unprecedented” and that 2021 is on track to “become the worst year for state legislative attacks against LGBTQ people in history.”
Until now, 2015 held that record, with 15 anti-LGBTQ bills enacted into law, David said. So far this year, eight bills targeting LGBTQ people have been signed into law, and another 10 are sitting on governors’ desks awaiting signatures, according to the Human Rights Campaign.
“Just to underscore the severity of these bills and the dangerous threshold we are about to cross: If these bills are enacted, it would mean that states will have enacted more anti-LGBTQ bills this year alone than in the last three years combined,” David said.
The national landscape
So far in 2021, eight bills targeting LGBTQ people have become law, most of them centered on transgender minors.
Governors in four states — Arkansas, Mississippi, Tennessee and Alabama — have signed bills banning trans athletes from competing on school sports teams that align with their gender identity.
Republican Gov. Kristi Noem in South Dakota issued two executive orders that will prohibit trans girls from playing on girls sports teams. Noem also signed a religious freedom bill that advocates say opens the door to discrimination against LGBTQ people.
Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson, a Republican, signed a similar bill that allows doctors to refuse to treat someone due to their religious or moral beliefs. Hutchinson vetoed another bill to ban transition care for trans minors — including puberty blockers, hormones and surgery — but the Arkansas Legislature overrode the veto, and the bill will become law this summer.
In North Dakota, Republican Gov. Doug Burgum signed a bill that the Human Rights Campaign says will allow student groups that receive state funding through their universities to turn away LGBTQ students “under the guise of free speech.”
In addition to those measures, another 10 are sitting on governors’ desks. Among them are a bill in Montana that would require gender-affirming surgery before a trans person can change the gender marker on their birth certificate; bills in West Virginia and Alabama that limit trans athlete participation; and bills in Arkansas and Tennessee that would require parents to sign off on any mention of gender identity or sexual orientation in school curriculums.
The Tennessee Legislature is expected to send a bill to Republican Gov. Bill Lee’s desk that requires schools to provide “reasonable accommodations,” such as single-occupancy restrooms, to public school students who don’t want to share public facilities with trans students.
“All of these bills are dangerous and harmful to LGBTQ people, and many of them have particularly singled out some of the most vulnerable in our community, which are transgender youth,” David said.
A few governors, like Hutchinson, have already vetoed some legislation. Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey, a Republican, vetoed a bill last week that would have required parental notification of any mention of LGBTQ people in school curriculums. Burgum in North Dakota and Kansas Gov. Laura Kelly, a Democrat, both vetoed trans athlete bans.
The vetoes, David said, are the result of advocates’ efforts to provide elected officials with facts instead of misinformation about the medical care trans young people receive, or the potential negative economic effects of passing such bills.
“Once they understand the facts from the medical community, from the business community, from families, they understand that these bills are not supported by the facts, they're not supported by science and there's no basis to advance these bills. Yet they are still under pressure from their ‘base,’” David said, “which is why we're seeing some of these bills signed, because they're providing red meat to their base, but at the same time they recognize that some of these bills are just simply unconscionable.”
Major medical organizations like the American Academy of Pediatrics, the American Medical Association and the American Psychological Association oppose medical care bans and support affirming care for trans youth, Dr. Robert Garofalo, division chief of adolescent medicine at Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago, said during the news conference.
“We know that gender-affirming care is best practice and to think otherwise just flies in the face of all available scientific evidence,” Garofalo said. One study published in the journal Pediatrics found that trans people who received puberty blockers had a lower risk of suicidal thoughts than adults who wanted them but couldn’t access them.
The vetoes and opposition to the bills from some Republicans are also the result of grassroots activism, said Jasmine Banks, whose daughter is trans. Banks is also founder of Reconcile Arkansas, a queer and trans advocacy group.
"This is one of those moments in history where we're putting these folks on notice and we're saying, 'We are the people who put you in those positions of power, and if you continue to leverage your attacks on our communities, you will no longer be in those positions. We will move you out of those leadership positions,'" Banks said during Thursday’s news conference.
David said a number of bills are also poised to soon pass their second legislative chambers, such as abill in Tennessee that would require businesses to post signs outside of restrooms if they allow trans people to use the bathroom that aligns with their gender identity.
.https://www.nbcnews.com/feature/nbc-out/state-crisis-advocates-warn-unprecedented-wave-anti-lgbtq-bills-n1265132
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