Advocates, opponents of trans rights bill to have their say on Beacon Hill

[Ian David]

Brace yourselves. If opponents of transgender rights have their way, the discussion at a March 4 hearing on the transgender rights bill, House Bill 1722, will be derailed in favor of dredging up age-old arguments about who gets to use which bathroom. The landmark hearing will take place before the Joint Committee on the Judiciary and will mark the first time that any committee of the state legislature has heard testimony exclusively related to trans rights. The bathroom argument - essentially, that women will be harassed by men in the ladies room, an argument that was successfully employed to torpedo the Equal Rights Amendment - is an old one.

Already the anti-gay Coalition for Marriage and Family has sent an action alert to its members, warning them of the alleged dangers posed by the bill to bathroom safety. The alert called on supporters to call legislators and parrot that same argument. Meanwhile, on the fringier end of the anti-LGBT movement Amy Contrada of the group MassResistance has been slowly releasing pieces of what she purports to be a 75-page report warning against "the coming nightmare of H.B. 1722." (see"Contrada warns of trans apocalypse.")

But the advocates who drafted the bill and the lawmakers who are pushing for it say the arguments of groups like the Coalition and MassResistance are a red herring, distracting from the bill’s true purpose: to extend the state’s non-discrimination and hate crimes protections to a population that desperately needs them. In the run-up to the hearing the Massachusetts Transgender Political Coalition (MTPC) and its allies are mobilizing members of the transgender community and their supporters to testify to the discrimination the trans community faces and the impact that passing H.B. 1722 would have on addressing it.

H.B. 1722: The breakdown

Opponents of the bill have accused it of doing some outlandish things. Contrada, for instance, alleges that it would force hotels to host BDSM conferences against their will. But Laura Langley, one of the drafters of the legislation and chair of the Massachusetts Lesbian and Gay Bar Association’s committee on transgender inclusion, gave Bay Windows a breakdown on what the language of the bill actually does. H.B. 1722 will add "gender identity and expression" to the state’s hate crimes laws. It will also add protections based on gender identity and expression to state non-discrimination laws covering education, employment, housing, credit, and public accommodations. The bill requires the inclusion of "people of diverse gender identities or expressions" on the advisory boards of the Massachusetts Commission Against Discrimination (MCAD), the state’s lead civil rights agency. Finally, the bill expands the name and mission of the Massachusetts Commission on Gay and Lesbian Youth to include transgender and bisexual youth.

More:
http://www.edgeboston.com/index.php?ch=news&sc=glbt&sc2=news&sc3=&id=70964


See also:

Enemies of Equality Are Attacking Again! Contact Massachusetts Congress-critters TODAY!
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=221x66724