The "Spaghetti Dinner" Clause That Launched the Latest Religious Freedom Suit

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BY SUNNIVIE BRYDUM
OCTOBER 17, 2016

Just days after a new Massachusetts law took effect this month ensuring trans people have equal access to spaces of public accommodation, right-wing legal powerhouse Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF) filed a lawsuit challenging the law on “religious freedom” grounds.

According to the suit, filed on behalf of “four diverse Massachusetts churches,” the new statewide law requiring all places of public accommodation to make facilities available to the public in accordance with an individual’s gender identity “[forces] churches to open their sensitive areas—like changing rooms and restrooms—to members of the opposite sex.”

“This requirement,” ADF claims, “conflicts with the religious beliefs of these churches regarding God’s design for human sexuality.”

The language in ADF’s complaint clearly reads as a dog-whistle to the transphobic right wing, in which ADF is a key player. The phrasing of the supposed injury—“open their sensitive areas… to members of the opposite sex”—is clearly drafted to evoke visions of sexual violation, a tried-and-true (though patently false) scare tactic anti-LGBT activists frequently use to defeat nondiscrimination policies.

http://religiondispatches.org/the-spaghetti-dinner-clause-that-launched-the-latest-religious-freedom-suit/

http://www.advocate.com/transgender/2016/7/08/massachusetts-gov-signs-transgender-public-accommodations-bill

https://adflegal.blob.core.windows.net/web-content-dev/docs/default-source/documents/case-documents/hope-christian-fellowship-v.-williamson/horizon-christian-fellowship-v-williamson---complaint.pdf?sfvrsn=4