Houston Says No to HERO

A few issues ago the topic of Texas was brought up. Texas recently was in the process of reviewing a bill called the Houston Equal Rights Ordinance that had been passed in 2014. This would make it so that, like California, Texas would no longer allow discrimination against transgendered individuals. And for a while it seemed to be picking up traction. Activist groups were talking to massive amounts of people to get them on board.

Unfortunately, the ordinance wasn’t as favorable to the people as they once thought. Many religious and conservative activist groups used scare tactics to put things in their favor. They used bathroom scare tactics to sway voters to their way of thinking. These groups said that if this bill remained in their laws then what would stop men from just walking into women’s restrooms.

This marks for a major step back in terms of the equal rights movement. While not many outside of Texas are surprised by this outcome, it still is a sad thing to see a state take steps back.

Township High School Trans Debacle

Being a small Illinois school, Millikin students are highly aware of Illinois high school drama. Recently one high school has caused enough drama to warrant the attention of several news media outlets.

Transgender issues in high schools have always been a tender topic. Many schools don’t know what to do with these students. For a student who is out and proud using a gender neutral bathroom could be seen as insulting. This student, who wishes to remain nameless, wanted to simply be able to change in the girls locker rooms and do so in a bathroom stall. Many girls already do this because of one insecurity or another so this transgendered girl asking should be no different.

However the school doesn’t think so. This school sees her as a danger to other students and a privacy concern for other girls since she isn’t a true girl by their standards. Where this school gets into legal trouble is that this directly goes against Title IX protocols. Title IX protects all students for being discriminated against due to gender or sexuality for any reason. It also prevents any sort of harassment for being a certain gender.

This school faces losing all of their federal funding if they continue to stand by their decision. However the student body is rallying behind this girl by signing a petition to give her the right to change in her proper locker room: the girl’s locker room. They are almost to the 800 signatures that they need for their petition to be valid.

You Can Play

The New York Giants have recently participated in the You Can Play campaign. This campaign is targeted towards LGBTQ individuals in the sports community. In years past, the sports community has been known for looking down upon their queer teammates. The point of this effort is to show support from a highly regarded sports team that is a part of a system that has discriminated for years.

A large reason for this is due to events of last year. Last year, the St. Louis Rams had the first openly gay football player on their team. Michael Sam came out last year as homosexual; however at the end of the year he was cut. No other NFL team would take him for the next season. A Canadian team wanted to draft him, however at this point he said he was done with professional football.

It remains to be seen whether or not he was cut due to his homosexuality, but these are the types of things that the New York Giants are trying to abolish with their efforts.