Something Else Republicans Don’t Get
ENDA is dead, but the Equality Act yet lives.
The Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA), first introduced in the 103rd Congress in 1994 and in every Congress since then, except the 109th and the current 114th, would have forbidden an employer with 15 or more employees:
(1) to fail or refuse to hire or to discharge any individual, or otherwise discriminate against any individual with respect to the compensation, terms, conditions, or privileges of employment of the individual, because of such individual’s actual or perceived sexual orientation or gender identity; or
(2) to limit, segregate, or classify the employees or applicants for employment of the employer in any way that would deprive or tend to deprive any individual of employment or otherwise adversely affect the status of the individual as an employee, because of such individual’s actual or perceived sexual orientation or gender identity.
The Equality Act represents the most invasive threat to religious liberty ever proposed. Were it to pass, its sweeping effects on religious liberty, free speech, and freedom of conscience would be historic.
Aside from the enumerated protections that give rise to conflict between sexual identity and religious liberty, by elevating sexual orientation and gender identity to the level of race, the law’s effect would functionally equate those who don’t agree with it with racists and label them perpetrators of irrational bigotry. Indeed, to favor the Equality Act is to oppose and actively stigmatize the moral convictions that millions of Americans adhere to with abiding sincerity and deep religious precedent.
All public accommodations and programs would be prohibited from denying any good or service to persons on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity. This sounds acceptable in theory, but it leaves no room for accommodating the viewpoints of those whose services, speech, or creativity are used to serve wedding ceremonies. Consider the cases of florists, photographers, and bakers who have had no problems serving gay customers for years, but have objected to providing their services for gay weddings. The Equality Act leaves these individuals defenseless by failing to accommodate their sincere religious beliefs and by failing to distinguish between the dignity of gay individuals and the particular conduct (such as wedding ceremonies) in which some cannot in good conscience participate.
What he says is, of course, absolutely true. As is this:
The bill’s stated intentions and its actual consequences are very different. While the bill purports to protect individuals from discrimination, the Equality Act would discriminate against those who do not agree with a regime of laws premised on sexually permissive understandings of human nature that deny sexual complementarity. It would thus create a new form of discrimination by socially isolating certain beliefs.
What this all comes down to is that Republicans (and most conservatives) believe that discrimination is perfectly okay if it concerns religion. Thus, churches, synagogues, and mosques should be free to hire as ministers, rabbis, and imams only men for leadership positions and discriminate against women. Christian, Jewish, and Muslim schools should be free to hire as teachers just Christians, Jews, and Muslims and discriminate against those of other religions. Religious organizations should be free to admit only heterosexual members and discriminate against homosexual, transgender, and gender fluid individuals. Religious florists, photographers, and bakers should be free to refuse to provide their services for same-sex weddings.
But do Republicans and conservatives really believe what they are saying? Do they actually believe that religious discrimination is okay? Not always. Consider the recent case of Kuwait Airways refusing to carry Israelis on its airplanes.
After thirty-five years of service, Kuwait Airways recently ended its flights between New York City and London rather than have to transport Israelis between the two cities. Kuwait, like sixteen other mostly Arab countries, does not recognize the state of Israel. And Kuwaiti law prohibits domestic companies from conducting business with Israeli citizens. Kuwait Airways does not allow Israelis on its nonstop flights between New York City and Kuwait City because Israelis are granted visas to visit Kuwait. At issue is just the flights from New York City that used to connect in London before going on to Kuwait City. After an Israeli citizen filed a complaint when his attempt to book a flight on Kuwait Airways from New York City to London was refused, the U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT) ruled that the airline’s longstanding policy of prohibiting Israelis from traveling on those flights amounted to “unreasonable discrimination” because Israeli passport holders have the legal right to travel from the United States to the United Kingdom. “An airline does not have the right to refuse to sell tickets to and transport a person between the U.S. and any third country where they are allowed to disembark based on the laws of that country,” said a spokeswoman for the DOT.
I don’t know of a single Republican who has come to the defense of Kuwait Airways for its practice of discrimination against Israelis. Keep in mind that the Kuwaiti attitude toward Israel is ultimately a religious dispute.
Republicans just don’t get it on discrimination.
If discrimination is bigoted, racist, sexist, xenophobic, homophobic, unjust, and just plain wrong, then it doesn’t suddenly cease to be those things when the discrimination is based on some religious conviction.
But discrimination is not “wrong.” In fact, there is nothing inherently “wrong” with discrimination. It is not a dirty word. No one has the right to work any job, be served in any restaurant, shop at any store, enter anyone’s property, rent any hotel room, lease any apartment, buy any house, be admitted to any club or organization, or associate with someone who doesn’t want to associate with him. Discrimination is not aggression—even if it is based on stereotypes, prejudice, bigotry, or racism, and even if it appears to be illogical, irrational, nonsensical, or unreasonable—and should not be prohibited by force of law.
Discrimination means freedom. All discrimination, not just religious discrimination.
A free society is a society free of discrimination laws.
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