Expectations are that democrats will attempt to resuscitate the Employment Nondiscrimination Act (ENDA) this year. ENDA would provide nationwide protections for LGBT in employment, housing, education, credit, and public accommodations. Conservatives have consistently opposed those protections on the basis that they are "special rights" (and hence reserved only for normal, Christian Americans), that LGBT people would frivolously run amok litigiously if we had these protections, and that the protections are not necessary because discrimination is simply not taking pace.
This diary takes down that last point.
In the nation's capital Alexa Rodriguez has filed a discrimination complaint against MedStar Georgetown University Hospital for refusing to perform breast implant surgery upon her because of her gender identity. Rodriguez had been cleared for the surgery earlier in the year but then had to battle her insurance provider to cover the surgery. During that period the hospital changed its policy...and now refuses to do the surgery. At least two other transgender women have also been denied such treatment.
They told me that when I got the pre-approval for the insurance we can schedule the surgery. So after I received that approval I called to make an appointment for the surgery.
--Rodriguez
The hospital employee she talked with while attempting to schedule the surgery said the hospital was no longer taking transgender women for surgery.
And I asked him why. He was like, ‘Oh, I don’t know. They’re not saying anything.'
--Rodriguez
Marianne Worley, director of media relations for MedStar Georgetown University Hospital, said in a statement to the Washington Blade that the hospital has a policy of not discriminating against patients based on sexual orientation and gender identity and expression among other categories.
While the hospital doesn’t offer some specific programs such as gender transition treatment, “We do see and diagnose anyone who presents to us,” she said, including transgender patients. “MedStar Georgetown University Hospital does not have a policy on assisting with gender transition; it is just not a comprehensive service that we currently offer,” Worley said in her statement.
Our conclusion has been that a high quality gender transition service is best delivered in the context of an integrated program rather than in a one off manner, and such a program does not exist at MedStar Georgetown.
MedStar Georgetown is a Catholic hospital and, consistent with all Catholic hospitals, it operates under the Ethical and Religious Directives of the Catholic Church
--Worley
Rodriguez was referred to Georgetown by Whitman Walker Health, which provides health care to much the district's LGBT population.
We are surprised and disappointed to learn of Georgetown’s statement and its implications for access to much-needed surgery services for the metro D.C. transgender community .
--Shawn Jain, Whitman Walker
They could be running afoul of the Human Rights Act because they are providing implants for cancer patients and other people, and because they’re doing that and they’re not going to do it for this individual they’re running the risk of liability.
--Brian Markovitz, civil rights attorney
In Gloucester County, VA
a transgender student and the ACLU have sued Gloucester County Schools for banning him from the boys room. Gavin Grimm points out that he was specifically identified as "a girl" and "a freak" at a public board meeting at which he had his bathroom access restricted. The suit bases its claim of discrimination on Title IX.
The suit discusses how Gavin has been ostracized from the girls’ room, where others perceive him to be a boy and ask him to leave. He has also found that using the school’s single-stall restrooms actually spotlights him as “the black sheep,” describing walking to the rarely used facilities as a “walk of shame.”
The school board’s policy is deeply stigmatizing and needlessly cruel. Any student -- transgender or not -- should be free to use single-stall restrooms if they want extra privacy. Instead of protecting the privacy of all students, the school board has chosen to single out transgender students as unfit to use the same restrooms as everyone else.
--Joshua Block, ACLU
A cisgender woman has filed a lawsuit against Fishbone's Rhythm Kitchen Cafe in Detroit after she was injured while being physically removed from the premises.
Cortney Bogorad says that at about 11pm on January 23, after eating and paying for her dinner, she endeavored to use the restroom and heard a shout:
Whatever man is in the restroom, come out now!
A male security guard then entered the women's restroom and stated
This is a woman's bathroom, if you are a man, come out!
Bogorad stated that she was a woman, not a man and attempted to show him her identification, but he was not interested.
After she was pushed out of the restroom, Bogorad saw someone who she said may have been the restaurant's manager and attempted to explain the situation and again offered to show her ID. The individual also ignored her, she said.
The guard then "proceeded to aggressively hold a badge inches away from plaintiff's face and shouted loudly at her, telling her that he was a security officer.
Bogorad then swatted the badge away from her face. The guard then picked her up "against her will by her hooded sweater and bra.
The guard carried her to the front of the restaurant and physically threw her out onto Monroe Street, Bogorad said. Her upper torso was exposed to all of the patrons that were sitting inside the restaurant.
".. In the process she sustained physical damages including contusions, wrist injuries, shoulder injuries and scarring which required medical treatment. As a direct and proximate result of the defendants' wrongful acts, plaintiff not only suffered physical damages, but suffered severe embarrassment, humiliation, shock and mental and emotional distress and anguish."