I just read a story about this guy who lost his job because he's gay. He was accused of creating a distraction at the workplace and making his heterosexual male coworkers uncomfortable so they fired him. That's disturbing enough for me but in a way I can kind of see it. People are bigoted. If they can keep gays away from them they'll do it.
In this case, this is actually a long-standing policy that's used to hurt guys at their place of employment like this. They've been able to get away with it for fifteen years or so and nobody says a word. It just gets overlooked! The reasons for this policy are silly: they argue, as in this case, gay people will upset the cohesion of employees. They say gays will hurt morale and business will fade away because of all the discomfort. Now, isn't it stupid that instead of punishing the bigots, the law hurts gay people? This guy apparently didn't do anything to bring this on!
Like anyone, this guy seems to have just existed. He went to work on time and did everything he was supposed to do. But some people got worked up about it so now he's fired.
The kicker? Even though this seems like a backwards policy that hurts a significant portion of the Democratic electorate, the policy was introduced by a well known Democrat! What are we doing? It's just stayed that way for fifteen years, unquestioned. Obviously a majority of the people wouldn't be behind something like this, and efforts are trying to be made to stop this shit.
The legislators and people involved want to study the issue for the next year. Can you believe that? This place is fucking firing people all the time for stupid reasons and the best they can do is say, well, we'll study this and decide how best to stop firing gay people. They could just stop, and should've stopped before this guy.
And worse? They are thinking about creating a website where people can anonymously give their opinions on whether or not gays should be ALLOWED their jobs! That's how they expect to solve this: through a year long study and an anonymous program where bigots can openly bash their gay coworkers.
How is this moral? I don't get it.
Gays are really getting hurt by all of this, you could imagine. Even those who have no interest in working at this place live with that hanging over our heads: there's always somewhere gays are not good enough for. There's always something we can't do.
There is a remedy to this. There's a little less than sixty days now, a short window, in which they can end this policy the easiest. The problem is the bosses don't want to upset those "victims" - the same ones they're seeking anonymous advice from - and instead want to just wait and see what the study says and what the anonymous bigots tell them. And that's how they'll decide whether or not to fix this outdated and immoral policy.
I for one am holding out hope for that easier fix. That's the best way to do this. These people need to know that. No gay person should have to live with this hanging over their heads for their whole lives. It's unfair. We're not doing anything wrong. I'm sorry about others' discomfort but that's not my fault. How can we be held responsible for others' feelings?
I just thought I would bring this travesty to your attention. Maybe someone will do something.
UPDATE: I have to go visit my mom now. Didn't expect this post to take off the way it did. I'll reply to comments when I get back though.