Arkansas ‘values’ on display: Governor will stand in bathroom door against non-existent transgender surge and gay rights in general – Arkansas Times

The war against the virtually non-existent boy-in-the-girls-bathrom dominated the news conference yesterday by Governor Hutchinson and Attorney General Leslie Rutledge promising massive resistance in Arkansas to a Biden administration proposed rule to extend Title IX protection against discrimination on account of sexual orientation or gender identity.

Please note my emphasis.

The rule amendments will include protections against discrimination based on sexual orientation as well as gender identity. The Education Department has said it plans to issue a separate notice of proposed rulemaking to address whether and how the agency should amend the Title IX regulations to address students’ eligibility to participate on a particular male or female athletics team, though that was the focus of the news conference alarums yesterday.

Got it? For now, NO rule has been proposed on what Hutchinson and Rutledge and Missy Irvin describe as an existential threat to women’s athletics. (As yet, I’ve heard of no instance of a transgender female seejubg to participate in school athletics in Arkansas.) What has been proposed so far is protection against discrimination against LGBTQ students.

This proposal, the governor said bluntly yesterday, is a “conflict with the values of Arkansas.”

What an embarrassing admission. And it’s nothing but the truth.

Discrimination against LGBT people of any age is deeply embedded in Arkansas law. The Arkansas civil rights law doesn’t prevent discrimination in employment, housing or public accommodations on account of sexual orientation or gender identity. The law prevents local jurisdictions from extending such protection. Though blocked by the courts, a law remains on Arkansas books criminalizing homosexual acts. At every level in Arkansas, religion is cited as a ground for discriminating against LGBT people by people forgetful of the Great Commandment and forgetful that not ALL religious faiths hold the same venomous view of sexual minorities.

It is, by the way, a short step from using the pretext of the state fundamentalist religion to discriminate against LGBT people to using it to defend discrimination based on color,  religion or national origins.

Rutledge’s ignorance has long been on display. Thursday, the governor, hoping to run for president, has shamefully joined the Republican demagogues’ parade. He happily joined the national Republican strategy of demonizing the tiny ranks of transgender people, a desperate ploy for a party with little of substance to offer voters except fear and loathing of the different. He offered utter nonsense yesterday in trying to explain how discriminating against a tiny class of oppressed people was actually protecting them.

Don’t think for a minute that this is ONLY about keeping transgender women out of women’s sports (women in men’s sports is OK, which says something about how Republicans view women as the lesser sex).

You need only read Hutchinson’s own words about the breadth of this proposed rule that he promised to fight.

The governor is saying he’s OK with no school protection for gay children. And, in the bargain, he will stand in the bathroom door to prevent entry by a transgender girl in state-sanctified spaces. Should any such person be brave enough to try in a place like, say, Conway, where defense of non-discrimination seems to have led to the assault of a woman earlier this week. No doubt by a good Christian.

The governor got perturbed when I earlier compared him to Orval Faubus for interposing state “values” to prevent Planned Parenthood from receiving reimbursement for family planning services that prevent unwanted pregnancies; in earlier support of discrimination against gay people, and in defending an absolute abortion ban despite suggesting he thought it went too far.

It’s time to dust off the meme.

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