On Monday the Heritage Foundation hosted a panel discussion titled, “The Inequality of the Equality Act: Concerns from the Left” where four self-described liberal feminists, including an openly gay woman and one man who formerly identified as transgender, detailed their concerns over transgender activism. The left is pushing special, elevated, civil rights-type protections for gender identity, but women are becoming the real losers.
Soon, House Democrats are expected to reintroduce the Equality Act and likely expedite its passage. Although the bill may not see Senate action, the deceptively named “Equality Act” could be a difficult political hurdle for some, and details just how far the left will try to push the debate. The Equality Act seeks to add sexual orientation and gender identity to the immutable protected classes outlined in the Civil Rights Act. In addition to very legitimate religious liberty concerns, the Equality Act would directly harm women and girls by compromising sex-segregated spaces and placing women’s privacy and safety in jeopardy.
The left is openly shutting down anyone who dares to question the transgender movement and has no problem eating their own. One of the panelists, Julia Beck, a writer who is a producer at Women’s Liberation Radio News who is openly lesbian, testified how she was removed from Baltimore’s LGBTQ Commission for “using male pronouns to talk about a convicted male rapist who identifies as transgender and prefers female pronouns.” They referred to her speech as violent.
One of the other panelists, Kara Dansky, a board member of the self-described “radical feminist” group the Women’s Liberation Front, pointed out how difficult it is to even define the term “gender identity” without using circular reasoning or gender stereotypes. Gender identity, according to the left, is fluid and is defined as the gender you identify as or as a man wearing dresses or participating in stereotypical female activities. As we know, a woman’s choice to dress a certain way does not determine whether or not she is a woman, sex is an objective scientific, biological fact. The left is so adamant on destroying all gender stereotypes, yet they are still compelled to use them to define gender identity. This is a regressive policy.
In Alaska we have already seen women’s rights trumped by ordinances requiring transgender accommodation. In Downtown Hope Center v. Municipality of Anchorage, a homeless shelter, serving women who have suffered rape, physical abuse, and domestic violence, is being accused of turning away a transgender woman. Women staying at the shelter said, “If you allow biological men to sleep right next to us at night, to disrobe and change right next to us at night, we’ll brave the cold.[1]” This clearly undermines protections for women who have escaped abusive, violent situations and forces them into an uncomfortable, vulnerable position in a place that should be safe.
In the words of these feminists, the Equality Act would erase women, making the unique biological character of being female become meaningless. Sharing similar concerns, Concerned Women for America is joining efforts to ensure women are not erased.
[1]https://www.ktuu.com/content/news/Transgender-woman-at-center-of-Downtown-Soup-Kitchen-lawsuit-speaks-out-504529741.html