Transgender pastor claims bias, sues Lutheran denomination
DEEPA BHARATH
Thu, March 2, 2023 at 11:58 PM GMT+1
The Rev. Megan Rohrer, who was elected as the first openly transgender bishop of one of the largest Christian denominations in the country in May 2021, has filed a lawsuit alleging that he was forced out from his post after enduring several months of discrimination and harassment.
The denomination, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, declined comment, according to an email from spokesperson Candice Buchbinder.
Rohrer, of San Francisco, resigned in June as bishop of the ELCA's Sierra Pacific Synod amid allegations of racism after he fired the pastor of a predominantly Latino, immigrant congregation in Stanton, California, on the Day of Our Lady of Guadalupe, for which the community had planned elaborate festivities.
In his lawsuit filed Wednesday in U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, Rohrer accuses the denomination of discriminating against him for being transgender and deliberately misgendering him and creating a “hostile work environment.” He is seeking monetary damages.
Rohrer, who now works as a senior communications specialist with a Black nondenominational church in San Francisco, said Thursday that he always felt the support of Lutherans in the pews, but not from the higher echelons of the national church. On his first day as bishop, during a video call, Rohrer said he was misgendered and ridiculed for featuring drag queens at his ordination.
Rohrer alleges in the lawsuit that he was scapegoated and “publicly shamed as a racist."
Christian viewer discretion advised - be sure to call your health care provider
Thailand's 'most beautiful transgender woman' and husband wear $580K in attire at extravagant wedding
Michelle De Pacina
Sat, March 4, 2023 at 1:25 AM GMT+1
Thai transgender model Poyd Treechada Petcharat, who is colloquially known as Thailand’s “most beautiful transgender woman,” has tied the knot with her businessman beau in an extravagant Peranakan wedding.
Poyd, 36, and Oak Phakwa Hongyok were married in a traditional Peranakan ceremony in Phuket on Thursday.
The actor shared the news on Instagram along with their wedding photos.
The intimate ceremony was reportedly held at Baan Ar-Jor, a heritage hotel, museum and restaurant owned by Oak’s family.
Poyd wore an embroidered traditional Peranakan wedding dress with a flower crown that was handmade by artisans from Thailand's Ranong province and antique jewelry. Oak wore a western tuxedo with two gold brooches. They reportedly spent about 20 million baht (approximately $580,000) for their traditional wedding costumes, which took months to complete.
In June 2020, after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that workplace discrimination against people based on their sexual orientation or gender identity was illegal, Alaska quickly moved to follow suit.
It published new guidelines in 2021 saying Alaska’s LGBTQ protections now extended beyond the workplace to housing, government practices, finance and “public accommodation.” It updated the website of the Alaska State Commission for Human Rights to explicitly say it was illegal to discriminate against someone because of that person’s sexual orientation or gender identity.
The executive director for the state commission co-wrote an essay describing the ruling as a “sea change under Alaska law for LGBTQ+ individuals’ rights to be free from discrimination.”
But a year later, the commission quietly reversed that position. It deleted language from the state website promising equal protections for transgender and gay Alaskans against most categories of discrimination, and it began refusing to investigate complaints. Only employment-related complaints would now be accepted, and investigators dropped any non-employment LGBTQ civil rights cases they had been working on.
An investigation by the Anchorage Daily News and ProPublica found the decision had been requested by a conservative Christian group and was made the week of the Republican primary for governor, in which Gov. Mike Dunleavy was criticized for not being conservative enough. The commission made the change on the advice of Attorney General Treg Taylor and announced it publicly via its Twitter feed — which currently has 31 followers — on Election Day.
The LGBTQ advocacy nonprofit Identity Alaska called the reversal “state-sponsored discrimination.”
OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) — Oklahoma Republicans formally censured their nonbinary Democratic colleague Tuesday after state troopers said the lawmaker blocked them from questioning a transgender rights activist accused of assaulting a police officer during a protest over anti-trans legislation.
The party-line vote means Rep. Mauree Turner, who uses they/them pronouns, will be removed from all committee assignments unless the second-term lawmaker issues a formal apology, including to the Highway Patrol, which provides security at the Capitol complex.
Turner, the first openly nonbinary and Muslim person elected to the Legislature in Oklahoma, said Tuesday that won’t happen, as Republicans continue to work to strip away the rights of trans people.
“I think an apology for loving the people of Oklahoma is something that I cannot do,” said Turner, D-Oklahoma City, flanked by several Democratic colleagues. “It’s something that I actively refuse to do.”
The Tennessee House Just Passed a Bill Completely Gutting Marriage Equality
The Tennessee House of Representatives has passed a bill that would allow people to refuse to perform a marriage if they disagree with it.
According to the bill, which passed Monday night, “a person shall not be required to solemnize a marriage if the person has an objection to solemnizing the marriage based on the person’s conscience or religious beliefs.”
The bill, which now moves to the state Senate, is the latest in an onslaught of measures that the Tennessee legislature has passed attacking LGBTQ rights. This bill could also apply to couples where at least one partner is transgender, or to mixed race couples.
Gay Marriage / LGBTQ Rights / Equality Act
Posted: Mon Mar 13, 2023 1:54 am
by RTH10260
Tennessee's anti-trans bill could cost the state $2 billion in lost revenue, panel says
Kenneth Niemeyer
Sat, March 11, 2023 at 8:01 PM GMT+1
A Tennessee anti-trans bill defining "sex" as "biological anatomy at birth" is moving through the state legislature.
If passed, the bill could cost the state $2 billion in revenue, a report from the state fiscal review committee says.
The state's health department could lose $750 million dollars if the bill passes, according to the report
.
The state of Tennessee could lose upt to $2 billion in revenue if the state legislature passes an anti-trans bill that defines sex as "biological anatomy at birth," according to the state's fiscal review committee.
A February 28 report from the committee says that the bill could result in increased state and local spending to be in compliance with the new law.
"Proposed language may result in increases to state and local expenditures associated with compliance measures, potential civil litigation, and could jeopardize federal funding," the report says.
The Federal Department of Education said that the billl, if passed, could jeaprodize the funding that the state's schools get through the Individuals with Disabilities Act and Title 1, intended to give financial assistance to low-income children, according to the report.
The state health department also stands to lose $750 million in federal grant money if the bill passes because it could be out of compliance with Title X, which allows for alternate definitions of "sex," the report states.
Sanders signs Arkansas trans care malpractice bill into law
LITTLE ROCK, Ark. (AP) — Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders has signed into law legislation making it easier to sue providers of gender-affirming care for children, a move that could effectively reinstate a blocked ban on such care.
Sanders on Monday signed the new law, which won’t take effect until this summer. It would allow anyone who received gender-affirming care as a minor to file a malpractice lawsuit against their doctor for up to 15 years after they turn 18. Under current Arkansas law, medical malpractice claims must be filed within two years of an injury.
Legal experts have said the change could close access to gender-affirming care for children by making it nearly impossible for providers to get malpractice insurance.
The new law is among a growing number of bills targeting transgender people, who have faced increasingly hostile rhetoric at statehouses. At least 175 bills targeting trans people have been introduced in statehouses so far this year, the most in a single year, according to the Human Rights Campaign.
The bill was signed as a federal judge is considering whether to strike down a 2021 Arkansas law that would prohibit doctors from providing gender-affirming hormone therapy or puberty blockers to anyone under 18 — or referring them to other doctors who can provide that care. No gender-affirming surgery is performed on minors in the state.
We all have our repug despots. Maistriana here isn't done. He wants to run for Senator next time, after a thorough trouncing by Shapiro here last year. I don't know what it will take to make him quit.
RTH10260 wrote: ↑Mon Mar 13, 2023 1:55 am
What will they do with the freak features of nature like hermaphrodites and those missing genitals?
Humanely euthanize.
Bah, you can’t make money off Em if they’re dead! Traveling circus!!
Gay Marriage / LGBTQ Rights / Equality Act
Posted: Tue Mar 14, 2023 4:30 pm
by AndyinPA
I knew someone years ago who was diagnosed as a hermaphrodite. He withdrew from social circles not long after, so I don't know what happened to him, and we moved not long after. This was in the 70s. I went to look up information about them just now, out of curiosity, and I was surprised to find myself directed to religious sites. Apparently, they were never mentioned in the Bible so are a puzzle to Christians (evangelical persuasions, presumably). I wasn't interested in what they had to say beyond that.
The south eastern US of A....proudly marching backward into the 19th century....
Gay Marriage / LGBTQ Rights / Equality Act
Posted: Tue Mar 14, 2023 4:54 pm
by Phoenix520
My constant refrain:
If all those chemicals we dump into our environment every day, where they combine in ways god never even considered, can turn frogs gay and create two headed newts, who’s to say they’re not having extra special effects on human development?
Gotta love Republicans for their consistency: Consistently blaming the things they’re most responsible for on everyone else.
Gay Marriage / LGBTQ Rights / Equality Act
Posted: Tue Mar 14, 2023 5:40 pm
by Azastan
AndyinPA wrote: ↑Tue Mar 14, 2023 4:30 pm
I knew someone years ago who was diagnosed as a hermaphrodite. He withdrew from social circles not long after, so I don't know what happened to him, and we moved not long after. This was in the 70s. I went to look up information about them just now, out of curiosity, and I was surprised to find myself directed to religious sites. Apparently, they were never mentioned in the Bible so are a puzzle to Christians (evangelical persuasions, presumably). I wasn't interested in what they had to say beyond that.
A bit odd that Christians are baffled by hermaphrodites, since people have known about such things in animals for a really, really long times.
Most of the rural people in Tennessee could tell you about freemartins, for example.
Gay Marriage / LGBTQ Rights / Equality Act
Posted: Tue Mar 14, 2023 6:28 pm
by neeneko
Azastan wrote: ↑Tue Mar 14, 2023 5:40 pm
A bit odd that Christians are baffled by hermaphrodites, since people have known about such things in animals for a really, really long times.
Most of the rural people in Tennessee could tell you about freemartins, for example.
These are also people who believe that humans are special and unique, thus any comparing them to animals is 'atheist communism!'. They feel existential dread at the very idea that humans and other animals have anything in common since the spark of the divine is the root of their ethical system when it comes to animals... and humans they consider 'subhuman'.
Gay Marriage / LGBTQ Rights / Equality Act
Posted: Wed Mar 15, 2023 12:16 am
by Luke
In much happier news...
Exclusive: Wedding Bells Ring for Media Mogul David Geffen And Much Younger Boyfriend
by Roger Friedman - March 14, 2023 7:01 pm
Exclusive: Sources tell me David Geffen got married over the weekend.
The 80 year old billionaire wed his 30 year old boyfriend Donovan Michaels in Beverly Hills, they say. Two couples attended the small ceremony which was held in the shroud of secrecy.
Congrats to all.
Geffen, a media mogul, is said to be worth $7.7 billion. He’s used much of his wealth in enormous acts of philanthropy, endowing museums, arts centers, and hospitals.
In the past Geffen was famously linked with Cher. But in more recent years he’s had a string of boyfriends. And now he’s tied the knot. Joni Mitchell sang that Geffen was a “free man in Paris” once. No more!
I've known David since I was 21 and can attest that 30 is way older for David. The stories that could be told. Truly an amazing artist, businessman and philanthopist. Good for him and good luck to Donovan. It wasn't a secret. Be happy!
Azastan wrote: ↑Tue Mar 14, 2023 5:40 pm
A bit odd that Christians are baffled by hermaphrodites, since people have known about such things in animals for a really, really long times.
Most of the rural people in Tennessee could tell you about freemartins, for example.
But they won't have no truck with them, nossir. Them folk are the devil's initi-----oh, sorry, I thought you said 'Freemasons'.
Gay Marriage / LGBTQ Rights / Equality Act
Posted: Wed Mar 15, 2023 3:46 pm
by neonzx
orlylicious wrote: ↑Wed Mar 15, 2023 12:16 am
In much happier news...
What is with old guys robbing the cradle? Those gay guys are just as bad as straights on that level. (my father robbed cradles until he realized he could not keep up with them -- best to stick to ones own age bracket)
The stories that could be told. Truly an amazing artist, businessman and philanthopist. Good for him and good luck to Donovan. It wasn't a secret. Be happy!