GLBTQ: Workplace Discrimination

Imagine finding the job of your dreams. In fact, it’s not just a job to you – you’re doing something you love, and simply getting paid to do it. Now, imagine you are also one of the millions of hardworking and dedicated gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgendered or queer Americans. Depending on where you live in the United States, you could be fired at any moment if your employer discovers your sexual orientation.

This is a very real reality in America today. According to an article in today’s Washington Post 31 states allow employers to terminate an employee if s/he is gay or lesbian – no explanation required. The article also mentions the House of Representatives is about to consider the Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA) aimed at providing equality in most of America’s workplaces.

The ENDA would make it illegal for employers to make decisions about hiring, firing, promoting or paying an employee based on sexual orientation or gender identity (churches and the military exempt). Rep. Barney Frank, D-Mass., one of two openly gay members of Congress, expects it to pass the House, but few on the Hill are hopeful about the bill’s fate in the Senate.

The article goes on to say that GOP Senate members have already threatened a filibuster and it is unlikely the Democrats can round up enough Republican support to garnish the 60 votes needed to end the filibuster. Let's stop for a minute though. If you take a step back and look objectively at the situation, it so closely resembles the debate surrounding civil rights reform and former Senator Strom Thurmond's famed filibuster that it’s scary. "Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere," Martin Luther King, Jr. once said.

Why would our country’s elected officials be opposed to preventing discrimination of any kind in the workplace? Adding women into the workplace didn’t turn out so badly. Neither did including African-Americans. So why more than 40 years later are we still discussing the legality of discrimination in the workplace? Regardless of one’s views on homosexuality or alternative lifestyles, I would think we could all agree that in the 21st century, the workplace is where all Americans can come together on equal footing in our own respective quests for the American dream. However, Republican senators and conservative lobbying groups beg to differ.

Hopefully, in the coming weeks, Republicans and conservatives will see this as a civil issue and not a social one. If you’d like to help extend equality into the workplace for GLBTQ Americans, contact your member of Congress and encourage him/her to support the Employment Non-Discrimination Act. Your expression of support could be the tipping point.