OMG!!! We can't have a chick with a dick in a women's restroom!!!!
That was about the extent of the argument against Houston's nondiscrimination ordinance, which went down hard at the polls last night.
I wish I could say I was surprised by this result, but sadly, I wasn't. This result was easy to forecast. Why, why, why did the Houston City Council put this measure on an off-off-year election ballot when the hottest thing on the ballot was a bunch of big business-sponsored state Constitutional Amendments? Turnout in Houston was only about 10 percent, and that's actually good for this kind of election. But the bad news, of course, is that a low turnout election like this meant that an outsized proportion of Republican and evangelical voters were going to the polls. Sad but true fact: Democrats just don't vote in numbers in off-year elections, and this was one removed from that.
Some background on this: Houston passed the ordinance, but evangelical preachers, etc. rounded up signatures to force a repeal election. The Houston city secretary declared that there would be an election. But then the election board actually looked at the ballots, and discovered that they were well short of the number of signatures needed. They ruled there would be no election.
Well, the right wingers lost in court all the way up in this one, until they hit the Texas Supreme Court, which has NEVER approved anything pro gay. (Reason: All the judges are Republicans and are elected. Think they would risk a challenge from the right? You know the answer on that.)
In a preposterous ruling, the court said that it didn't matter that there weren't enough valid signatures. The city secretary had initially said the petitions were good, and that was all that mattered!!!!!!! So basically the state Supreme Court called an illegal election. I HATE TEXAS POLITICS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
(The court did give the Houston council the option of repealing the ordinance rather than having a vote. ... More on that later.)
All of the state's elected Republican leaders, of course, not wanting to waste a chance to suck up to fundies, jumped on the repeal bandwagon, and right wing causes raised millions of dollars that was spent on ads declaring that if the ordinance passed, male sexual predators would be allowed to lurk in women's restrooms waiting to rape your wife, mother and daughter. Isn't this 2015????
What Houston should have done was go ahead and repeal the ordinance, then pass it again next year and put it on the 2016 general election ballot, where it would have had a MUCH greater chance of victory. Believe it or not, Houston is actually a majority Democratic city, though you wouldn't have known it by Tuesday's result.
OK, now that this has been repealed, does this mean that women can't go in men's restrooms? I HATE it when arrogant bitches do this. Just freaks me out, and I worry about being raped or assaulted or something, or maybe being traumatized for life by accidentally seeing a vagina :)
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/houston-equal … 4d2e0bee4e
A little bit of difference between CA and TX. In California, gay rights supporters weren't prepared for what the presence of Obama at the top of the ticket would mean. He brought a ton of new and minority voters to the polls who weren't necessarily well informed on the issue and just voted on gut reaction. Ideally, they should have had that election during an off (gubernatorial) election year. Gay rights folks may also have taken victory a little for granted?
Here in TX, just the opposite. We *need* as many voters as possible, and having the vote in an off-off election was just a death sentence, especially under the current Republican climate.
I think the problem here is that Mayor Parker, who is on her way out of office, wanted this as a "legacy" piece of legislation and so pushed ahead with it rather than taking the more prudent course, which would have been repealing the ordinance now and trying again at a better time. The Houston council is talking about trying it again, but I would recommend skipping at least one election cycle. To come right back at it again would only infuriate conservatives more. (BTW, council doesn't have to put the ordinance up for a vote, but you can bet the same forces that called this election would get another called in no time.)
Also, I don't *really* mind when women use the men's room, although it does freak me out a little when they use the urinal :) (And no joke, I have actually seen this!)
And Erik, Lawrence is a college town and I assume much more progressive than Kansas as a whole!!!
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/11/08/opinion/sunday/ … ef=opinion
@Bear'nFW--you're right; one thing this reminds me of is the first attempt here in CA to legalize same-sex marriage. The campaign was done during the wrong election cycle, poor messaging, and most importantly a 'deer in the headlights' lack of recognition of the forces opposed to the initiative. The amount of money that the Mormon Church and other organizations opposed to same-sex marriage used to defeat the initiative was unimaginable at the beginning. Reading how the Houston initiative unfolded and then voted down has the same elements that happened here. We, the LGBT community, are slowly gaining rights, but when it comes to the ballot box you really have to think through the whole campaign. The amount of vitriol and hatred out there, coupled with piles of money, directed at the gay community is alive and well and will rear its ugly head whenever given the chance. Ultimately Houston will pass its initiative, but it's a good lesson that we still have a long way to go and that our recently gained rights are tenuous at best.
I was surprised here to see the comment directed towards Bear's good-natured ribbing about women using men's bathrooms. ...and you wonder why some women are pissed? Last, that someone who comes from a marginalized community would think that it's OK to exploit another marginalized community for their own monetary gain is appalling. Or maybe that was an attempt at humor and I missed it?
I think this off-year election results (a favored Democrat lost badly in the Kentucky governor's race and the GOP pretty much swept the few results on the ballot) should have fired a warning shot for 2016. Democratic voters in this country outnumber Republicans. But GOP voters are pissed off and energized and are going to go to the polls en masse. If Democrats stay home, and this means you, too, gay guys on here who don't often vote, you may be looking at a horror like President Ted Cruz come January 2017. You may not be as excited about Hillary Clinton as you were about Obama, but my God, look at the possible alternatives! Don't say you weren't warned!!!
Seriously though, bathroom access wasn't the point of the ordinance. It was the way opponents chose to attack it, as they didn't have the guts to campaign against the measure on its true merits. Gay people have ZERO protections in housing and employment here in Texas, and this was Houston's attempt to address the problem, as most other major Texas cities have. Dallas, Fort Worth, San Antonio and Austin already have similar ordinances, and Republicans are trying to pass a law in the state Legislature to strip local control of the issue from cities.
Republican politics have gotten so mean and cynical that this country has reached the point of being unable to achieve anything. Republicans actually think gay people are the ones who are intolerant because we dare to seek equal rights, and that by seeking equal rights, we're getting "extra" rights (whatever that means). We're supposed to stay in our closets and not say a word and accept the GOP garbage that we have the same rights as every other American. That genie is out of the bottle, Neanderthal Republicans, and it ain't going back in.
I do hate that feminist bullshit tho. If I own a business and want to make profits wouldn't I hire ONLY women to increase my profits? If women do the same job but I can get away with paying 25% less then that's what I would do.