Making LGBTQIA+ hatred legal in Tennessee.
In Tennessee, extremist right-wing lawmakers are pushing for the passage of bills that would gravely affect the human rights of LGBTQIA+ people there, including one that would force state and local governments to only recognize “anatomy and genetics” at birth, and another that would require private schools and churches to segregate restrooms and changing areas based on “immutable biological sex.”
The state’s Senate Judiciary Committee has taken up Senate Bill 936, which if/when passed – will officially make it a policy for the state to recognize that only “biological males and females” (sic) exist in Tennessee, thereby erasing transgender and intersex people.
This ill-informed bill was sponsored by a religious fanatic, Republican Sen. Paul Rose of Covington, who does not believe in the segregation of the State and the Church, stating that “folks don’t understand that when God created us, Genesis 1:27, he created male and female, end of sentence. There is no such thing as gender.”
This bill will mandate local governments and the state to revise all ordinances, resolutions, rules, policies and procedures to reflect references to any person’s sex or gender to be solely based on their “genetics at birth”. For those who will not comply, the state government can withhold Department of Economic and Community Development grants from local governments.
Earlier, the state’s House voted 74-18 for House Bill 64, which bans transgender people from using bathrooms/toilets not aligned with their sex at birth.
