Sorry I didn't post last night--I actually fell asleep early! Being an inveterate night owl, that does not often happen. Well, Happy St. Patrick's Day! Today was an important day--a day of Senate hearings on the Equality Act. There was some amazing testimorny from Abigail Shrier, and at points I felt I was in some sort of surreal dream because I found myself agreeing with folks like Ted Cruz (not my favorite politician)!
As I was watching some of the testimony, an email with a link came through my inbox--and it gave me so much hope! It was a new survey by WoLF. We've looked at some of their surveys before, but this new one was from New York.
New York has a track record that vies with California's. In recent years, New York has experimented with doing away with cash bail, it has legalized surrogacy, and so forth. WoLF repeated the same questions it had asked citizens of other states.
From their website, here are the key findings (the following is quoted material):
Summary of Key Results
* 85 percent of NY voters believe that people who are gay or identify as transgender should be protected from discrimination in employment, housing, and public accommodations.
* Only 20 percent of NY voters approve of male domestic abusers and sex offenders being housed in women's prisons regardless of their claimed "gender identity."
* Only 28 percent of New York voters support passing the Equality Act in its current form (and only a third of voters who strongly support the Equality Act think it does not need to be amended)
* 87 percent of NY voters agree that employees should be allowed to express personal and spiritual convictions outside the workplace without getting fired.
(End of quoted material.)
An ovewhelming majority of New Yorkers believe that while no one should be discriminated against for a sexual orientation or a gender identity, it is reasonable to allow women to retain single-sex spaces, and is reasonable for religious persons to be protected from retaliation for their beliefs. Wow! Do our politicians understand that there is a strong consensus on these very points across states both deep blue, deep red, and everything in between?
I fear that if the Democrats do not wake up to this very political fact, they will lose in 2022, and perhaps 2024 as well. And if the Democrats destroy the filibuster, they may regret it much sooner than they imagine.
It's also very telling that we are now seeing the rise of a new coalition--LGB without the T. One such organization is the UK's LGB Alliance. Lesbians, of course, were the first to be radicalized since trans-identified males often wish to have sex with them as "transbians." Recently, the "G" and the "B" have been attacked by the "T" for their transphobic genital preferences, as well. It is interesting to see how the T has become a liability and a disaster for other sexual minorities. People across the political spectrum seem to be waking up to some of the truths expressed in this quote: