In a 6-3 decision, the court said the 1964 Civil Rights Act, which bars employers with 15 employees or more from discriminating on the basis of sex, requires them to treat male and female employees equally regardless of their sexuality or biological gender at birth — regardless of whether they are gay or lesbian, straight or transgender.
SF Chronicle – U.S. Supreme Court rules job discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender identity is illegal – June 15, 2020
It is a good thing that the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that job discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender identity is illegal ( Bostock vs. Clayton County). To condone discrimination based on who people love and are attracted to and people who are on hormones to self-authenticate their gender is simply unethical. Prescribing hormones to people to self-authenticate has its own set of ethical questions, but that is another topic all together. What is lost on many journalists and commentators who think this is simply a big win for people who are homosexual or identify as transgender is that they miss a key aspect of the ruling. What the ruling does is simply reaffirm the 1964 Civil Rights Act which bars employers with 15 employees or more from discriminating on the basis of sex
Gorsuch wrote. “That’s because it is impossible to discriminate against a person for being homosexual or transgender without discriminating against that individual based on sex.”
What this means, and what the court is saying is that sex is real. In our current world of polarized political rhetoric, identity politics and solipsism this may seem like a minor point, but in reality it is significant. Bostock vs. Clayton County may be framed as a win for LGBT rights but it far more subtle. Gorsuch frames the issue with “it does not matter whether you are gay or identify as transgender you are first, fundamentally a human – female or male.” Surprisingly, he is looking at the issue from a feminist, not really a LGBT, perspective.
Eventually there will be other judgments by the court that will disappoint the LGBT community. They will become shrill and irate and claim that Gorsuch has changed his views and backpedaled but in fact they will not understand the premise of his argument and reasoning. Indeed, the ERA, that unfortunately never passed, is an amendment that would have deemed equality not based on gender but sex.
It is refreshing to see the Supreme Court function as it was intended. A place where cases are argued and laws are created that take the long view and are not susceptible to the politics and fads of the day,
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