Cake fight over court ruling
Walking back LGBT community progress
With the Supreme Court delivering the latest sign that civil rights are on the decline in the Trump era, it is time for the LGBT community and its allies to buckle up. If history is any guide, there is a rough road ahead.
Throughout the last century, periods of increased acceptance for LGBT people have been followed by a backlash. Whether he is encouraging that or just responding to it, it is becoming crystal clear that President Trump is leading us backward once again.
The feel-good 1920s saw openly gay and lesbian actors win acclaim on stage and screen. But the earliest embers of the gay rights movement were snuffed out by the Great Depression, and the 1930s saw a resurgence of anti-gay laws and tortuous medical practices offering a “cure.”
World War II put millions of young men and women in samesex units where many gay folk found kindred spirits. When the war ended, many gay veterans chose to live near others in major cities. The modern movement has its roots in those immediate postwar years, when gays and lesbians formed organizations to push for reform before McCarthyism ushered in a new social conservatism that sent LGBT people scattering back into hiding. The civil rights movement and the free-love 1960s reignited the push for gay equality, which officially exploded with New York’s Stonewall riots in 1969. The 1970s hustle could not have been any gayer.
Then came AIDS. The virus itself may not have known the historical pattern, but the reaction, or lack of one, to the gay holocaust certainly fit the pattern. As did the 1990s with the reaffirmation of the ban on LGBT servicemembers and the crusade against marriage equality by the right wing.
During the Obama era, marriage equality became a national right, LGBT service members could proudly serve, and protecting transgender people from discrimination became a priority. We had a good run, but the evidence is undeniable that it is over.
Just months into his presidency, Trump banned transgender people from military service. Trump has rolled back health care protections for LGBT people, rescinded anti-discrimination rules, packed his administration full of homophobes and nominated a slew of anti-gay judges.
Trump also urged the Supreme Court to side with the Masterpiece Cakeshop in its quest to discriminate. Yesterday, seven justices, including Trump-appointed Neil Gorsuch, obliged the president’s request.
To Trump, the steps forward the LGBT community has taken in recent years are just another part of the Obama legacy that he is determined to destroy.