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Six Reasons To Oppose H.R.5: The Democrats’ Orwellian ‘Equality Act’
âȘ On Thursday, the House of Representatives passed H.R.5, âThe Equality Act.â Three Republicans joined with every single Democrat to support the bill, which now moves to the Senate. The bill will require 60 votes to pass in the Senate, due to the filibuster. Conservatives and other Americans concerned about the act should reach out to their senators now and urge them to oppose the bill…
The Equality Act bill would amend Federal law to prohibit discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity, among other things. It would also expand the areas in which non-discrimination law applies while explicitly gutting the Constitutional protections of religious freedom.
In true Orwellian fashion, the Democrats have crafted an Equality Act that instead promotes inequality by enabling the government to privilege LGBT ideology over Americans who disagree for religious, or other reasons. The Equality Act opens the door to a host of new governmental action & regulations to stifle dissent and enforce orthodoxy on LGBT issues, particularly the divisive claims of transgender activism.
The bill explicitly endorses the Supreme Court decision in Bostock v. Clayton County (2020), which redefined discrimination on the basis of âsexâ to include discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity. This arguably constitutes an abuse of power, since the plain meaning of âsexâ does not include sexual orientation or gender identity and since Congress could not have possibly intended to prohibit this kind of discrimination decades before same-sex marriage.
Here are six reasons Conservatives should oppose the Equality Act. Six reasons to pressure your senators & representatives to vote against this horrifically destructive piece of legislation.
1.The Equality Act Explicitly Guts Religious Freedom
H.R. 5 explicitly erodes the protections of the Religious Freedom Restoration Act of 1993 (RFRA), a landmark piece of legislation in which Congress and President Bill Clinton championed religious freedom by reprimanding the Supreme Court for trampling on Native Americansâ religious freedom in Employment Division v. Smith (1990). RFRA set the bar very high for any government action that violates the right of free exercise of religion. Any policy must be narrowly tailored to a compelling government interest and it must use the least-restrictive means to achieve that goal.
Yet the Equality Act hobbles RFRA for any claims involving discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity. This isnât just a conservative talking-point against the Democratic bill; itâs written in the plain text of the legislation!
âThe Religious Freedom Restoration Act of 1993 (42 U.S.C. 2000bb et seq.) shall not provide a claim concerning, or a defense to a claim under, a covered title, or provide a basis for challenging the application or enforcement of a covered title.â the bill says.
In other words, the âEqualityâ Act explicitly carves out an exemption for itself from the rights of religious freedom â an exemption that only applies to claims of discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity.
2.The Equality Act Directly Endangers Womenâs Privacy & Safety
By redefining discrimination on the basis of sex to include discrimination on the basis of transgender identity and by expanding the list of places that fall under public accommodations rules, the Equality Act would force many institutions to open womenâs restrooms, locker rooms, and changing rooms to biological males who claim to identify as transgender.
As Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito explained in his dissent to the Courtâs ruling in Bostock v. Clayton County, âit is a matter of concern to many people who are reticent about disrobing or using toilet facilities in the presence of individuals whom they regard as members of the opposite sex. For some, this may simply be a question of modesty, but for others, there is more at stake. For women who have been victimized by sexual assault or abuse, the experience of seeing an unclothed person with the anatomy of a male in a confined and sensitive location such as a bathroom or locker room can cause serious psychological harm.â
Based on broad understandings of âtransgender statusâ that could include those who identify as âgender fluidâ and those who have not undergone any surgery to alter their bodies. âA person who has not undertaken any physical transitioning may claim the right to use the bathroom or locker room assigned to the sex with which the individual identifies at that particular time,â Alito reasoned.
This is not to say that transgender people are predators, but to note that women have passionately fought to secure their rights and now their private spaces will be opened to biological males. The real concern is not that males who suffer from gender dysphoria or who identify as a female will abuse women, but that prurient men will abuse this loophole; forcing some women who have experienced sexual assault into sharing intimate quarters with biological males.
Lesbian feminist Julia Beck condemned H.R. 5 as âa human rights violationâ that will deprive âevery single person in this countryâ of âtheir right to single-sex sports, shelters, grants, and loans. The law will forbid ever distinguishing between women and men.â
3.The Equality Act Will Destroy Womenâs Competitive Sports
During the COVID-19 pandemic, Democrats responded to any criticisms of their lockdown policies with the mantra, âTrust the science.â While the science is very much out on the question of whether or not lockdowns cost more lives in terms of long-term depression or save more lives by slowing the spread of the virus, the science on biological sex is very clear: biological males enjoy physical advantages over biological females, and this translates into inequality in competitive sports.
Males have specific biological advantages over females that cannot be erased by simply identifying as female. Due to these long recognized advantages, sporting events have long had different standards for boys and girls to accommodate the athletic striving of biological females. For example, womenâs volleyball nets are 7 inches lower, the weight of high school shot put for boys is 36 percent heavier, the hurdle is 6 inches higher for boys, etc. Womenâs sports exist to enable fair competition, and transgender activism destroys that possibility.
Duke Law School professor Doriane Lambelet Coleman warned that if womenâs sports must admit biological men, âthe very best women in the world would lose to literally thousands of boys and men, including thousands who would be considered second-tier.â
4.The Equality Act Mandates Ideological Enforcement In Medicine
While the condition of gender dysphoria (the persistent and painful identification with the gender opposite oneâs biological sex) is real, it does not automatically negate or erase the factual truth of biological sex. Human beings are either male or female down to the level of their DNA, and males and females have different biochemistry even before they are born. Furthermore, many doctors consider transgender âtreatmentsâ to be harmful to the patients involved.
The Equality Act would enforce transgender orthodoxy upon the medical field in the name of fighting âdiscrimination.â If a Roman Catholic hospital refuses to provide hysterectomies except in the case of a dangerous disease, for example, a woman who identifies as a man can sue for discrimination because the hospital wonât remove her uterus.
This bill would also allow the government to force doctors into violating the Hippocratic Oath by performing âtreatmentsâ that harm healthy bodily function in pursuit of false gender identities.
This policy would probably face stiff court challenges, but the explicit exemption from RFRA could enable it to succeed.
Doctors need not necessarily be religious in order to have professional objections to transgender âtreatments.â Endocrinologists like Dr. Michael Laidlaw have argued that cross-sex hormones and âpuberty blockersâ actually cause a disease called, hypogonadatropic hypogonadism. Further, there is no documented evidence transgender transition surgery improves the mental health outcomes of gender dysphoric people. Men and women who have formerly identified as transgender and undergone surgery have often grown to reject transgender identity and lament the damage they did to their own bodies.
5.The Equality Act Strengthens The Abortion Mandate
The Equality Act would not only expand âpublic accommodationsâ to include health care providers, but it would interpret âsex discriminationâ to include preventing treating âpregnancy⊠or a related medical condition,â which can include abortion.
Under this bill, a woman could sue a religious employer for discrimination if she got fired for having an abortion. The bill could also weaken the Hyde Amendment, which prohibits federal taxpayer funding for abortion, which may constitute a form of âsex discrimination.â
6.The Equality Act Undermines & Opposes Biblical Teachings
Not only would the Equality Act effectively provide special privilege to LGBT people above those who disagree with the LGBT orthodoxy, but it also arguably constitutes a direct attack on Bible-based values.
The Coalition for Jewish Values (CJV), a group representing over 1,500 Orthodox rabbis in public policy debates, condemned H.R. 5 as âa direct attack on Jewish values and practices.â CJV argued that according to the act, a person would be considered âbigotedâ for adhering to traditional Jewish doctrine.
The text of H.R. 5 states that âdiscrimination against a married same-sex couple could be based on the sex stereotype that marriage should only be between heterosexual couples.â
âThe Equality Act expressly declares that the Book of Genesis [see 2:24] and all of the Jewish laws pertaining to marriage as a sanctified union between man and woman (called âkiddushinâ in Hebrew, from the word âkadosh,â Holy) are nothing more than engagement in discriminatory stereotypes,â CJV wrote in a letter to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.). âThis is a disgraceful attack upon Jewish Biblical beliefs, rendered no more excusable by the fact that other traditional religious groups have similar tenets.â
In the letter, CJV listed many observant Jewish practices which would be grounds for discrimination complaints under the proposed legislation, including separate seating at weddings, single-gender dancing, and even separate hours for swimming.
âIt is outrageous that Congress would declare us bigoted for simply maintaining our time-honored traditions,â Rabbi Avrohom Gordimer, Chairman of the CJV Rabbinic Circle, said in a statement. âAnd it is no mere insult; the law even explicitly rejects religious freedom as a defense, meaning it provides Anti-Semites with a new way to persecute the religious Jewish community.â
The Bill’s attack on biblical and traditional sexual values also targets Christians, Muslims, and many secular Americans for mockery and derision.
Most importantly, the law would enforce LGBT orthodoxy explicitly at the expense of religious freedom and freedom of conscience.
In 1993, Democrats and Republicans came together to defend religious freedom. Now, Democrats are on the precipice of eviscerating that central constitutional protection. Americans must loudly protest this horrific bill and increase pressure to discourage their moderate Democrat representatives from voting for it. âȘ
