Cruel, bigoted Republicans have now introduced roughly 300 anti-LGBT bills in the first month of 2024. At least, that is the tale that left-leaning advertising are using.
Headline after headline reads, “285 anti-LGBTQ+ bills introduced in state legislature already this season, and it’s still January.”
The American Civil Liberties Union, which displays a live map of alleged “anti-LGBT” regulations in each state on its website, is the public’s primary source for this assertion.
According to ACLU attorney Harper Seldin, trans people across the nation are going through a traditional and risky attempt to control their bodies and lives that is being fueled by radical politicians with the intention of erasing them from public life. These proposals, when combined, are overt attempts to deny trans people the freedom to be who they are at work, school, and the health care that many of us require to survive.
Is any of this, however, really accurate? It’s undoubtedly trickier than any of these stories would have you believe.
For starters, the list shows bills that have been introduced but never passed. Yet the ACLU admits that many of these bills, if not all of them, will never be passed into law. Every year, about 150,000 bills are introduced in state legislatures on a variety of subjects, but very few of them always pass.
After all, getting a bill introduced frequently only requires one state legislator’s work. Therefore, becoming agitated over bills that have just been introduced is a little alarming.
However, what the ACLU considers an “anti-LGBT” bill is so broad and political that it effectively renders the group’s dataset useless as any kind of meaningful metric. When people hear about “anti-LGBT bills,” they probably picture legislation that specifically targets LGBT people for unfair bias and is motivated by hatred and animosity. While some of the bills listed by the ACLU undoubtedly fall under that category, its real analysis employs a far, far broader brush.
For instance, laws that merely impose gender segregation in public school sports, a fundamental issue of fairness and protection that is widely supported by the public, and even many LGBT community members, like myself, are referred to as “anti-LGBT” laws. The ACLU’s study also finds parental rights legislation to be bigoted because it merely forbids schools from withholding information about students from parents (as long as there is no reasonable concern that doing so would result in abuse) and allows parents to choose not to participate in physical lessons. The ACLU claims that laws that accurately define “sex” under state law as referring to science and reproductive ability rather than gender identity are “anti-LGBT.”
Also, hate laws are those that forbid schools from teaching sexuality and gender identity to students in kindergarten through fourth grade. However, this isn’t always bigoted or hateful at all. Everyone agrees that students shouldn’t be exposed to material that is inappropriate for their age, even though it’s not always clear where and when to draw the line. Does the ACLU really think you’re a bigot if you don’t want kindergarteners to learn about transgender identity or sexual orientation?
The ACLU is essentially claiming that any bill that adopts a stance other than the most progressive one on any issue faintly related to LGBT rights is an “anti-LGBT bill” driven by hatred. This is unfortunate because, regrettably, there has been significant complacency in how gay people are accepted in the U.S. There is no question that politicians in some states and localities are passing legislation that unfairly targets and limits the rights of transgender or gay people.
It would be great to have a complete list of the locations where these issues are truly present. Otherwise, the ACLU is merely promoting Democratic National Committee advertising while feigning neutral civil rights activism.
Brad Polumbo, a freelance journalist, YouTuber, co-founder of BASEDPolitics, and contributor to the Washington Examiner, goes by the moniker “Brad_Polumbo.”
