10 GAY PEOPLE'S CHRONICLE
ENDA
Continued from page 1
protection. The original bill's gender identity clauses had been stripped out in a version introduced in October by gay Rep. Barney Frank of Massachusetts.
Frank, chair of the House Financial Services Committee and an adviser to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, is part of the body's Democratic leadership. He substituted the non-TG bill after leaders feared that including gender identity would make it too hard for more conservative members to support.
The House Education and Labor Committee passed the non-inclusive version October 18 by a vote of 27 to 21.
The committee's chair George Miller of California, according to The Hill, announced to the freshman lawmakers at their breakfast with Pelosi on October 24 that the Baldwin amendment would not be allowed to come
up.
November 2, 2007
Meanwhile, the ENDA bill, which was initially scheduled for a vote last week was pulled off the calendar without explanation.
The Democratic leadership decided to
Most of the 30 Democratic newcomers were elected
by beating Republicans in districts that voted for
George W. Bush in 2004.
protect its members while shunning the wishes of nearly every LGBT advocacy
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organization in the nation. At press time, UnitedENDA.org, a website set up to track opposition to removing TG protection from the bill, had 359 groups listed. HRC is not among them.
New Dems are more conservative
Most of the 30 Democratic newcomers were elected by beating Republicans in districts that voted for George W. Bush in 2004.
They were recruited to run by then-Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee chair Rep. Rahm Emanuel of Illinois because he thought they were electable, but without regard to their positions on issues. Some are more conservative than the Republicans they defeated.
Alter the 2006 election, HRC president Joe Solmonese told the Gay People's Chronicle that even though the Democrats control the agenda, it is not a more LGBTaffirming Congress.
During an October 11 press conference, Frank said the Democratic leadership has to protect its freshman members.
"Some of my colleagues are uneasy about dealing with transgender issues," said Frank. "People in the transgender community have been given an unduly optimistic view of where we were by people in my line of work who are good at smiling, winking, and nodding."
At that press conference, Frank was clear that failure to pass an ENDA bill-any ENDA bill-would weaken the Democratic majority, which had promised to pass one in December of last year, and make it harder to ever bring the bill up again.
That was the reason why Speaker Pelosi didn't simply delay the vote until more support for gender identity could be won.
Pelosi also does not want the vote to occur next year, which is an election year.
Her decision rekindled the debate within the LGBT community that was previously thought to have been settled in 2004, when, after years of infighting, the community, including HRC and Frank, united around supporting only a transgender-inclusive bill.
Before then, Frank was skeptical of the ability to pass an inclusive bill and favored a more incremental approach, as did HRC. House LGBT allies in a tough spot
The latest fracas has divided the LGBT community, some of it bitter.
The incrementalists on one side argue that a Democratic majority needs to be protected because it keeps a federal marriage ban amendment from coming up. They say that another bill could be passed later to include transgender protection.
Hilary Rosen, an LGBT activist and Democratic lobbyist whose partner is former HRC president Elizabeth Birch, is a committed voice for incrementalism. She wrote in the Huffington Post:
"Even if we lose the Baldwin amendment, this bill is a long way to presidential signature. We still have a chance to get an inclusive bill out of Congress and onto the president's desk. Which president, I don't know. But let's save the slaughter of a critical piece of legislation for the time when it may really deserve it. Now is not that time."
Rosen criticizes the directors of LGBT organizations for lining up with the Republicans to kill a gay equal rights bill.
"We might not like the hand we've been dealt," wrote Rosen, "but walking away from the table is not an option in my book."
However, the community's failure to support the non-inclusive bill and the lobbying against it has put LGBT allies in the House in a tough spot.
If they vote for the non-inclusive bill, they will be criticized by the LGBT community and the anti-LGBT forces.
If they vote to kill an LGBT rights bill, even a bad one, they will also be criticized.
National Gay and Lesbian Task Force director Matt Foreman is an advocate of supporting only a TG-inclusive bill.
He wrote that LGBT allies in Congress should not be put in that position.
"When the [trans-inclusive] ENDA is the only major gay rights bill on the table, those who are truly our community's friends will either stay on or come back," wrote Fore-
man.
Foreman's three New York lessons
Foreman led the passage of a similar bill-without TG provisions-in New York State in 2002, before assuming his current post. He backed it for many of the same reasons Frank and the incrementalists are giving for the federal one.
"I want to talk about the mistakes I made in the years leading up to the passing of New York's law," Foreman wrote on his blog, "so they would not be repeated with ENDA."
Foreman wrote that three mistakes were "seared into my mind and heart."
The first mistake is "to accept what legislators have to say on the subject, which is invariably that trans-inclusion will kill the legislation."
"We accepted that because we had thought we had to," wrote Foreman. "We thought that making a stink about this would derail other legislative priorities."
The second lesson learned, according to Foreman, is: "you have to make the bill trans-inclusive early on so that when it finally starts moving, the issue is behind you and it cannot be used as an excuse for inaction."
Foreman said the third mistake is not easy for him to admit.
"I failed to recognize my own anti-trans ignorances and prejudices," Foreman wrote. "Legislators essentially said, 'You gays in suits are okay, but them, there's no way.'
"I realize now that I bought that I was a "good gay" and from that point there's no escaping the unspoken corollaries, I am better and I am not one of them," Foreman continued.
"From there, it's easy to start spinning out the differences between anti-gay and anti-transgender discrimination and why the remedies to it are different," Foreman wrote.
Foreman said those pushing for the noninclusive ENDA are not prejudiced, but many do not recognize how "trans issues are 'gay' issues and how 'gay' issues are trans issues and don't see reason to spend time or political capital on them."
"That needs to change now," Foreman concluded.
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Darjeeling
Continued from page 8
Schwartzman, a very handsome man, seems to always mask himself with bad mustaches in his films. His lovelorn, sexaddicted Jack is an existential mess that we both want to laugh at and cry with because we can see so much of ourselves in him.
Angelica Houston as their runaway-momturned-nun is lovely in her small role, looking gorgeous as she ages with grace and elegance. Waris Ahluwalia as the train's chief steward and Amara Khan as Rita, Jack's Indian fling aboard the train turn in nice performances.
Irfan Khan as a bereaved father in the village where the brothers are forced to grow up turns in another small yet nuanced performance as he did in this year's A Might Heart, based on the real-life story of slain journalist Daniel Pearl.
Robert D. Yeoman's cinematography and the production design by Mark Friedberg
bring India to life with its vibrancy and vividness. Together with Anderson's vision, India is as much a character in the film as any of the humans.
Another important set of characters in the film are eleven pieces of Louis Vitton luggage designed by gay fashion designer Marc Jacobs. The baggage that these brothers have come to India with, monogrammed and exorbitant, are as human as they are existential.
The Darjeeling Limited will steal your heart with slow, stealthy steps. Anderson continues to examine the American family with mature insight and quirky beauty. Young and brilliant, he continues to be a director of importance and relevance, one to watch for years as he goes from strength to strength.
The feature film is preceded by a short called Hotel Chevalier (with a stunning Natalie Portman) where the audience is introduced to the character of Jack. It's a little gem foreshadowing the brilliance of The Darjeeling Limited. ♡