Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity (SOGI) Laws Are Not Fairness for All
by Ryan T. Anderson, Heritage Foundation:
In the United States of America, people who identify as LGBT are free to live as they want. But SOGI laws, including FFA, are not about freedom—they are about coercion. SOGI laws are about forcing all Americans to embrace—and live out—certain beliefs about human sexuality. They are not about protecting the freedom of people to live as LGBT, but about coercing everyone else to support, facilitate, and endorse such actions. This is one fundamental problem in equating coercive antidiscrimination laws with permissive religious freedom laws. And imposing a bad coercive policy on everyone while exempting select faith-based institutions is anything but fairness for all.
Current proposals to create sexual orientation and gender identity (SOGI) laws with varying types of religious exemptions would not result in fairness for all.1
The most prominent model for creating specific LGBT policies while showing concern for religious freedom is known as “fairness for all,” a phrase used by proponents to describe a law first adopted in Utah and similar proposals in other states and potentially at the national level. The “Utah Compromise” was a law enacted in Utah in the spring of 2015 that created sexual orientation and gender identity antidiscrimination policy in employment and housing, while also creating certain religious liberty exemptions and protections. Indiana attempted (but failed) to pass similar legislation in January 2016. See Ryan T. Anderson and Robert P. George, “Liberty and SOGI Laws: An Impossible and Unsustainable ‘Compromise,’” Witherspoon Institute Public Discourse, January 11, 2016, http://www.thepublicdiscourse.com/2016/01/16225/ (accessed November 28, 2018). Thus far, no fairness for all legislation has been introduced at the federal level, but there is discussion among advocates about doing so.
Instead, they would penalize many Americans who believe that we are created male and female and that male and female are created for each other. They would violate the privacy and safety of women and girls, the conscience rights of doctors and other medical professionals, and the free speech and religious liberty rights of countless professionals. Establishing bad public policy and then exempting select religious institutions is not acting for the common good—and is certainly not fair for all.
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