Saturday, September 13, 2008

Loss of Employer Religious Liberty Draws Near for All

As more states pass employment nondiscrimination laws, and even the federal ENDA, the day when every Christian employer is forced to hire "men in drag" is visible on the horizon.

-- From "Smoother Transitions" by Lisa Belkin, New York Times 9/4/08

Across the country, particularly at larger companies, transgender workers are being protected and assisted in ways that were hardly imaginable a few years ago.

Currently, 125 of the Fortune 500 companies include “gender identity” in their nondiscrimination policies, compared with “close to zero” in 2002, according to Jillian T. Weiss, an associate professor of law and society at Ramapo College of New Jersey, and an expert on transgender workplace diversity.

The level of acceptance can also be measured by the efforts made to recruit transgender workers. At the Out and Equal Workplace Summit, a conference for the LGBT community, to be held in Austin, Tex., later this month, 400 of the Fortune 500 will be represented. At the second annual Transgender Career Expo, to be held in Atlanta in October, participants can meet with recruiters from sponsors such as General Motors, I.B.M., Ernst & Young and New York Life.

“It is a different world,” said Dr. Weiss, who attributes the change, in part, to the slow adoption of laws banning discrimination on the basis of gender identity (20 states and roughly 100 cities have such laws) . . .

To read the entire article, CLICK HERE.