The case has already made legal history

The news media just lie to us about this.

A 79-year-old woman has reasonable grounds to claim that a Maine assisted-living facility discriminated against her for being transgender when it rejected her as a potential resident, the Maine Human Rights Commission found. 

In other words a 79-year-old man wants to force himself on a women-only assisted living facility.

The commission’s 3-2 vote on Monday sets in motion a process that could result in a lawsuit being filed against Sunrise Assisted Living in the town of Jonesport on a claim of violating state nondiscrimination law by denying Marie King’s application for residency.

King’s attorneys say the case has already made legal history as the nation’s first known discrimination complaint filed by a transgender person against a long-term care facility.

Fun for the lawyers then. A first! Fame! Glory! Not so fun for the woman who has to share a room with King.

“This kind of discrimination against transgender people needing long-term care is far from an isolated incident, but it is also plainly illegal,” said Karen L. Loewy, senior counsel at Lambda Legal, which is not involved in the case. 

Quisling. What about the discrimination against women who don’t want to share living spaces with random men?

Nearly half of U.S. states, including Maine, have laws explicitly forbidding discrimination based on gender identity in both housing and public accommodation, legal categories that apply to homes caring for the elderly. 

But how are we defining discrimination here? Women are allowed to have spaces away from men, so in what sense is it “discrimination” for women to want spaces away from men including men who call themselves women? Women who need spaces away from men don’t care what the men call themselves, they care what the men are, which is men. Why does this law “forbidding discrimination” ignore the reality in favor of the saying? Just saying usually is not enough as a matter of law.

In July 2021, a California appellate court struck down a portion of a 2017 state law that made it a misdemeanor for nursing home staff to deliberately and repeatedly misgender residents or use their former name — known in the trans community as “deadnaming.” The court found that this part of the law violated staff members’ right to free speech under the First Amendment. The California Supreme Court is reviewing the decision and may ultimately reverse it.

The California law has stood at the vanguard of a nascent movement in Democratic-controlled states to establish explicit legal protections against discrimination for LGBTQ seniors in nursing homes.

Which sounds nice if you don’t pause to think about it, but in reality what it means is that women will be forced to have men around whether they want to or not.

“Long-term care facilities need to understand that they’re going to have lesbian, gay and transgender residents or applicants,” said Chris Erchull, a staff attorney at GLBTQ Legal Advocates & Defenders in Boston, the nonprofit firm representing King. 

But those are not the same thing. Lesbian and gay, no problem, but transgender means forcing women to share bedrooms with men. This is not as progressive as they’re pretending it is.

The human rights commission’s decision, Erchull said, “is a reminder to all assisted-living homes and other long-term care facilities that they have to treat people with respect, compassion and understanding.” 

Where’s the respect, compassion and understanding for women who don’t want to share bedrooms with men?

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