Gay Lesbian Rights

An anthology of primary documents for high-school and college students who are studying or debating the issues of gay and lesbian rights in America, dating from colonial times to the present.

An innovative, data-driven explanation of how public opinion shifted on LGBTQ rights The Path to Gay Rights is the first social science analysis of how and why the LGBTQ movement achieved its most unexpected victory—transforming gay people from a despised group of social deviants into a minority worthy of rights and protections in the eyes of most Americans. The book weaves together a narrative of LGBTQ history with new findings from the field of political psychology to provide an understanding of how social movements affect mass attitudes in the United States and globally. Using data going back to the 1970s, the book argues that the current understanding of how social movements change mass opinion—through sympathetic media coverage and endorsements from political leaders—cannot provide an adequate explanation for the phenomenal success of the LGBTQ movement at changing the public’s views. In The Path to Gay Rights, Jeremiah Garretson argues that the LGBTQ community’s response to the AIDS crisis was a turning point for public support of gay rights. ACT-UP and related AIDS organizations strategically targeted political and media leaders, normalizing news coverage of LGBTQ issues and AIDS and signaled to LGBTQ people across the United States that their lives were valued. The net result was an increase in the number of LGBTQ people who came out and lived their lives openly, and with increased contact with gay people, public attitudes began to warm and change. Garretson goes beyond the story of LGBTQ rights to develop an evidence-based argument for how social movements can alter mass opinion on any contentious topic.

Can a baker refuse to make a wedding cake for a gay couple? Despite the U.S. Supreme Court decision guaranteeing marriage equality in 2015, lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) citizens in the United States continue to be discriminated against in fundamental areas that others take for granted as a legal right. Using social equity theory and intersectionality but written in an accessible style, this book demonstrates some of the ways in which LGBTQ citizens have been marginalized for their identity and argues that the field of public administration has a unique responsibility to prioritize social equity. Categories utilized by the U.S. Census Bureau (male or female, heterosexual or homosexual), for example, must shift to a continuum to accurately capture demographic characteristics and citizen behavior. Evidenced-based outcomes and disparities between cisgender and heterosexual and LGBTQ populations are carefully delineated to provide a legal rationale for a compelling governmental interest, and policy recommendations are provided – including overdue federal legislation to prohibit discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity.

The American LGBTQ Rights Movement: An Introduction is a chronological survey of the LGBTQ fight for equal rights from the turn of the 20th century to the early 21st century. Illustrated with historical photographs, the book beautifully reveals the heroic people and key events that shaped the American LGBTQ rights movement. The book includes personal narratives to capture the lived experience from each era, as well as details of essential organizations, texts, and court cases that defined LGBTQ activism and advocacy.

'This book is unique in setting the question of homosexuality in its historical, legal, political, and religious contexts in North America. It is no longer possible in Catholic ethics to address sexual morality with a model of absolute moral norms, immune from the ambiguities and complexities social justice issues introduce. Peddicord looks at the personal and social sides of homosexuality, and fairly examines all sides of the Roman Catholic response.' --Lisa Sowle Cahill, Boston College

LGBT, faith, and academic thought-leaders explore prospects for laws protecting each community's core interests and possible resolutions for culture-war conflicts.

In persuading the Supreme Court that same-sex couples have a constitutional right to marry, the LGBT rights movement has achieved its most important objective of the last few decades. Throughout its history, the marriage equality movement has been criticized by those who believe marriage rights were a conservative cause overshadowing a host of more important issues. Now that nationwide marriage equality is a reality, everyone who cares about LGBT rights must grapple with how best to promote the interests of sexual and gender identity minorities in a society that permits same-sex couples to marry. This book brings together 12 original essays by leading scholars of law, politics, and society to address the most important question facing the LGBT movement today: What does marriage equality mean for the future of LGBT rights? After Marriage Equality explores crucial and wide-ranging social, political, and legal issues confronting the LGBT movement, including the impact of marriage equality on political activism and mobilization, antidiscrimination laws, transgender rights, LGBT elders, parenting laws and policies, religious liberty, sexual autonomy, and gender and race differences. The book also looks at how LGBT movements in other nations have responded to the recognition of same-sex marriages, and what we might emulate or adjust in our own advocacy. Aiming to spark discussion and further debate regarding the challenges and possibilities of the LGBT movement’s future, After Marriage Equality will be of interest to anyone who cares about the future of sexual equality.

Carlos A. Ball argues that as progressives fight the First Amendment claims of religious conservatives and other LGBT opponents, they should take care not to forget the crucial role the First Amendment played in the early decades of the movement, and not to erode the safeguards of liberty that allowed LGBT rights to exist in the first place.

From Boulder in 1974 to Maine Question 1 in 2009, the first comprehensive history of the LGBT movement's fight against anti-gay ballot measures

Diane Miller examines recent arguments supporting lesbian and gay civil rights, exploring the ways these arguments are both constructive - helping to win court cases seeking basic human rights, and limiting - narrowly framing how the general public views lesbians and gays, and how lesbians and gays view themselves. Incorporating case studies of lesbians in the military and in politics, Miller discusses in detail the experiences of Colonel Margarethe Cammermeyer, who was discharged from the National Guard after twenty-seven years of service when she revealed that she was a lesbian, and Roberta Achtenberg, who was nominated by Clinton for the job of Assistant Director of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) and became the first lesbian or gay man to face the Senate confirmation process. Drawing on these cases and their outcomes, Miller evaluates the advantages and disadvantages of civil rights strategies in the struggle for lesbian and gay rights.