Michigan gay laws
Sexual Orientation, Gender Culture, and the Law
This seminar will examine sexual orientation and gender self in the U.S. legal system. We will explore the ways in which different views of sexual orientation and gender identity own influenced the constitutional and statutory rights of gays, lesbians, and transgender people. Topics will include: anti-sodomy laws; associational rights (relating to both associations among LGBT persons and those who pursue to exclude such persons from general and private spaces and activities); anti-gay ballot initiatives; military service; efforts to expand and limit family and parental rights, including second-parent adoption and marriage rights; equality rights in educational contexts; equal employment opportunity; and religious release restoration acts. Throughout, we’ll consider the interactions among lawyers and legal advocacy; LGBT movements; legislative politics; and doctrinal development in declare and federal courts, as well as in administrative agencies such as the EEOC and the federal Department of Education.
Understanding LBGTQ Rights in the Michigan Workplace
By: Collin H. Nyeholt, attorney at law
(517) 522-2550
collin@caseydconklin.com
- Introduction – We Have Reach a Long Way, but we Hold a Long Way to Go.
There was a time not very long ago when homosexuality was treated as mental illness, deviancy, and criminality. In 1952, the American Psychiatric Association listed homosexuality as a mental disorder in the DSM-I. “Transgendered” individuals, persons who struggled with their gender identity or did not conform to gender roles, were viewed as suffering from a “disorder.” Laws targeted at homosexual sex practices, notably anti-sodomy laws, remained on the books in many states as tardy as 2003. With such threats to the very right to be homosexual, same-sex marriage was almost un-thought of, save for with derision and terror. In November of 1967, in an article entitled “Civil Rights and the Homosexual: A 4-Million Minority Asks for Equal Rights” whistleblower Webster Schott wrote that the right of homosexuals to marry was “high among the deviate’s hopes.” In 1996, Congress passed the Defense of Marriage Act (“DOMA”) which, according to the House Judiciary Comm
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In 2018, the Michigan Civil Rights Commission issued an interpretative remark declaring that sexual orientation and gender identity fall under the definition of "discrimination because of . . . sex" under the Eliot-Larsen Civil Rights Behave (ELCRA). On this basis, the Michigan Department of Civil Rights (MDCR) began accepting and searching claims of discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender persona. In 2022, the Court of Claims ruled that discrimination against an individual who identifies with a gender different than that assigned at birth counted as "discrimination because of . . . sex" but discrimination based on sexual orientation did not. The Michigan Supreme Court reversed the latter decision, affirming sexual orientation and gender identity as "discrimination because of . . . sex" and therefore protected under the ELCRA. Some assume that discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity or expression has risen in the past few years. Accordingly, it was suggested that current practices governing the prohibition against discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity or
(CBS DETROIT) — Michigan has ranked among one of the most welcoming states for the LGBTQ+ group, according to a fresh index.
Out Leadership, a lgbtq+ advocacy group, provides an index that ranks states based on where lgbtq+ and transgender people can live while facing the least discrimination. The index measures the impact that government policies have on the LGBTQ+ residents living in each state, "quantifying the economic imperatives for inclusion and the costs of discrimination," according to Out Leadership.
States are ranked on a scale from no risk (100) to high risk (0), and Michigan received an overall score of 78.07, classifying it as a low-risk state. This score jumped from the 73.20 score Michigan received in 2023.
Michigan received scores that fall under "no risk" in the categories of legal and nondiscrimination protection and political and religious attitudes.
These categories assess state laws that directly impact LGBTQ+ residents, including the processes for transgender people to modify their gender on birth certificates and driver's licenses, protections for LGBTQ+ individuals in foster care, common spaces and at serve , the extent