http://www.onenewsnow.com/Culture/Default.aspx?id=1292816A long, drawn-out debate over a homosexual discrimination ordinance in a Kansas college town has culminated with a victory for "gender identity."
In a 3-to-2 vote on Tuesday night, city commissioners awarded Manhattan -- home of Kansas State University -- the broadest special protections of any community in the nation for homosexuals, bisexuals, and transgenders. Commissioner Jayme Morris-Hardeman, Mayor Pro Tem Jim Sherow, and Mayor Bruce Snead voted in favor of the ordinance. Commissioners Bob Strawn and Loren Pepperd cast the dissenting votes.
Opposition leaders say they will not give up the fight to protect family values, listing among their reasons for opposing the measure that the ordinance approves of that which is "morally wrong" and that it "promotes the very discrimination it seeks to prevent."
Donna Lippoldt (KFPC)Donna Lippoldt, director of the Kansas Family Policy Council, is working in cooperation with a citizen-led group called Awaken Manhattan. Lippoldt says strategic decisions need to made quickly.
"The Awaken Manhattan team needs to do make a decision," she urges. "Are we just going to wait for the election on April 5 and get these three new commissioners in there and see if it can be reversed that way? Or are we going to go with a citizen petition drive to get it on a ballot? We could either get it on the April 5 ballot or we could wait for a special election."
Even though the language of the ordinance is vague, she argues that some of the members of the Manhattan City Commission thought it necessary to create a protected class providing equal rights.
"The mayor, Bruce Snead, Jim Sherow, and Jayme Morris-Hardeman really believe that they were the Martin Luther Kings of Manhattan, Kansas," says Lippoldt. "They're just so determined to get these homosexual special rights delivered to this community that two of them [who] are up for re-election [are] not even running for re-election -- probably because they know they would never be re-elected."
According to the ordinance, which takes affect September 1, gender identity is defined as "a person's good faith and continuing presentation of the person's gender-related identity, appearance, mannerisms, or other gender-related characteristics, which may or may not be consistent with the person's biological sex."
Topic: City leaders push through special rights for homosexuals (Read 467 times)