Tag: civil rights

Ohio Voted to Protect Reproductive Rights — Now What?

Our May 2024 Meeting Blurb

May 11 @ 10:00 am — 11:30 am

In 2023, Ohio vot­ed to add repro­duc­tive rights to the Ohio con­sti­tu­tion and it was­n’t even a close vote but things aren’t all rosy as Christian Nationalists and their friends in the state house and else­where try to under­mine our vic­to­ry.

Our May 2024 Meeting Blurb

Our speak­er will be Kristin Hady who has been a long­time repro­duc­tive rights advo­cate, clin­ic escort, and Board mem­ber of Pro-Choice Ohio and the Agnes Reynolds Jackson Fund (Aggie Fund) and works with Abortion Access Front as Director Of Programs.

What shenani­gans are the reli­gious zealots try­ing to pull and what can we do to stop them and get them to abide by the new amend­ment.

The lat­est NW Ohio gam­bit is State Rep. Josh Williams intro­duced a bill that would take away local gov­ern­ment fund­ing if a munic­i­pal­i­ty funds abor­tion ser­vices and any mon­ey “clawed back” would be giv­en to the fake preg­nan­cy cen­ters that already get mil­lions of tax dol­lars from Christian Nationalists in the state house.

This meet­ing is FREE and open to the pub­lic. We will be in Community Room A

THE AGNES REYNOLDS JACKSON FUND

Pro-Choice Ohio

Abortion Access Front

Unless oth­er­wise not­ed, our meet­ings and events are free and open to the pub­lic. In-person, in-door meet­ings and events we STRONGLY rec­om­mend atten­dees wear masks. Speakers can wear them if they choose while speak­ing. Click more infor­ma­tion about our In-person Meeting Policy. SHoWLE has a No Weapons pol­i­cy

If you aren’t able to join us for the meet­ing and would like to see it please use the fol­low­ing Zoom invite to view a live stream. The meet­ing will not be record­ed.

Topic: SHoWLE Monthly Meeting — May 2024
Time: May 11, 2024 10:00 AM Eastern Time (US and Canada)

Join Zoom Meeting
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/87538128071?pwd=M1hKdEhvTUJYeGE5MThsRDJiOTVUQT09

Meeting ID: 875 3812 8071
Passcode: 484812

One tap mobile
+13052241968„87538128071#„„484812# US +13092053325„87538128071#„„484812# US

Dial by your loca­tion

  • +1 305 224 1968 US
  • +1 309 205 3325 US
  • +1 312 626 6799 US (Chicago)
  • +1 646 558 8656 US (New York)
  • +1 646 931 3860 US
  • +1 301 715 8592 US (Washington DC)
  • +1 346 248 7799 US (Houston)
  • +1 360 209 5623 US
  • +1 386 347 5053 US
  • +1 507 473 4847 US
  • +1 564 217 2000 US
  • +1 669 444 9171 US
  • +1 669 900 9128 US (San Jose)
  • +1 689 278 1000 US
  • +1 719 359 4580 US
  • +1 253 205 0468 US
  • +1 253 215 8782 US (Tacoma)

Meeting ID: 875 3812 8071
Passcode: 484812

Find your local num­ber: https://us02web.zoom.us/u/kczwjegBRj

Free

Heatherdowns Branch Library

3265 Glanzman Rd
Toledo, Ohio 43614 United States + Google Map
Posted on

Toledo Humanists Condemn Override of HB 68 Veto

***FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: Toledo Humanists Condemn Override of HB 68 Veto

TOLEDO — The Secular Humanists of Western Lake Erie con­demn the over­ride of the veto of House Bill 68 that will now allow the ban on gender-affirming care and ban on Trans women in school sports to become law.

The major­i­ty ignored med­ical sci­ence and the pleas of the Trans com­mu­ni­ty and dis­missed their very exis­tence. Several Senators dur­ing the vote claimed Trans kids don’t exist and that their God assigned the child’s gen­der at con­cep­tion. Rep. Gary Click, in a state­ment on X called for resources for indi­vid­u­als who regret their tran­si­tion “as they realign with their authen­tic selves.” We reject Rep. Click’s call as mis­guid­ed and tinged with reli­gious big­otry.

We don’t believe that laws and pub­lic pol­i­cy should ignore sci­en­tif­ic con­sen­sus or be irra­tional­ly sup­port­ed by moral pan­ic. It is clear to us that some leg­is­la­tors believe their reli­gion is above basic human decen­cy and com­pas­sion. Bullying chil­dren is not a good look.

It was also iron­ic in the same ses­sion the same peo­ple who vot­ed to harm Trans kids over­rode a veto on a bud­get item that pro­hibits local gov­ern­ments from enact­ing their own reg­u­la­tions on tobac­co, par­tic­u­lar­ly bans on the sale of fla­vored nico­tine prod­ucts, which are typ­i­cal­ly mar­ket­ed toward minors.

The action by the Ohio Legislature to force HB 68 into law also denies the right of par­ents to sup­port their child’s health care needs what­ev­er that maybe.

We hope that the ban is chal­lenged in court and ends up like oth­er sim­i­lar bans by being ruled uncon­sti­tu­tion­al.

We will do what we can to sup­port the LGBTQI com­mu­ni­ty dur­ing these unwar­rant­ed and inde­fen­si­ble attacks from the gov­ern­ment.

Media con­tact: Douglas Berger, President

More infor­ma­tion:

‘Cowardly, self-serving vote’: Ohio Senate over­rides DeWine’s veto; bans health­care for trans youth

Posted on

SHoWLE Disappointed Some Local Legislators Want To Subvert The Will Of The Voters

Image showing districts that have pro-life members

The Secular Humanists of Western Lake Erie are dis­mayed and dis­ap­point­ed that sev­er­al local mem­bers of the Ohio House of Representatives signed on to a let­ter to announce their inten­tion to sub­vert the will of the vot­ers who passed State Issue 1 on November 7th.

Continue read­ing “SHoWLE Disappointed Some Local Legislators Want To Subvert The Will Of The Voters”
Posted on

We Oppose HB 183: The Bathroom Ban For Trans People

President Douglas Berger sub­mit­ted writ­ten tes­ti­mo­ny to the Ohio House Higher Education Committee that is con­sid­er­ing House Bill 183 that would pro­hib­it trans­gen­der kids and adults from using the pub­lic bath­rooms that align with their gen­der iden­ti­ty.

Two peo­ple on the com­mit­tee are from the NW Ohio area. Rep. Derek Merrin (R‑42) and Rep. Josh Williams (R‑41).

The hear­ing for oppo­si­tion tes­ti­mo­ny is Wednesday October 11th. Here is the text of his tes­ti­mo­ny as sub­mit­ted:

Chair Rep. Young, Vice Chair Rep. Manning, and Ranking Member Rep. Miller, my name is Douglas Berger and I am President of the Secular Humanists of Western Lake Erie, based in Toledo.

I am writ­ing today to express our group’s oppo­si­tion to House Bill 183 that would pro­hib­it trans­gen­der kids and adults from using the pub­lic bath­rooms that align with their gen­der iden­ti­ty.

We oppose this dis­crim­i­na­to­ry bill since it reminds us of the dark days of Jim Crow when bath­rooms and even drink­ing foun­tains were seg­re­gat­ed by race and this bill is based on the same kind of false nar­ra­tive and flim­sy evi­dence that those Jim Crow laws were based on.

We are also tired of mem­bers of this leg­is­la­ture pass­ing off irra­tional reli­gious big­otry as pub­lic pol­i­cy and law. When will your need to impose your reli­gion on oth­ers stop?

HB 183 has no fac­tu­al basis and no data to jus­ti­fy a ban is need­ed. Most anec­do­tal sto­ries are made up. The num­bers of teach­ers and peo­ple of faith who have been arrest­ed and charged for abus­ing chil­dren far out dis­tance any report­ed crime due to Trans peo­ple using the bath­room that aligns with their gen­der iden­ti­ty. I am more fear­ful of a child being alone with a priest or min­is­ter than using a bath­room with a Trans per­son.

Representative Lear and Bird also failed to note which reli­gious con­ser­v­a­tive lob­by group they copied and past­ed this ridicu­lous pro­pos­al from. There is a rea­son these pro­pos­als all look alike.

We can also promise that the peo­ple who intro­duced this bill and at least three mem­bers of this com­mit­tee have nev­er met a Trans kid and has nev­er talked to the Trans com­mu­ni­ty but they seem to want to dis­crim­i­nate against Trans peo­ple any­way. I’m sure it is eas­i­er to dis­crim­i­nate when you nev­er talk to them.

Our mem­bers would also like to know who will enforce this ban and how will it be enforced. Will birth cer­tifi­cates be required to be shown or will a school offi­cial be des­ig­nat­ed as a gen­i­tal check­er? Will you have a par­ent sign a form so their child can have a gen­i­tal check? If there is no enforce­ment mech­a­nism then this pro­pos­al is just for show. In fact it would be used to out Trans kids and bul­ly them.

Adding on an unfund­ed man­date on pub­lic schools and col­leges that you bare­ly help fund is also some­thing to con­sid­er.

In a recent TV inter­view, a mem­ber of this com­mit­tee said that edu­ca­tion­al pol­i­cy should only go toward the aca­d­e­m­ic progress of stu­dents and we should­n’t be intro­duc­ing social issues into the class­room. How does HB 183 advance aca­d­e­m­ic progress? It does­n’t but it sure intro­duces social issues into the class­room. How will this bill improve the dis­mal school rank­ing the state has received recent­ly.

Why don’t Trans kids deserve to be pro­tect­ed too?

We ask you to vote no on HB 183.

Posted on

SHoWLE Disappointed By 303 Creative Court Decision

Toledo, July 1, 2023 — The Secular Humanists of Western Lake Erie are very dis­ap­point­ed in the rul­ing on June 30 by the US Supreme Court in the 303 Creative LLC v. Elenis case. It is wrong that reli­gious beliefs now trump all oth­er rights to full pub­lic busi­ness accom­mo­da­tions and allow dis­crim­i­na­tion of peo­ple in a pro­tect­ed class.

The court said that requir­ing the graph­ic design­er to make wed­ding web­sites for same-sex cou­ples was an uncon­sti­tu­tion­al vio­la­tion of her first amend­ment rights because the cre­ation would be seen as an endorse­ment of some­thing her reli­gious beliefs pro­hib­it.

We don’t believe requir­ing busi­ness own­ers not to dis­crim­i­nate against cus­tomers in pro­tect­ed class­es makes the per­son or busi­ness endorse some­thing against their reli­gious beliefs. At the end of the day they can still not approve of same-sex mar­riages. If a busi­ness can’t bring itself to serve cus­tomers from the pro­tect­ed class­es then they need not be a pub­lic busi­ness.

We are also con­cerned about the unprece­dent­ed pro­tec­tion the court grant­ed to a reli­gious per­son. They ruled on a case that did­n’t include any actu­al harm. The plain­tiff was­n’t cre­at­ing wed­ding web­sites when she filed the law­suit and there is some ques­tion that the LGBT cus­tomer writ­ten about in her case was made up. Secular peo­ple who claim their reli­gious free­dom was vio­lat­ed, like for exam­ple chal­leng­ing 10 Commandment stat­ues on court house lawns, are dis­missed because the mere pres­ence of the reli­gious item or text isn’t an actu­al harm accord­ing to fed­er­al courts.

The plain­tiff agreed in court that she would sell her ser­vices to LGBTQ peo­ple, just not wed­ding web­site designs. So her reli­gious beliefs are not absolute. How does mak­ing a sign for a gay man not also seem to endorse his sex­u­al ori­en­ta­tion?

The deci­sion was capri­cious and arbi­trary and gave spe­cial rights to reli­gious peo­ple that are not allowed by any­one else. The Christian Nationalists have been bent on sub­vert­ing decades of church and state legal deci­sions.

The US Supreme Court set back reli­gious free­dom for many years.

For fur­ther infor­ma­tion on this deci­sion see: Supreme Court rules web­site design­er can decline to cre­ate same-sex wed­ding web­sites

Supreme Court rules web­site design­er can decline to cre­ate same-sex wed­ding web­sites

About Secular Humanists of Western Lake Erie

The mis­sion of the Secular Humanists of Western Lake Erie is to pro­vide a sup­port­ive local com­mu­ni­ty for human­ists and oth­er non­the­ists, while pro­mot­ing an eth­i­cal, rea­son­able, and sec­u­lar approach to life through edu­ca­tion, com­mu­ni­ty ser­vice, out­reach, activism, and social events.

We envi­sion a Northwest Ohio and Southeast Michigan where sec­u­lar peo­ple are respect­ed and inte­grat­ed in broad­er soci­ety, live val­ues of rea­son and com­pas­sion, and enjoy a friend­ly human­ist com­mu­ni­ty.

#

PDF of Statement Available Here

Posted on

Toledo Blade Underplayed Bigotry Toward The Trans Community

SHoWLE President Douglas Berger had a let­ter to the edi­tor pub­lished in the Toledo Blade on April 20, 2023, respond­ing to a pre­vi­ous edi­to­r­i­al that seemed sym­pa­thet­ic to a woman who gave a speech against Trans women at the University of Toledo. The edi­to­r­i­al down­played the big­ot­ed fram­ing and rehash of anti-Trans tropes relat­ing to Trans women par­tic­i­pat­ing in women’s sports. The edi­to­r­i­al com­plained about Trans rights sup­port­ers protest­ing Riley Gaines’ speech but didn’t point out the false nar­ra­tive that Gaines used in her speech and the fact that it was spon­sored by the right-wing Christian Nationalist group Turning Point USA.

Douglas was also dis­ap­point­ed that even though his let­ter was pub­lished, the heart of it was cut out by the Blade and made it seem, again, that the issue was one of dif­fer­ence of opin­ion and not one of a bat­tle to pro­tect the rights of a mar­gin­al­ized group. SHoWLE doesn’t believe that human rights should be put up for a pop­u­lar vote or be debat­ed like what ice cream fla­vor you like.

Below is the full text of the let­ter Douglas sub­mit­ted fol­lowed by images of the Blade edi­to­r­i­al in ques­tion and the print­ed let­ter.

I sat down to read the Blade and saw yet anoth­er edi­to­r­i­al (“Editorial: Let Riley tell her sto­ry” pub­lished 4/22) claim­ing that some­one with big­ot­ed ideas is being hurt because oth­er peo­ple have called them out on their big­otry. Make no mis­take, Riley Gaines told her sto­ry framed in big­otry against Trans women all because a Trans woman won ONE event at the NCAA tour­na­ment.

Gaines should know that more goes into per­form­ing sports than just body parts and what sex one is but we live in a soci­ety that seems to accept the sta­tus quo for longer than we need. Take bas­ket­ball. When women were first allowed to play bas­ket­ball, they were only allowed to play half court because men assumed that women did­n’t have the sta­mi­na to run up and down a full court. They also had to play in skirts because it was un-ladylike to wear shorts in pub­lic.

Does Gaines feel the four oth­er women that beat her in the 200 freestyle were actu­al­ly “intact males” and why did­n’t Lia Thomas win that race if she won the 500 freestyle? I thought Trans women had an unfair advan­tage?

The sci­ence on the issue isn’t clear yet but unlike Gaines’ anec­do­tal “evi­dence”, the NCAA has had spe­cif­ic rules to include Trans ath­letes for at least 10 years now. One would think the flood gates would be open and there would be only Trans women win­ning every­thing — obvi­ous­ly that did­n’t hap­pen. A per­son­’s genet­ic make-up and inter­nal and exter­nal repro­duc­tive anato­my are not use­ful indi­ca­tors of ath­let­ic per­for­mance.

It is also telling that Gaines’ talk was spon­sored by the Christian Nationalist group Turning Point USA, whose founder and President Charlie Kirk, on a pod­cast in 2022, said that the Transgender com­mu­ni­ty was a “social con­ta­gion” and that this “pub­lic mania” would, in 20 years, be likened to “the modern-day equiv­a­lent of lobot­o­mies in the 1920s and 1930s”.

Riley Gaines (like Charlie Kirk) used big­otry to tell her sto­ry, the con­tent of which was under­played in the edi­to­r­i­al. As we move for­ward and the peo­ple who sup­port all humans as hav­ing basic dig­ni­ty and worth become the major­i­ty only then will we be actu­al­ly unit­ed as peo­ple.

Posted on

SHoWLE Asks Local Media To Stop Running False Anti-Abortion Ad

The Secular Humanists of Western Lake Erie are ask­ing local media in Northwest Ohio to stop air­ing the TV ad by the anti-abortion group “Protect Women Ohio” because it is a false ad.

In that ad that began air­ing March 15th, a nar­ra­tor speaks:

“Your daugh­ter is young vul­ner­a­ble online. You fear the worst. Pushed to change her sex or to get an abor­tion. You have some right to help her through this but activists want to take all that away. Under their pro­posed amend­ment to the Ohio. Constitution the state shall not inter­fere with indi­vid­u­als get­ting abor­tions or sex changes mean­ing you could be cut out of the Biggest deci­sion of her life.”

Audio of Protect Women Ohio: Fear the Worst 3/15/2023

Forcing daugh­ters to get sex changes or abor­tions appears no where in the actu­al text of the pro­posed amend­ment.

FULL TEXT OF PROPOSED AMENDMENT

Be it Resolved by the People of the State of Ohio that Article I of the Ohio Constitution is amend­ed to add the fol­low­ing Section:

Article I, Section 22. The Right to Reproductive Freedom with Protections for Health and Safety

A. Every indi­vid­ual has a right to make and car­ry out one’s own repro­duc­tive deci­sions, includ­ing but not lim­it­ed to deci­sions on:

con­tra­cep­tion;
fer­til­i­ty treat­ment;
con­tin­u­ing one’s own preg­nan­cy;
mis­car­riage care;
and abor­tion.

B. The State shall not, direct­ly or indi­rect­ly, bur­den, penal­ize, pro­hib­it, inter­fere with, or dis­crim­i­nate against either:

An indi­vid­u­al’s vol­un­tary exer­cise of this right or
A per­son or enti­ty that assists an indi­vid­ual exer­cis­ing this right, unless the State demon­strates that it is using the least restric­tive means to advance the indi­vid­u­al’s health in accor­dance with wide­ly accept­ed and evidence-based stan­dards of care.
However, abor­tion may be pro­hib­it­ed after fetal via­bil­i­ty. But in no case may such an abor­tion be pro­hib­it­ed if in the pro­fes­sion­al judg­ment of the preg­nant patien­t’s treat­ing physi­cian it is nec­es­sary to pro­tect the preg­nant patien­t’s life or health.

C. As used in this Section:

“Fetal via­bil­i­ty” means “the point in a preg­nan­cy when, in the pro­fes­sion­al judg­ment of the preg­nant patien­t’s treat­ing physi­cian, the fetus has a sig­nif­i­cant like­li­hood of sur­vival out­side the uterus with rea­son­able mea­sures. This is deter­mined on a case-by-case basis.”
“State” includes any gov­ern­men­tal enti­ty and any polit­i­cal sub­di­vi­sion.

D. This Section is self-executing.

Text of pro­posed amend­ment as approved by Ohio bal­lot board March 2023

Sex reas­sign­ment surgery is not men­tioned at all. The pro­posed amend­ment only cov­ers indi­vid­ual repro­duc­tive choic­es. The anti-abortion ad also selec­tive­ly quotes the peti­tion say­ing the state “shall not inter­fere” to fear mon­ger to par­ents who demand tight con­trol on their chil­dren. The “pro­tect women” group is sim­ply lying.

Local media need to stop run­ning the ad. Advocacy ads are not cov­ered by fed­er­al law or cov­ered by the first amend­ment. We aren’t talk­ing about a dif­fer­ence of opin­ion we are talk­ing about a false ad.

Are ad dol­lars more impor­tant than the truth?

Broadcast media are grant­ed a license to use the pub­lic air­ways in the pub­lic inter­est. Passing off a false ad that advo­cates tak­ing rights away from peo­ple is not act­ing in the pub­lic inter­est.

About Secular Humanists of Western Lake Erie

The mis­sion of the Secular Humanists of Western Lake Erie is to pro­vide a sup­port­ive local com­mu­ni­ty for human­ists and oth­er non­the­ists, while pro­mot­ing an eth­i­cal, rea­son­able, and sec­u­lar approach to life through edu­ca­tion, com­mu­ni­ty ser­vice, out­reach, activism, and social events.

We envi­sion a Northwest Ohio and Southeast Michigan where sec­u­lar peo­ple are respect­ed and inte­grat­ed in broad­er soci­ety, live val­ues of rea­son and com­pas­sion, and enjoy a friend­ly human­ist com­mu­ni­ty.

Media Contacts

Douglas Berger — President
567–215-2694

#

Posted on

SHoWLE Opposes Senate Bill 49: The Religious Expression Days “R.E.D.” Act.

This ses­sion, the Ohio Senate intro­duced Senate Bill 49 also known as The Religious Expression Days “R.E.D.” Act. If passed it would give reli­gious stu­dents in pub­lic schools three days off each year for reli­gious rea­sons. SHoWLE oppos­es this bill for the main rea­son is it gives spe­cial priv­i­leges to reli­gious stu­dents. We also don’t believe a law is need­ed since many school dis­tricts cur­rent­ly make accom­mo­da­tions for reli­gious obser­vances.

SHoWLE President Douglas Berger sub­mit­ted writ­ten tes­ti­mo­ny to the Ohio Senate Education com­mit­tee. Here is the text of his remarks:

Continue read­ing “SHoWLE Opposes Senate Bill 49: The Religious Expression Days “R.E.D.” Act.”