Quote:Because the 14th Amendment was not being adhered too. The 14th Amendment does in fact address this. Had the Amendment been followed to the letter of the law no additional protection would have been necessary.


My beef with additional legislation is two fold.

1. We excuse the behavior of those who ignored the original laws that covered that very issue.

2. Once you pass these types of specific protection laws you make it darn near impossible for employers to let an incompetent person of the newly specified group go for their incompetence. Ask any HR person about the additional hoops and the longer time line in these cases.


Sorry for the delayed response to your question. My work and life schedule did not provide me ample time for an adequate response.

This is the point I have been trying to make. The 14th Amendment is not enough to provide protections on its own. Even though it expresses the idea of equality, it was not enough to implement the full meaning of that word.


Therefore, when someone says additional protections are not needed for LGBT person's because of the Constitution, I can knowingly say that is not true. It was not true for black people and it is not true for gay people.


The one positive is that the Constitutional Amendments paved the road for cities to create Human Rights Ordinances, Committees and Commissions which already designate explicit protections against discrimination and rights to public accommodation in such a way that six words are all that is necessary to be added to provide equal (not special or extra) rights to people who are gay or transgender. Because it is so simple a majority of gay American citizens now have equal protection where the live as several local governments have already updated their city's ordinances. Jacksonville is not one of those places (yet). Providing these protections means that these people can focus on being the best employee they can be while bringing their "whole self" to work without fear of unjustified termination. As for terminating underperforming employees .. I know Florida is a right to work state and I have seen plenty of incompetent employees fired with cause by simply being put on a performance management program to encourage them to get up or get out. Based on the amount of layoffs I have seen local employers go through in some rollercoaster years, I wouldn't think getting rid of employees good or bad is as difficult as you make it sound.

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