Anti-Gay/Anti-Trans Christian Groups Scripted Tennessee Discrimination Bill
By Zack Ford on Nov 8, 2011 at 3:48 pm
http://thinkprogress.org/lgbt/2011/11/08/364345/anti-gay-anti-trans-christian-groups-scripted-tennessee-discrimination-bill/In May, the Tennessee legislature passed a bill dubbed the "Special Access to Discrimination" (SAD) Act that prohibits municipalities from creating non-discrimination protections for the LGBT community. Conservatives advanced the legislation after Nashville passed such protections earlier this year, effectively overriding them. Equality advocates are now suing to overturn the law, arguing it was designed to illegally discriminate against LGBT people as opposed to protect businesses from "burdensome" regulation, as lawmakers argued. Documents obtained in the suit now show that the Family Action Council of Tennessee (FACT) and Southern Baptist Convention were scripting the debate, rooting their arguments in anti-LGBT bias. FACT president David Fowler wrote the following to state Sen. Mae Beavers (R):
FOWLER: The bill itself is not that complicated. We don't need more regulation of business and business sure doesn't need the 348 different cities coming up with their own ideas of what a discriminatory practice is. That's the line and you just repeat it like Glen Casada did last night when the bill passed the House 73 to 24.
