QueertyChris Vickers and his lawyer Randi Barnabee claim Vickers' coworkers and a coworker's spouse harassed him and endangered his life for not meeting their expectations of a "man". Traumatized by fourteen months of alleged abuse, Vickers took the accused anti-gay discriminators to court. Unfortunately for Vickers, Ohio's legislature doesn't protect private sector gay employees. The judicial system, meanwhile, does protect transsexuals.
Barnabee's 2004's Smith v. Salem case argued the City of Salem fired veteran firefighter Jimmie L. Smith after Jimmie became a woman. Barnabee, herself a post-op transgender, persuaded the court that Title VII of 1964's Civil Rights Act protects against gendered stereotyping. Thomas Ling writes for the Harvard Civil Rights-Civil Liberties Law Review:
