Kansas law makers recently proposed two bills. One of which would discredit same sex marriage. Tonia Hughes, assistant professor, film and photography shared her thoughts on the bill.
“The sad thing is that I think it’s representative of the fact that you do still have this prejudice out there, and people who are so angry and hostile and prejudice[d]that are trying to put a bill like that through,” Hughes said.
James Perez, student, thought that the bill’s ideas were outdated.
“To talk like that in 2019 is ridiculous and I’m sure other people would feel the same way,” Perez said.
The first bill uses terms like “mythology” when describing sexual orientation, and regarding the LGBT community as part of “secular humanism” which is identified as a religion. A portion of the law also states that LGBTQ civil rights are offensive to the race based civil rights movement in the 60’s, and calls same sex marriages and transgender people “immoral with a tendency to erode community standards of decency.”
“On the one hand, the bill really is ridiculous and it’s easy to kind of laugh it off,” Hughes said. “But on the other hand, it’s reflective of where we are in society. And kind of how frightening that is. That somebody would have that much hatred, that they would want to pursue something like that.”
Other students like Keenan McCord and Josephine Zimmermann gave their opinions on the bill.
McCord said, “You’re trying to discredit them and say they’re doing injustice, you know, you’re lying to yourself.”
Zimmermann said, “It’s just people wanting to live their lives and have the same rights as anybody else.”
Hughes said, “I think, though, we have to compare it to the civil rights movement because it’s the only other movement that really has challenged laws in the same kind of way.”
From The Campus Ledger Simone Griggs.