Khadijah Farmer speaking at a news conference across from the New York State Supreme Court on Tuesday as her partner, Joelle Evans, looked on. (Photo: Stan Honda/Agence France-Presse/Getty Images)
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By DAN RENZI
Thursday, May 15, 2008
Richard Smoak, US District Judge
Three cheers to Judge Richard Smoak of the United States District Court, Northern District of Florida, who issued an order on May 13 against the Holmes County School District, that forces the school to stop censoring students who want to wear gay pride symbols, such as raimbow pins and stickers.
Students at Ponce de Leon High School asked the ACLU to file suit against the school district, after they were prevented from wearing the gay pride symbols. The principal of Ponce de Leon High School had banned them because, in his words, he believed seeing the symbols automatically cause students to picture gay people having sex. Luckily, Judge Smoak has a shred of common sense and disagreed, smacked down the district’s ban, and he even went so far as to warn the district not to retaliate against students over the lawsuit. (Snap!) Although, one must question: what kind of a horny pig is this principal, that he is thinking these things all day? There is nothing sexual about a rainbow sticker, regardless of where it is worn.
The Caliente Cab Company, New York
Alright, we don’t mean to kick them when they’re down, but while we’re on the subject of lawsuits: The Trandgender Legal Defense Fund recently won a lawsuit against the Caliente Cab Company, a restaurant in New York’s West Village, on behalf of a woman named Khadijah Farmer. It seems Ms. Farmer--who is, in fact, a woman, and was born as one--went to use the ladies’ room at the restaurant, when someone complained they thought she was a man. The restaurant’s bouncer barged in while she was doing her business, banged on the stall door, and told her she had to leave; even when she showed her ID that she was, in fact, a woman, the bouncer did not care. It seems Farmer is so butch, she looks like enough of a man to bypass Federal ID.
The TLDF took the case not because Farmer is transgendered (she’s not), but because the case sets the precedent that gender discrimination based on appearance is illegal in New York. But of all places, this restaurant is in the West Village? There must be drag queens walking in-and-out of there all day, what’s the big deal? In any case, Caliente Cab will pay Farmer $35,000, with promises to never be naughty again. So feel free to eat there, they’ve learned their lesson, no “gay boycott” necessary.
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