LGBT rights activists claimed another major victory when a federal judge ruled Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 protects workers from discrimination in the workplace based on sexual orientation.
The case was prompted by a suit brought by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission against Scott Medical Health Center, alleging a man employed as a telemarketer for the company was repeatedly subjected to homophobic remarks by his manager.
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The discriminatory behavior, argued the EEOC, amounted to sex discrimination, which has generally been prohibited in the workplace for over half a century, along with discrimination based on race, color, religion and national origin.
Scott Medical countered that the homophobic slurs hurled at the employee did not constitute sex-based discrimination, an argument categorically rejected in the ruling.
"There is no more obvious form of sex stereotyping than making a determination that a person should conform to heterosexuality," wrote US District Court Judge Cathy Bissoon in her decision, as reported by BuzzFeed.
The case is likely far from over, however. Earlier this summer a federal appeals court in Chicago reached the opposite conclusion in a similar case, ruling that courts could not consider harassment based on sexual orientation to be classified as sex discrimination until the U.S. Supreme Court rules otherwise.
The Chicago court has been asked to reconsider that decision and is expected to do so in the coming weeks.
If the Supreme Court does eventually address the issue, it is likely to side with LGBT rights advocates. Sexual orientation is not specifically cited in the Civil Rights Act, nor is it referenced in the Constitution, which five of the current justices decided protects the right to same-sex marriage in a landmark ruling last summer.
While there has never been a federal law that specifically bars discrimination based on sexual orientation, 22 states and the District of Columbia have passed such laws since Wisconsin became the first to do so in 1982.
Generally, the states with such protections are more liberal ones in the Northeast, Upper Midwest and on the West Coast, although Utah, arguably one of the country's most conservative states, is a notable exception.
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