West Virginia advocacy groups are reacting to a new federal ruling that further protects the LGBT community. A Thursday ruling by the federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission has deemed discrimination against workers based on sexual orientation illegal.
Under current law, West Virginia does not protect LGBT persons from being fired or discriminated against at work, but the new ruling by the EEOC extends those protections to citizens across the country.
In regards to Thursday’s decision, a similar ruling was handed down in 2012, when the EEOC determined that transgender workers were protected from discrimination.
Jennifer Meinig, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union of West Virginia, called the ruling groundbreaking but said protections are also needed on the state level. According to Buzzfeed, the commission ruled that gender identity-based discrimination is barred by the sex discrimination ban.
“This is a significant development because protections for gay and transgender people are almost nonexistent in federal law and in 28 states, including West Virginia,” Meinig said.
“Shockingly, there are no explicit protections civil rights protections for LGBT folks on the books in terms of employment.”
Meinig says the ACLU of West Virginia, along with LGBT advocacy group Fairness West Virginia plan to lobby for state legislation that ensures employment, housing and other public accommodation protections for the LGBT community.
Fairness West Virginia executive director Andrew Schneider echoed Meinig’s belief that there is still work to be done on the state level.
“You’re going to see us trying to add sexual orientation and gender identity to the state’s human rights code. Simply not having it in there is, in a way, giving a green light to those who are prejudice, those who are biased and those who are homophobic to act out those prejudices in actions that should be unlawful,” Schneider said.
“That’s unlawful now under the EEOC ruling, but it should be unlawful under state code,” he added.
Schneider pointed to a 2013 poll by Public Policy Polling that showed 68 percent of West Virginians said discrimination in employment and housing based on sexual orientation or gender identity should not be allowed.
A bill known as EHNDA–the Employment and Housing Non-Discrimination Act–has been introduced in West Virginia in multiple legislative sessions over the past few years. That legislation has sought to provide employment and housing protections for the LGBT community. However, various versions of the bill have failed repeatedly.
Calls seeking comment from the Family Policy Council of West Virginia, a conservative policy group that has argued against LGBT protections in housing and employment, were not immediately returned.
At the legislature today, bills are read in their entirety on the Senate floor as Democrats retaliate for action on the charter schools bill. In the House, the Judiciary committee begins to consider amendments to the Coal Mine Safety and Jobs Act. And, we’ll get a first look at a new documentary about one of West Virginia’s most notable politicians on The Legislature Today.
Thurmond, West Virginia is the smallest town in America to pass an ordinance banning discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity. In a unanimous vote Monday night, the town of five residents adopted employment, housing and public accommodation protections to a new town-wide Human Rights Act.
Since 2009, Fairness WV, a statewide advocacy organization, has been working with communities to pass these types of ordinances. In a statement, Executive Director Andrew Schneider says the Thurmond ordinance is stronger than current protections in the statewide Human Rights Act.
Bills to extend protections in employment and housing based on sexual orientation and gender identity have failed in the West Virginia Legislature for years.
Charleston, Huntington, Morgantown, Athens, and Harpers Ferry all have adopted similar ordinances banning discrimination against LGBT citizens.
Songwriter Sam Gleaves was inspired by the story of Sam Williams, a former coal miner who was harassed at work for being gay.
Sam Gleaves is a musician who grew up playing old time mountain music in Southwestern Virginia. His songs have a high lonesome, old-time sound. Their roots are deep in Appalachia, and the stories they tell explore some bitter truths about how hard it can be to be different here. I met up with Gleaves at his home in Berea, KY to talk about one song in particular.
Sam Gleaves says he’s been drawn to music since he was kid in Rural Retreat, Virginia. He loved to listen to Bob Dylan and Stevie Nicks. “I was always interested in songs that told stories about real people and real emotion. So I was drawn to folk music.”
Sam Gleaves. Photo by Susi Lawson.
When he was 12, he got a guitar and started playing along with the radio, picking out the chords.“I’d been teaching myself to play the guitar for about a year or so, and my mom said ‘there’s a fella over there in Rural Retreat that teaches music lessons in his barber shop.’ So I went in his barber shop for the first time. There were two young men playing an old time dance tune. And I had never seen that, up close and personal in that way. Just to think it was just two guys it was really amazing to me.”
Sam Gleaves started taking lessons from that barber, an old time musician whose name was Jim Lloyd. Last spring Sam graduated from Berea college in Berea, KY, where he studied oral history and played in the college’s bluegrass band. Now, he’s turning his attention towards something other than traditional old time music. He’s producing an album of original songs called Aint We Brothers. The title song is based on the true story of a coal miner from West Virginia who was harassed and threatened at work after his co-workers discovered he was gay.
I was born here just the same as you/ Another time, another day
I’m sure the good Lord took his time/ Making each of us just this way
I walked beside you step by step/ And it never crossed my mind
That I would grow up one of the different kind
“I wanted to write the song about what it means to be a man. LGBTQ folks in Appalachia have a particularly complex identity because because you have modern queer culture, which is very urban, and very young feeling. And then there’s what we think about Appalachian culture- having deep roots and being rural. But then you have people that belong to both of those identities. Like as a gay man who grew up in southwestern Virginia, I have to claim my whole self,” said Gleaves.
The coal miner who inspired his song recently sent Sam Gleaves an email, letting him know how much he enjoyed hearing the song. The coal miner, also named Sam, used to be known as Sam Hall. He married his partner Burley Williams in D.C. back in 2010, and recently took his husband’s name. Sam and Burley Williams live in a small town a few miles outside of Charleston W.Va.
Sam Williams is 32 years old, tall and muscular, with hands that are chiseled from the seven years they’ve spent cutting coal from these hills. But he’s not a coal miner anymore. He quit Massey energy in 2010 after working as a miner for seven years. I spent an evening at their home. At their kitchen table, I ate a nectarine while Burley Williams cooked burritos. Sam Williams talked about what happened when his coworkers found out he was gay.
“Not that I ever even told them that I was gay. They just watch, follow, see me come out of a bar, automatically stereotype me. I faced a lot of things in the mines. I’ve been told that they hope all faggots die. There’s a fine line between someone saying that they’re joking and somebody looking you in the eye and saying it and knowing that that’s what they meant. But when it’s your supervisors it’s a whole different ball game.”
Then I asked him about Sam Gleaves’ song. Williams said he thinks it’s a very powerful song, especially the verse that goes:
First things first I’m a Blue-collared man
With scars on my knuckles, dust on my hands
Probably wouldn’t have ever known
I’ve got a man waiting on me at home
“Yes, that relates to me so much because I know that Burley was waiting for me at home. He’d wait for me until I got in and then he’d have dinner waiting on me, even if I got in at 3:00 in the morning,” said Williams.
Burley and Sam Williams were married in D.C. in 2010. Last year when same sex marriage became legally recognized in West Virginia, Sam took his husband’s name.
He and Burley have lived together since 2009. The first years they were dating, Sam Williams was dealing with the worst of the harassment and threats from his co-workers. Burley says there were nights when he feared for Sam’s life.
“And they messed with his vehicle, like scratched ‘Quit Fag’,” says Burley Williams. Sam’s co-workers “took the wheel weights off his tires. It was nerve-wracking because when he didn’t come home, I had to go out drive to the mines and go search for him. I’m thinking someone’s shot him on the side of the road.”
Sam’s co-workers even came to their house late at night to bang on their door. To protect himself and Sam, Burley bought his very first gun. He also got a concealed weapon permit, in case they were ever confronted when they went out in public.
“You always know that there’s hate out there. There’s individually people that never will be accepting of gay individuals. So you do have to take precautions to protect yourself and your family and your loved ones,” said Burley Williams.
Sam Williams relaxing with his two dogs Bella and Lacy.
Sam Williams finally had had enough, and he quit his job in 2010. He sued his former employer, Massey Energy for sexual harassment.
He couldn’t sue for discrimination, because in West Virginia it’s legal to discriminate against people who are gay. State law prohibits discriminating against people on the basis of sex or race – but the law doesn’t include sexual orientation. The same is true of other states in Appalachia, like Kentucky and Virginia.
Andrew Schneider is the Executive Director of Fairness West Virginia, a gay rights advocacy group. The group is trying to pass a law that would make it illegal to discriminate against an employee based on sexual orientation or gender identity.
“It’s particularly, I think, risky now, that we have marriage equality, because you can get married on Sunday and fired on Monday. Marriage, in some ways, makes our relationships in the gay community more visible. You are more prone to having your picture of your loved one on your desk. You’re more likely to wear your wedding ring. You want to talk with your co-workers about what you did with your family over the weekend. We never expected we would get marriage before we got non-discrimination,” said Andrew Schneider.”
Even without that legal protection, Sam Williams was able to get a settlement from his former employer. In 2011, Massey Energy was bought out by Alpha Natural Resources, and the new owners agreed to settle Sam’s case out of court. Alpha declined to comment on the case, but they did send an email saying the company “is committed to a workplace that is free of discrimination and where all employees, no matter their gender identity or sexual orientation, are treated fairly and with respect.”
Still, Sam Williams says he doesn’t think it would be safe to go back to mining. Now he works as a manager at a Dollar General.
“I do miss running good coal. I miss being top dogs on the coal crew- before everything started getting more violent. If there was a perfect world out there I’d love to be a coal miner again. But it’ll never happen again…more than likely. But it was fun.”
But it wasn’t fun once he had to look over his shoulder all the time, worried that somebody he worked with would follow through on their threats to kill him.
Even years later, Sam Williams still seems hurt that the people he thought were his close friends turned against him. In the song about him, the coal miner has a conversation with his co-workers. In the song, the miner tells them he’s still the true West Virginian he always was. That doesn’t change just because he’s gay.
To tell you the truth, I don’t want to fight
I just want to say one thing outright to you:
Ain’t we flesh and blood too?
And ain’t we brothers too?
Sam Gleaves is currently recording his debut album Aint We Brothers in Nashville, TN. The album is being produced by Cathy Fink and will be released this May.
Our story on Sam Gleaves and Sam Williams was reported by Roxy Todd, in collaboration with a new podcast WVPB is working on called Us & Them. Us & Them explores how Americans are divided along cultural fault lines. Listen for new episodes this spring.
The LGBT advocacy organization Fairness West Virginia held their annual conference in Charleston Saturday and this year, the group had plenty to celebrate.
Fairness Executive Director Andrew Schneider said Saturday that’s certainly something to celebrate, but the fight isn’t yet over. Now, the organization is looking on to its next legislative battles.
The results of the mid-term elections were something many LGBT advocates expressed dismay about, but Schneider said the idea that his organization can’t work with the new Republican leadership is a myth.
“We were more accustomed to working with Democrats, but we have always worked with Republicans,” Schneider said. “With that said, we need to do a lot more outreach to Republicans now that they’re in power.”
Schneider said he thinks it’s an easy sell. Republicans tend to be seen as business friendly, Schneider said, and bills that protect equality are attractive to businesses.
“This makes perfect economic sense,” Schneider said. “You build a society that is just and inclusive and businesses will won’t to relocate here because they can attract the best and brightest employees who want to live in a place that’s inclusive for everyone.”
Even so, Schneider recognizes his organization had trouble getting a bill passed to protect LGBT people both in housing and the workplace even when the Democrats controlled both houses at the state level.
This year, he said, he plans to work with cities to pass ordinances on the local level like Charleston, Huntington and Morgantown have.
“We’re going to build them from the ground up trying to get nondiscrimination ordinances passed in all corners of the state, in all communities and build the grassroots to the point where the state legislature can no longer ignore,” he said.
Those protections become even more necessary with marriage equality according to Schneider as homosexual couples begin to do the things heterosexual couples do, like bringing husbands or wives to company parties.
