The Speculum: 200 Years of Painful "Progress"
August 07, 2025
As we have now entered Pride Month, it is important to commemorate the LGBTQ+ community’s fight to get to where they are now and where equality needs to go in the future. As the Trump Administration rolls back previous Executive Orders protecting the LGBTQ+ community and continues to implement more policies that discriminate against the community, it is now more important than ever to have widespread knowledge of the Equal Rights Amendment.
The 28th amendment protects all individuals from being discriminated against based on sex. This codifies the rights of members of the LGBTQ+ community into the US Constitution. This amendment helps protect against the regressive Executive Orders that have been enacted in the recent months such as, Executive Order 14168: Defending Women From Gender Ideology Extremism and Restoring Biological Truth to the Federal Government order signed by President Trump on January 20th. Discrimination against transgender individuals and discrimination based on sexual orientation are both forms of sex discrimination that are illegal under the 28th amendment.
So why are these Executive Orders being enacted if there are already constitutional protections against them? While the ERA met all of the requirements to become law in 2020 when Virginia became the 38th state to ratify the amendment, it was not until right before President Biden left office that he declared it the “law of the land.” Constitutional scholars agree that this amendment had reached ratification under Section V. That is why these executive orders are being fought against in court cases to continue to protect LGBTQ+ rights and protect the Constitution.
This month we celebrate the strength of the LGBTQ+ community from the Stonewall Riots in the 1960s and Don’t ask, Don’t tell policies to the landmark decision in Obergefell v. Hodges in 2015 and Bostock v. Clayton County in 2020. Commemorating these moments and these great strengths also means looking toward the future and the future of LGBTQ+ rights in America. As this fight for equality continues the Equal Rights Amendment will play an important role in the fight. The amendment has passed its legal hurdles, and now it is time for us to utilize it to demand equality and to encourage its recognition among all Americans. The ERA doesn’t just demand equality for women; it protects all people that have been discriminated against for something regarding their sex or sexual orientation.
Therefore, as we continue through Pride month and grapple with commemorating the strength of the LGBTQ+ equality movement in the past and the enduring strength as the community moves forward toward equality it is important to remember that we now have an amendment in the US that provides this equality and we need to utilize it to move toward a society that does not tolerate these continued discriminations.
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