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As the rightist philosopher Richard Weaver famously said, “ideas have consequences.” And I can tell you from personal experience some of the consequences of at least one idea, that of “natural law.”

Why did the 2007 Values Voter Summit talk about immigration as much as abortion and same-sex marriage?

Is religion good for you, full stop? Many Americans think so—and perhaps that’s unsurprising in a country where most people struggle to survive, while a wide variety of gurus, hucksters, and…

In the midst of tense debates around race, gender, and partisan politics, the 2021 Southern Baptist Convention made waves by narrowly electing Ed Litton, a white Alabama pastor known for his…

“Race” as an idea barely existed before the Enlightenment and the onset of modernity in the West. Today, many dismiss the race-concept as an illusion, arguing that “there is no such thing as race;” or in more universalist terms, “there is only one race: the human race.” Yet race continues to demarcate and stratify all the world’s peoples in striking ways.

After the demoralizing passage of Proposition 8 overturned same sex marriage in California in 2008 , those with a national platform laid this defeat for LGBTQ rights at the feet of racial minority communities. Much of this chatter went uncontested, as major news outlets asked mainstream LGBTQ groups (typically featuring White male spokespersons) as well as right-wing voices(often conservative religious voices of color) to analyze African-American and Latino communities’ perspectives on LGBTQ rights, cementing ideas of intolerance.

The outrageous killings of James Byrd, Jr. and Matthew Shepard shine a light on the power of hatred fueled by racism, sexism, homophobia, and other forms of intolerance that are used to separate and divide us as human beings. Proponents of hate crime legislation and enhanced penalties for hate crimes want to make sure that killings and acts of violence like these provide an opportunity not only to hold accountable those responsible, but to expose and eradicate all violence based on bias, bigotry and prejudice.

At the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights and Economic Justice, our mission is to eliminate race and national-origin discrimination through litigation, and community and legislative advocacy. Despite our narrowly focused mission we are always working collaboratively with community partners to advance an agenda that supports and affirms expansive hate crimes legislation.

On a visit to Zambia in February 2012, the United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon called on African countries to stop treating LGBT people as less than human or as second class citizens. He explicitly asked Zambian lawmakers to stop discriminating against people on the basis of sexual orientation.