On Wednesday, the Massachusetts House passed a bill that expands Massachusetts’ transgender residents to all public spaces, including bathrooms, locker rooms and dressing rooms that match their gender identity, the Boston Globe reports.
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The legislation, which passed by 116-36, protects transgender individuals from discrimination in shopping malls, libraries, gyms, restaurants and other public accommodations.
“You can’t tell people it’s OK to work at the diner, but not OK to sit at the lunch counter. We learned that a long time ago,” said Representative John V. Fernandes who helped write the bill.
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Representative Benjamin Swan shared he experienced discrimination as a Black man born in Mississippi in 1933 and stated, “some here will attempt today to smooth over some of the hurt and pain that has been inflicted on others by allowing this present practice of discrimination against [transgender people to persist].”
The House version of the bill is different than that of which was passed by the Senate, according to the Boston Globe, so the two must be reconciled.
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