Everyone is up in arms about the recent defeat of a pro-LGBT law in Houston called the Houston Equal Rights Ordinance or HERO for short. The issue, known as Proposition 1, was intended to ban discrimination based upon sexual orientation and gender identity by city and private employers, as well as in public accommodations. The ordinance would have also made prohibitions against discrimination based on sex, race, color, ethnicity, national origin, age, familial status, marital status, military status, religion, disability, genetic information and pregnancy explicit in the city’s code. Easy to support, right? Not so fast.
While LGBT advocates nationwide are pointing fingers at those who they perceive to be involved with the defeat of the legislation, and looking to build bridges with allies to pass similar legislation in the future, they seem to be holding everyone accountable except LGBT people themselves.
257,309 people voted on the HERO proposition; dismal turnout. The Houston adult population is roughly 1.6 million adults. Let’s assume that the LGBT population is 10 percent because the LGBT population density in Texas is 3.3 percent for the entire state and most LGBT people are located in the population centers of Houston, Austin, San Antonio and Dallas. That means there are 160,000 LGBT adults in Houston; why did they not turn out? Houston is a city which elected Annise Parker the openly lesbian mayor – three times! There is simply no excuse why LGBT voters didn’t turn out.
Only 100,000 people voted to support the HERO proposition. Even if you assume a 5 percent Houston adult LGBT population that would be 80,000 LGBT people. Yet the HERO proposition only got 100,000 votes. The national average for voters who self-identify as LGBT when asked is 5 percent, which means only about 13,000 LGBT people voted for HERO; the rest stayed home. LGBT voters in Houston did not care enough about their own civil rights to vote. Sound familiar? It should. That is exactly what happened in California with Proposition 8 in 2008.
I really don’t understand why our community does not turnout in droves when our rights are put on the ballot. Why isn’t the LGBT turnout 95 percent or 98 percent in these situations? How many times does a defeat like HERO and Prop. 8 have to happen before those in our community get that voting matters?
As we look to 2016 and the presidential election, it is this type of voter apathy that could deliver the Democratic nominee a defeat and put all of the gains the LGBT community has garnered over the last seven years at risk.
Unfortunately, if we lose our rights due to LGBT voter apathy we will be getting our just desserts. I pray that doesn’t happen in the 2016 presidential election, but to be honest, I am afraid.
STAMPP CORBIN
PUBLISHER
San Diego LGBT Weekly
