CEO Whose Career Was Destroyed By Fear Of Anti-Gay Bias Writes Gay Business Manifesto
Conservative opponents of the Employment Non Discrimination Act (ENDA) often claim that a bill protecting gays and lesbians in the workplace is unnecessary because there is no problem of discrimination against gays and lesbians in the business world.
They even go so far as to claim that gays and lesbians enjoy a privileged place in the economic system while ignoring evidence to the contrary. Enter in a new book written by a someone who became a victim of anti-gay bias in his company even though he was the Chief Executive Officer, and one of the most powerful and celebrated CEOs in the world at the time.
John Browne, Baron Browne of Madingley is best known for his reign over the energy giant British Petroleum or BP between 1995 and 2007. During his time as CEO he was lauded as the “Sun King†for bringing about a period of exceptional growth and advancement to the company. Like many other prominent men in our time he was brought down by a sex scandal. In 2007, Browne was forced to resign from his beloved company after a judge found that he had committed perjury while giving details about a liaison he had with a male escort.
While it was the act of lying to a judge and not his homosexuality itself that ultimately did him in, it is clear that what led up to this point was an extreme fear on Browne’s part that being openly gay could undermine his career. Throughout his time at BP, Browne had never dared disclose the truth that he was gay to any of his colleagues. Even as he resigned he tried to sweep the issue under the rug, saying in a statement,
“I have always regarded my sexuality as a personal matter, to be kept private.â€
Writing in Fortune today saying companies should “encourage a culture of openness,†Brown laments,
“Looking back now, I wish I had been brave enough to come out earlier.â€
It’s also important to note that the first major anti-discrimination protections for LGBTQ British subjects were not passed until 2003 as part of the Employment Equality Regulations in 2003, and were not extended to all areas of life until the passage of the Equality Act by the UK parliament in 2010.
Browne is once again in the news, but this time because he has written a new book entitled The Glass Closet: Why Coming Out Is Good Business. In his new manifesto he encourages the predominantly hetero-normative world of business to become more flexible and welcoming toward gays and lesbians. He discusses at length the negative effects being in the closet have both in terms of business productivity of workers as well as their personal relationships. Browne insinuates that had he not been confined to the closet for so much of his career, he may have been able to form more healthy relationships with other men earlier on instead of engaging with a male escort, which ultimately led to his resignation.
In a recent media blitz, he’s given several interviews and taken excerpts from his book explaining why he ultimately is happy to have been outed in 2007. In one except published by the Wall Street Journal he talks about the unexpected happiness that came as a result of his resignation. He also uses this as a way to encourage other gay men and lesbians in business to consider being more open about who they are.
Looking back, most of my fears about coming out were clearly unfounded. After I resigned, thousands of supportive letters poured in from around the world. I also underestimated both the capacity of my friends and colleagues to accept all of me and the extent to which people already knew, or suspected, that I was gay. Since then, I have remained active in the energy business, chaired the board of the Tate galleries, advised my fifth prime minister and built a wonderful relationship with another man. Had I known then what I know now, I would have come out sooner.
The lesson to be learned in Browne’s story is that even one of the biggest names in business could be brought down by homophobia that is still pervasive in much of the business world. Browne’s recent book and his advocacy for a more welcoming environment for gays and lesbians in the corporate sphere comes at what could be an increasingly crucial moment for ENDA in the United States congress. On the one hand, ENDA is receiving increasing support in the House of Representatives. However, ENDA has also lost a great deal of support…from LGBTQ organizations.
This week the number of Democrats in the House of Representatives who are no co-sponsoring ENDA dropped to just eight after Jim Costa of California signed on. And in a delightful turn of events, Republican Frank LoBiondo of New Jersey also pledged his support. Given the recent disaster with immigration reform and the recent defeat of one of it’s Republican supporters Eric Cantor, it’s good to hear that ENDA may still have a small chance of making it through the House this year.
Unfortunately, Conservative opponents who have been waging a national war against non-existent religious discrimination have planted a bomb in the act that threatens the support it has from the very Americans it will attempt to defend. ENDA contains a religious exemption clause that would hand  any religious organizations, even if they are non exclusively churches the ability to virtually ignore the bill’s statutes. But it is this religious exemption that has provided ENDA with the bipartisan support it is currently enjoying as it slowly but surely inches it’s way to the 218 votes needed for passage. This conflict was detailed in a report in Metro Weekly.
NCLR and the Transgender Law Center, which both lauded ENDA’s passage in the Senate last year, have since rescinded their support for the bill due to the religious exemption, according to The Washington Blade. But while they argue ENDA’s religious exemption as written is broader than it is under Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act for other minority groups and would open the door to LGBT discrimination in places far beyond churches and synagogues, narrowing ENDA’s religious exemption could also cause shaky Republican support to collapse entirely.
“For me, my job is I’m a mathematician trying to get to 218 votes,†out Rep. Mark Pocan (D-Wisc.) told Metro Weekly. “And if that’s the issue then we need to figure out how to get something done in this current environment. Either you change who is in those seats, which is something I’m working on for this fall, or we at least try to get something done as broad as possible, which can then be improved in the future when we have those opportunities. But certainly sitting back isn’t an option.â€
A similar crisis took place in 2007 over the issue of protections for the transgender community being included in the bill. Today we are left with a hard decision about whether it is best to pass a flawed bill now that we can attempt to fix later, or whether we should stick to our guns and pass a much stronger bill to begin with that cannot be undermined later. Whatever we do, Browne’s recent advocacy shows that the fear of anti-gay discrimination in the workplace is very real even for the most powerful and accomplished.
Thomas Alberts is a Seattle-based activist and writer. He holds a B.A. in English with a minor in Gender Studies from Weber State University. He currently serves on the volunteer board for Planned Parenthood Votes Northwest and interns as a blogger for NARAL Pro-Choice Washington. He also previously worked with Planned Parenthood Global in New York and Washington, D.C. as a Global Youth Advocacy Fellow, and has written for RH Reality Check. Thomas can also be found onTwitter, Facebook, and A Few Choice Words.
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New York Supreme Court Judge Juan Merchan heard arguments in court Tuesday morning without the jury present after prosecutors in District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s office accused Donald Trump of violating his gag order ten times, via posts on his Truth Social account.
Judge Merchan did not rule from the bench, but is expected to announce his ruling possibly as early as later Tuesday. Prosecutors asked for Trump to be held in contempt, and outlined four possible responses. Merchan refused one response but agreed three were possible.
Among them, Merchan might fine Trump and issue a stern warning that could threaten jail time if he violates the gag order in the future.
From the bench, Merchan had directed attorneys to create a timeline of events to show if Trump was reacting to what the ex-president’s attorneys called “attacks.”
“We’re gonna take one at a time, otherwise it’s going to get really confusing,” Judge Merchan said to Trump lead attorney Todd Blanche, as Lawfare managing editor Tyler McBrien reports. McBrien noted the judge “wants to get the timeline of these posts, reposts, and replies clear.”
RELATED: Fox News Host Suggests Trump ‘Force’ Court to Throw Him in Jail – by Quoting Him
Trump’s attorneys appeared to suggest if his posts are “political” they should not be subjected to the gag order, which bars Trump from making “public statements about known or reasonably foreseeable witnesses concerning their potential participation in the investigation or in this criminal proceeding.”
“Blanche says that the witnesses are making money, documentaries, TV interviews about Trump, all while Trump is gagged and threatened with jail if he responds,” McBrien also reported. “Merchan wants to get into what was actually said rather than interpret and ‘read between the lines.'”
Blanche earlier had insisted Trump was aware of what the gag order requires.
“‘Just to set the record very straight and clear: President Trump does know what the gag order’ allows him to do and not do,” MSNBC contributor Adam Klasfeld reported.
One of the larger issues discussed appears to be Fox News segments made by host Jesse Watters. One aired hours before then-juror number two asked to be excused, saying they no longer felt they could be impartial.
MSNBC’s Katie Phang posted this exchange between the judge and Trump’s lead attorney:
“Now, Merchan asks Blanche about what Jesse Watters, in fact, said.
Blanche: No.
Merchan: “So your client manipulated what was said and put it in quotes?
Blanche: I wouldn’t say it was a manipulation.
Merchan: This isn’t a repost at all. Your client had to type it out. Use the shift-key and all.”
It did not go well for Trump and his legal team.
At one point Judge Merchan told Blanche, “You’re losing all credibility.” McBrien reports when Merchan said that, “there was an audible gasp from the press.”
Former U.S. Acting Solicitor General Neal Katyal weighed in:
Very very ominous for a judge to say Trump’s lawyer has lost all credibility with the court. https://t.co/yAKk5HzFby
— Neal Katyal (@neal_katyal) April 23, 2024
“This isn’t quite like watching a full blown car accident, but it’s certainly like watching a fender bender,” McBrien also noted.
“This is going very badly for Trump already,” reported Courthouse News’ Erik Uebelacker. “Judge Merchan is losing his patience with Blanche, who can’t seem to prove that any of Trump’s attacks are ‘responses.'”
Attorney George Conway went further: “Blanche is flailing. This is painful to watch. Merchan is cutting him to shreds.”
Continuing, Conway wrote (not in quotation marks) Merchan said: “I’ve asked you several times to show me the post that the defendant was responding to. You haven’t done so once.”
He called the judge’s remark “BRUTAL.”
READ MORE: ‘Rally Behind MAGA’: Trump Advocates Courthouse ‘Protests’ Nationwide
“Basically, Blanche is pretty much arguing there’s a ‘running for president’ exception to the gag order that has been specifically directed at the man running for defendant,” Conway adds. “Merchan now getting pissed at Blanche’s unresponsiveness and evasiveness.”
Klasfeld also characterized the exchanges as “brutal.”
“Merchan says he’s going to ‘reserve decision on this,’ after brutal arguments for the defense.”
Trump has been criminally indicted in four separate cases and is facing a total of 88 felony charges, including 34 in this New York criminal trial for alleged falsification of business records to hide payments of hush money to an adult film actress and one other woman, in an alleged effort to suppress their stories and protect his 2016 presidential campaign, which could be deemed election interference.
Image via Shutterstock
Republican U.S. Senate candidate Kari Lake is promoting a conspiracy theory suggesting Hillary Clinton wants to assassinate her. Her remarks came just one day before she lost her attempt to have the Supreme Court review what some have called her conspiracy-theory fueled lawsuit about electronic voting machines.
“Lake, who filed the lawsuit during her failed campaign for governor in 2022, challenged whether the state’s electronic voting machines assured ‘a fair and accurate vote.’ Two lower courts dismissed the suit, finding that Lake and former Republican state lawmaker Mark Finchem had not been harmed in a way that allowed them to sue,” CNN reported Monday.
Also on Monday Law&Crime reported that when she filed her lawsuit, a Dominion Voting Systems spokesperson “rejected Lake’s cybersecurity claim, telling Law&Crime it was ‘implausible and conspiratorial.'”
Democracy Docket, founded by top Democratic elections attorney Marc Elias, called it “the end of the road for a conspiratorial lawsuit,” and Lake and Fincham, “election deniers.”
READ MORE: ‘Old and Tired and Mad’: Trump’s Demeanor in Court Detailed by Rachel Maddow
Lake, a far-right conspiracy theorist who has yet to concede the 2022 election, which she lost to Democrat Katie Hobbs, has a history of pushing exaggerated and baseless claims.
On Sunday, as MeidasTouch Network reported, Lake promoted an old, anti-Clinton conspiracy theory but twisted it to try to make it appear she was in danger from former U.S. Secretary of State and former Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton.
Lake on Newsmax listened to a clip of Secretary Clinton calling Trump’s fondness for Russian President Vladimir Putin a “bromance,” and saying the ex-president is “just gaga over Putin, because Putin does what he would like to do: kill his opposition, imprison his opposition, drive, you know, journalists and others into exile, rule without any check or balance.”
Then Lake promoted a thoroughly debunked conspiracy theory by responding, “Oh, boy. Oh, that’s really rich coming from a woman like Hillary Clinton, who’s, how many of her friends have just like, mysteriously died or committed suicide?”
“I mean, honestly, that’s rich of her. What President Trump wants is to root out the corruption and deliver our government back to We The People and she looks very nervous. She talked about her friend Mark Elias, Mark Elias has meddled in in his and his cohorts have meddled in the elections.”
She called Democratic policies, “destructive, deadly and frankly, in some ways, diabolical,”and added, “it’s almost comical that Hillary Clinton is talking about Trump wanting to kill his opponents.”
READ MORE: ‘Election Interference’ and ‘Corruption’: Experts Explain Trump Prosecution Opening Argument
“I just want to say as I’m as I’m speaking about this topic, I want everyone out there to know that my brakes on my car have recently been checked and they work. I’m not suicidal. And Hillary, I don’t mean any harm to you. Please don’t send your henchmen out to me. We understand what you’re about. ”
Watch below or at this link.
.@HillaryClinton is talking about Trump wanting to kill his opponents.
We call that projection.
While on the subject of Hillary, I want everyone out there to know that the brakes on my car work just fine. I’m not suicidal.
I’m very happy to be alive & working to save Arizona… pic.twitter.com/Mhj84g5bVu
— Kari Lake (@KariLake) April 22, 2024
READ MORE: ‘Rally Behind MAGA’: Trump Advocates Courthouse ‘Protests’ Nationwide
MSNBC top host Rachel Maddow, inside Manhattan’s Criminal Courthouse on Monday declared Donald Trump appeared “old and tired and mad,” as she delivered observations about the ex-president on trial for 34 counts of falsification of business records alleged in the alleged pursuit of election interference to protect his 2016 presidential run.
Trump “seems considerably older, and he seems annoyed. Resigned, maybe, angry. he seems like a man who’s miserable to be here,” the award-winning journalist told MSNBC viewers Monday afternoon.
“I’m no body language expert,” she conceded, “and this is just my observation. He seemed old and tired and mad.”
The New York Times’ Susanne Craig, from inside the courthouse Monday morning reported: “Trump is struggling to stay awake. His eyes were closed for a short period. He was jolted awake when Todd Blanche, his lawyer, nudged him while sliding a note in front of him.”
The Biden campaign was only too happy to pick up and report Craig’s observation, adding “feeble.”
A feeble and tired Donald Trump once again falls asleep in court pic.twitter.com/ShcnxYI8jH
— Biden-Harris HQ (@BidenHQ) April 22, 2024
Former Obama senior advisor David Axelrod, pointing to his piece at The Atlantic, wrote of Trump: “He has charmed & conned, schemed & marauded his way through life. He was bred that way. But the weariness & vulnerability captured in courtroom images betray a growing sense in Trump that he could wind up as the thing his old man most reviled:
A loser.”
Watch Maddow’s remarks below or at this link.
Maddow: Trump seems old and tired and mad pic.twitter.com/kQuHrBo4v1
— Acyn (@Acyn) April 22, 2024
READ MORE: ‘Election Interference’ and ‘Corruption’: Experts Explain Trump Prosecution Opening Argument
‘Election Interference’ and ‘Corruption’: Experts Explain Trump Prosecution Opening Argument
‘Old and Tired and Mad’: Trump’s Demeanor in Court Detailed by Rachel Maddow
‘I’m Not Suicidal’: Kari Lake Pushes Hillary Clinton Murder Conspiracy Theory
‘Cutting Him to Shreds’: ‘Pissed’ Judge Tells Trump’s Attorney ‘You’re Losing All Credibility’
‘Cutting Him to Shreds’: ‘Pissed’ Judge Tells Trump’s Attorney ‘You’re Losing All Credibility’
‘I’m Not Suicidal’: Kari Lake Pushes Hillary Clinton Murder Conspiracy Theory
‘Old and Tired and Mad’: Trump’s Demeanor in Court Detailed by Rachel Maddow
‘Election Interference’ and ‘Corruption’: Experts Explain Trump Prosecution Opening Argument
‘Rally Behind MAGA’: Trump Advocates Courthouse ‘Protests’ Nationwide
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News20 hours ago‘Old and Tired and Mad’: Trump’s Demeanor in Court Detailed by Rachel Maddow
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