03-26-12 Common Council Meeting Minutes

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REGULAR MEETING MARCH 26, 2012 Abbee Smith, 108 N. Main, residing at 2925 S. Creek Road, Niles, Michigan, President of Intrigue Counseling. She stated that she was born and raised here. She stated that her grandfather immigrated to this country to flee the harsh regime in Russia and the discrimination against his Jewish heritage. She stated that her family went on for four generations raising their families here. She stated that since then her family has moved to various parts of the country. She stated that she is committed to staying here and sustaining her business. She believes in strategy and hard work, she stated at the end of the day it doesn’t matter who loves who. She stated that Council’s time should be better spent on issues such as parking, empty store fronts and crime instead of having to address this issue of adding gender identity and sexual orientation to the South Bend Municipal Code’s Human Rights Ordinance. She encouraged the Council to support this bill. Catherine Pittman, 2628 Summit Ridge Drive, South Bend, Indiana, Licensed Psychologist, stated that she is concerned that opponents to this bill think that members of the GLBT Community should seek treatment to change their orientation. She stated that opponents against this bill have no intent to accept gay individuals as they are or accept them into this community. She stated that they also suggest conversion therapy to change their sexual orientation is counter to best practices in psychological treatment. Ms. Pittman stated that she has provided packets of information that the Council has received that state they are against these kinds of treatments. These organizations oppose these types of therapy because it is clear that sexual orientation is not a choice and that attempts to modify sexual orientation can have harmful effects. She stated that sexual orientation is one’s attraction to an individual of a particular sex. She stated that homosexuality, heterosexuality and bisexuality are normal variants of human sexuality. She stated that they are the normal variants in many animal species. She stated that some individuals do attempt to change their orientation there is no consistent evidence that such attempts are successful. In fact, therapeutic interventions may result in significant distress and increase depression in the individual in some studies. She stated this is not that some can change their behavior as they know people can suppress a variety of behaviors including sexual one or act in a specific way even when they have feelings to the contrary. You can force a left handed person to write with their right hand that is not disputed, but it doesn’t make the person right handed. There is no proven way to change a person’s orientation. Sexual orientation for both straight and gay individuals is not a conscious choice or something that can be safely modified. She noted that the inclusion of bi-sexual individuals in studies and case reports does tend to result in findings that confuse the issue. By definition bi-sexual individuals are those who feel attraction toward members of either gender, so it’s much more likely that an individual who is bi- sexual would be successful in changing his or her behavior to eliminate behaviors based on same sex attraction, but such a change in behavior doesn’t mean that the person’s sexual orientation has changed. The person remains bi-sexual even when he or he is not acting on feelings of attraction. Opponents of this legislation appear before the Council and argue that you should continue to allow individuals to be discriminated against. Instead they want these people to seek treatment to change their orientation in order to change themselves, to satisfy the expectations that others have of them. She asked the Council to consider the views of the professionals who have studied human behavior and who are committed to providing care for those in need. They do not support reparative therapy and they instead argue that they recognize gay and bi-sexual individuals as individuals entitled to respect, compassion, justice, and equal treatment. She stated that she believes Bill 09-12 would be a step in that direction and asked the Council to support it. Raul Jara, 1306 Chester, South Bend, Indiana, a researcher at the University of Notre Dame Latino Studies, and also served as a Census Representative for the inter-university program for Latino research which is a consortium of centers and institutes at 25 research universities across the country. He stated that most people opposed to this bill have represented themselves as members of the loving opposition. He stated that most don’t appreciate their perspective of approaching this with the word love, he however does. He stated that love is something that they should be ever mindful of. He stated that there is hate out there not loving opposition, but hate. It has appeared in these vary Council Chambers. He stated that in the July 10, 2006 meeting minutes the first meeting where a similar bill was presented. He quoted “that he owns two houses in South Bend and what 11