Free Republic

In an inevitable development, a former employee who identifies as neither male nor female is suing a catering company because co-workers continually referred to the individual as a female. According to the lawsuit, a person named Valeria Jones explained that Jones “was not a female or a male and that the term was unwelcome,” The Oregonian reported. Instead, Jones asked to be addressed by an unknown gender-neutral pronoun. In spite of the request, co-workers used terms such as “miss,” “lady” and “little lady” when referring to Jones, insisting Jones looked like a woman. The article did not specify Jones’ designated...

Last week, in a Fairfax, Virginia courtroom, a jury announced it had determined a homeowner's Yelp "review" of a local general contractor was in fact old-fashioned slander. It started in 2011, when Jane Perez posted a review that alleged contractor Dietz Development LLC had not only performed shoddy and destructive work on her home without a license, but also that a member of Christopher Dietz's crew had stolen her jewelry. So Dietz sued for defamation, to the tune of $750,000 in damages, which he may have been awarded had he not responded on the social network with what the jury...

The gay marriage fight arrived in a Southern courtroom Tuesday, as opponents of a Virginia law banning same-sex unions told a federal judge it was just like the Jim Crow-era prohibition against interracial marriage. Supporters maintained there was no fundamental right to gay marriage and the ban exists as part of the state’s interest in responsible procreation. “We have marriage laws in society because we have children, not because we have adults,” said attorney David Nimocks, of the religious group Alliance Defending Freedom. The case is being closely watched because it could give the gay marriage movement its first foothold...

This is well outside California, but it may well have ramifications in the Golden State: A lawsuit threatened by a pair of bird conservation groups has halted a wind power development the federal government had planned along the Lake Erie shore in Ohio. **SNIP** "We are absolutely elated that the Air National Guard has halted this project, at least temporarily and possibly for good," said BSBO Executive Director Kimberly Kaufman, adding that BSBO would continue to gather petition signatures despite the ANG's decision. "We want to document the full extent of the opposition to this -- and similar projects in...

An opera diva claims her career might be over — because she can’t belt out big notes without passing gas. Singer Amy Herbst is suing an Army hospital over allegedly botching a procedure that’s forced her off stage with chronic incontinence and flatulence. The opera performer and her hubby, US Army Staff Sgt. James Herbst, are plaintiffs in the federal complaint against Fort Campbell’s Blachfiled Army Community Hospital in Kentucky.

Businessman Percy Nilsson, 71, was perhaps best known for his ownership of his local Malmö Redhawks ice hockey team, but has lately been making headlines after a power-drill attack on an ice cream truck. On Friday, he was ordered to pay a fine of 100,000 kronor ($15,500) by the Malmö District Court. He was also sentenced to pay for the loss of income that the ice-cream truck owner faced after the vandalism. "It was a really tough sentencing and it's sad that it ended this way," Nilsson told the TT news agency. He lamented that he had already paid for...

Gay activists with the group Equality Florida announced Tuesday they are filing a federal lawsuit to attempt to overturn Florida's Marriage Protection Amendment. In 2008, 62 percent of Floridians voted to pass the historical amendment supported by the Florida Family Policy Council (FFPC). "Gay activists cannot win in the marketplace of ideas, so they have resorted to trying to find renegade courts who have little respect for the rule of law to create social change that would never happen through the people or their elected representatives," John Stemberger, FFPC president and general counsel, said in a statement. "Today's lawsuit is...

Parents, don’t let your girls grow up to be cheerleaders. That’s just one lesson to be gleaned from a lawsuit filed by a cheerleader for the Oakland Raiders, a National Football League team, which alleges sub-minimum wage pay and other labor abuses. While professional cheerleading may seem glamorous, the cheerleaders allegedly earn barely enough to afford their own pom-poms. And, by the way, if they forget their pom-poms, the cheerleaders are reportedly socked with a fine. [Snip] The Chargers stress that the role is a part-time job and that cheerleaders “should at least hold a part-time job or attend college...

The Supreme Court has ruled a group of Catholic nuns will not have to comply with the contraception mandate in ObamaCare while their lawsuit plays out in court, if they declare their objections in writing. .... [SNIP]

The Supreme Court will decide whether or not it should be a crime for someone to purchase a gun for another person if both are legally allowed to possess a firearm.

With their season long over with, one would think that the Raiders could be spared from bad news this offseason. Alas, it's still the Raiders. Current and former Raiderettes – yes, the team's cheerleaders – filed a lawsuit on Wednesday claiming that the team engaged in “wage theft and other unfair employment practices,” according to The Mercury News. The suit, filed in Alameda County Superior Court, alleges that the Raiders withheld the cheerleaders' pay until after the season, didn't fairly compensate the women for all their hours of work and asked that the cheerleaders pay for many of their...

The owners of a Christian bakery who refused to make a wedding cake for a lesbian couple are facing hundreds of thousands of dollars in fines after they were found guilty of violating the couple’s civil rights. The Oregon Bureau of Labor and Industries said they found “substantial evidence” that Sweet Cakes by Melissa discriminated against the lesbian couple and violated the Oregon Equality Act of 2007, a law that protects the rights of the LGBT community. Last year, the bakery’s owners refused to make a wedding cake for Rachel Cryer and Laurel Bowman, of Portland, citing their Christian beliefs....

A federal appeals court ruled Tuesday that potential jurors may not be removed from a trial during jury selection solely because of sexual orientation, extending to gays and lesbians a civil right that the U.S. Supreme Court has previously promised only women and racial minorities. A unanimous three-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals held that striking someone from a jury pool because he or she is gay constitutes unlawful discrimination. Its 39-page decision came in an antitrust and contract dispute between two rival drug companies over the price of a popular AIDS drug.

As if you needed another reason not to wear your dumb Google Glass in public—or ever, actually—an Ohio man claims he was yanked out of a movie theater and interrogated by federal agents, who believed he was illegally filming the movie with his face computer. The man’s full account is posted on The Gadgeteer, but we’ll summarize it here so you can get the gist of it before you’re engulfed forever in this ghastly winter storm. Last Saturday, our Glass-wearing protagonist and his wife went to a showing of Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit at an AMC in Columbus, Ohio. About...

Today the Supreme Court will hear oral arguments in Navarette v California, a case in which a wrong decision will effectively repeal the 4th Amendment rights of the American people. The text of the 4th Amendment reads: The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized. In 1968, the Supreme Court ruled that “…law enforcement...

Six South Florida couples who want to get married, but can't because they're gay, said Tuesday they're filing a lawsuit against the state seeking to overturn the Sunshine State's ban on same-sex marriage. Ten of the 12 plaintiffs, along with the gay rights group Equality Florida and the National Center for Lesbian Rights, announced the filing of their case at a news conference at the Lesbian and Gay Victor Center in Miami Beach.

Why is the EPA altering state boundaries in Wyoming - and reversing over 100 years of established law? Well, apparently the city of Riverton now falls under the jurisdiction of the Wind River Indian Reservation. Wyoming Governor Matt Mead warned of the dangers to all Americans of this type of unilateral land redistribution by the EPA: ...My deep concern is about an administrative agency of the federal government altering a state's boundary and going against over 100 years of history and law. "This should be a concern to all citizens because, if the EPA can unilaterally take land away from...

The story of Davis' unusual lawsuit was recounted by the San Antonio Express News Monday. The blog Sara for America has highlights: Davis said in her lawsuit that the newspaper ran “a series of contrived and false news stories and editorials…with malicious intent.” The lawsuit said “defamatory and libelous” remarks were made to inflict emotional distress and to deny her rights to free speech, assembly and association. It said that “Davis has suffered and is continuing to suffer damages to her mental health, her physical health, her right to pursue public offices in the past and in the future, and...

RICHMOND, Va. (AP) — Almost overnight, Virginia has emerged as a critical state in the nationwide fight to grant gay men and women the right to wed. Related Stories Okla. gay marriage ban struck down; ruling on hold Associated Press Judge rules Oklahoma gay marriage ban unconstitutional AFP US judge strikes down Oklahoma gay marriage ban as ‘arbitrary, irrational' Christian Science Monitor Utah appeals gay marriage ruling to top US court AFP The Supreme Court Puts Utah's Gay Marriages on Pause The Atlantic Wire This purple state was once perceived as unfriendly and even bordering on hostile to gay rights....

BOSTON – A federal appeals court on Friday upheld a judge's ruling granting a taxpayer-funded sex change operation for a transgender inmate serving a life sentence for a murder conviction, saying receiving medically necessary treatment is a constitutional right that must be protected "even if that treatment strikes some as odd or unorthodox." U.S. District Judge Mark Wolf ruled in 2012 that the state Department of Correction must provide sex reassignment surgery for Michelle Kosilek, who was born as Robert Kosilek and is serving a life sentence for the killing of his wife in 1990.