Sexuality and the Law Commons^™

Pornography As Trafficking, Catharine A. Mackinnon

Michigan Journal of International Law

In material reality, pornography is one way women and children are trafficked for sex. To make visual pornography, the bulk of the industry's products, real women and children, and some men, are rented out for use in commercial sex acts. In the resulting materials, these people are then conveyed and sold for a buyer's sexual use. Obscenity laws, the traditional legal approach to the problem, do not care about these realities at all. The morality of what is said and shown remains their focus and concern. The injuries inflicted on real people to make the materials, or because they are …

Note: Minnesota’S Proposed Same-Sex Marriage Amendment: A Flamingly Unconstitutional Violation Of Full Faith And Credit, Due Process, And Equal Protection, Jolynn M. Schlichting

William Mitchell Law Review

This note examines the constitutionality of Minnesota’s proposed marriage amendment. The note begins with a description of the recent national events leading up to the amendment’s proposal, followed by a discussion of the history of marriage in Minnesota, including passage of the Defense of Marriage Act in May 1997. Next, the note examines the language of Minnesota’s proposed marriage amendment and briefly addresses the process of amending state constitutional provisions. It then analyzes the proposed amendment’s constitutionality under the Full Faith and Credit Clause, the Due Process Clause, and the Equal Protection Clause of the United States Constitution. Finally, the …

Outside The Law: Intersex, Medicine And The Discourse Of Rights, Jo Bird

Cardozo Journal of Equal Rights & Social Justice

The article argues that the legal system perpetuates the erasure of intersex individuals by constructing intersex as a medical rather than a legal issue, leading to human rights violations. It contends that the law requires individuals to fit into a binary sex classification to be recognized as fully human, thereby denying intersex people legal visibility and protection. The article advocates for the recognition of intersex as a legal category to address the systemic discrimination and violence intersex individuals face, particularly in medical practices.

Cutting It: Surgical Interventions And The Sexing Of Children, Marie Fox, Michael Thomson

Cardozo Journal of Equal Rights & Social Justice

The article critiques the normalization of non-consensual surgical interventions on children, particularly focusing on male circumcision and intersex surgeries, arguing that these practices are rooted in cultural and gender norms rather than medical necessity. It challenges the legal and ethical frameworks that allow such surgeries, emphasizing the need for informed consent and stricter regulations.

Out Of The O.R. And Into The Streets: Exploring The Impact Of Intersex Media Activism, Sharon E. Preves

Cardozo Journal of Equal Rights & Social Justice

Babies are born intersexed, with ambiguous genitalia or other reproductive anatomical features, every day. Physical sexual ambiguity occurs frequently, affecting approximately one in 2000 births. Most infants born intersexed are surgically and hormonally altered to reflect the sexual anatomy associated with "standard" female or male sex assignment. This article explores the mobilization and methods of intersex individuals and their allies to destigmatize intersexuality and to alter the medical treatment they receive. I explore the intersex movement's use of mass media as a strategic activist tool and the implications of this mobilization for cultural and medical reform, arguing that media attention …

The Impact Of International Human Rights Developments On Sexual Minority Rights, Arthur S. Leonard

Articles & Chapters

The Supreme Court's decision in Lawrence v. Texas (2003) marked the first time that tribunal took notice of how foreign and international courts were dealing with the civil rights claims of lesbians and gay men as part of its discussion of American constitutional law. If this evinces a new openness by the Court to looking at such external sources in gay rights cases, what would it find on the major legal issues now facing the LGBT community in the United States? This article summarizes developments abroad on legal recognition of same-sex partners (including for purposes of immigration status) and military …

Same Sex Marriage And Its Implications For Employee Benefits: Proceedings Of The 2005 Meeting Of The Association Of American Law Schools Sections On Employee Benefits, And Sexual Orientation And Gender Identity Issues, Maria O'Brien, Constance Hiatt, Shannon Minter, Teresa S. Collett

Faculty Scholarship

Professor Maria O'Brien Hylton*: Welcome to this session on "Same Sex Marriage and its Implications for Employee Benefits." I'm Maria Hylton and I will introduce our speakers and moderate the program.

Our first speaker is Constance Hiatt, who is a partner with the Hanson Bridgett law firm here in San Francisco. She represents mostly large employers and large employee benefit plans, including the State of California's 401(k) and 457 plans as well as the University of California's benefits office. So, she has extensive experience in the employee benefits area and she came to us, to me really, through several …

Paradoxes Of Health And Equality: When A Boy Becomes A Girl, Noa Ben-Asher

ExpressO

This paper is about an unusual child custody dispute between the parents of a six-year-old child and the child welfare services of Franklin County, Ohio. The conflict emerged when the child’s parents complied with their male child’s professed desire to be treated as a girl by attempting to enroll the child in the first grade as a girl. The paper treats this case as an exemplary test-case of contemporary co-dependence between scientific-medical discourse and liberal-rights discourse. The paper analyzes the positions of the two sides of the custody dispute according to the classic modern distinction between mind and body. On …

International Child Abductions: The Challenges Facing America , Charles F. Hall

ExpressO

International child abductors often escape domestic law enforcement and disappear without consequence or resolution. International child abductions occur too frequently; in the United States alone, the number of children abducted abroad every year has risen to over 1,000. Currently, 11,000 American children live abroad with their abductors. These abductions occur despite international treaties and the Congressional resolutions that have significantly stiffened the penalties for those caught. Effectively combating international child abductions requires drafting resolutions that are acceptable across the diverse societies and cultures of the international community. Without such resolutions to fill the gaps of current treaties this problem will …

Inscribing Lesbian And Gay Identities: How Judicial Imaginations Intertwine With The Best Interests Of Children, Christopher Carnahan

Cardozo Journal of Equal Rights & Social Justice

The article examines the legal challenges faced by same-sex parents in adoption and child custody cases, highlighting the evolving definition of family and the impact of court rulings on children's best interests. It critiques the use of formal definitions of family and advocates for a functional approach that prioritizes children's welfare, emphasizing the need for legal recognition of diverse family structures.

Homophobia And The “Matthew Shepard Effect” In Lawrence V. Texas, Kris Franklin

NYLS Law Review

No abstract provided.

Civil Partnership In The U.K. – Some International Problems, Barry Crown

NYLS Law Review

No abstract provided.

Paradoxes Of Health And Equality: When A Boy Becomes A Girl, Noa Ben-Asher

Faculty Publications

(Excerpt)

In the fall of 2000, six-year-old male Zachary from a small town in Ohio, claimed that s/he was a girl and requested, from now on, to be called Aurora. When the child's parents honored this unusual wish and made efforts to make official the child's feminine identity, the case turned into a custody battle between the parents and the state of Ohio. Although the child was occasionally treated as a girl at home from the age of two, the attempt to register the child in public school as a girl motivated the state dissolution of this family. At the …

'I Do' Kiss And Tell: The Subversive Potential Of Non-Normative Sexual Expression From Within Cultural Paradigms, Elaine Craig

Articles, Book Chapters, & Popular Press

Using a comparative analysis of the equality movements of sexual minorities in Canada and India the author identifies a symbiosis between the subversive benefits of a deconstructionist approach to equality and the practical achievements to be gained by a rights-based model of social justice. The analysis is conducted through an examination of the role that the expression of same-sex desire plays in the legal and social positions of sexual minorities in Canada and India. The author argues that the acquisition of rights can provide sexual minorities with greater access to dominant cultural rituals and that such access provides opportunities to …

Lawrence And Same-Sex Marriage Bans: On Constitutional Interpretation And Sophistical Rhetoric, Mark Strasser

ExpressO

No abstract provided.

Finding Fundamental Fairness: Protecting The Rights Of Homosexuals Under European Union Accession Law, Travis J. Langenkamp

San Diego International Law Journal

In tackling the issue of sexual orientation discrimination, the European Union must make significant efforts to conform or, perhaps, eradicate incongruous legislation within Applicant Countries. The difficulty of this endeavor is two-fold: first, in terms of the number and complexity of the laws of each Applicant Country; and, second, in the absence of any detailed and systematic documentation of sexual orientation discrimination within those same Applicant Countries. Compounding, if not confounding, such legitimate endeavors are the inconsistent anti-gay legislation prevalent within the present Member States. The stakes are high for Member States and Applicant Countries alike. Thus, the European Union's …

The New European Union Directive On Sexual Harassment And Its Implications For Greece, Mary Ellen Tsekos

Human Rights Brief

No abstract provided.

Burdened By Proof: How The Australian Refugee Review Tribunal Has Failed Lesbian And Gay Asylum Seekers, Catherine Dauvergne, Jenni Millbank

All Faculty Publications

Our argument in this paper is that the evidentiary practices and procedures that have been developed by the Australian Refugee Review Tribunal are operating at a routinely low standard. Such practices contribute to decisions that are manifestly unfair and potentially wrong in law. Our conclusions are drawn from our detailed study of more than 300 refugee tribunal decisions made in Canada and Australia in response to asylum claims brought by lesbians and gay men.

Protecting Transgender Families: Strategies For Advocates, Taylor Flynn

Faculty Scholarship

For a transgender (trans) man or woman, what begins as the dissolution of a relationship may be transformed into a public nightmare in which the individual is forced to defend the authenticity of his or her gender in the face of relentless, brutal, and humiliating questions about the most intimate details of personal anatomy and sexual practices. This Article discusses this reality in the case of Michael Kantaras, a transsexual man in Clearwater, Florida in 2002.

Cloning And Reproductive Liberty, Francis J. Beckwith

Nevada Law Journal

No abstract provided.

Reply To Martha Nussbaum And Ian Hacking, Edward D. Stein

Articles

The essays by Martha Nussbaum and Ian Hacking both raise important issues about the some of the central themes of The Mismeasure of Desire and it is a pleasure and an honor to have such careful, significant and interdisciplinary thinkers engage my ideas. In this brief reply, I address some of their challenges.

Virginity Testing In Turkey: A Violation Of Women’S Human Rights, Chanté Lasco

Human Rights Brief

No abstract provided.

The Optional Protocols To The Un Convention On The Rights Of The Child On Sex Trafficking And Child Soldiers, Cris R. Revaz

Human Rights Brief

No abstract provided.

Little Sisters Book And Art Emporium V. Minister Of Justice: Sex Equality And The Attack On R. V. Butler, Janine Benedet

All Faculty Publications

Scholars and philosophers spend much of their time discussing what pornography means and whether it can be defined. This debate persists despite the fact that most men, regardless of their sexual orientation, seem to understand quite well what pornography is, and what it is for: they produce it commercially, buy it in magazines, rent it in videos, and search for it on the Internet. The pornography industry has the distinct advantage of selling a product that, in legal terms, is considered "expression," and therefore a product that has been declared worthy of constitutional protection under section 2(b) of the Canadian …

Intrastate Ethnic Conflicts And International Law: How The Rise Of Intrastate Ethnic Conflicts Has Rendered International Human Rights Laws Ineffective, Especially Regarding Sex-Based Crimes , Karina Michael Waller

American University Journal of Gender, Social Policy & the Law

No abstract provided.

Afterword – Straightness As Property: Back To The Future-Law And Status In The 21st Century, Symposium: Liberalism And Property Rights, Berta E. Hernández-Truyol, Shelbi D. Day

UF Law Faculty Publications

As is evident from the other works in this Symposium, throughout history in both the United States and the greater Western World, status-based exclusion of individuals and groups from property rights has been central to the existence of political and social hierarchies. Specifically, exclusion based on status — whether it be nationality, culture, race, sex or sexuality — has plagued our history and has been integral in the formation and development of both constitutional and property law regimes. Consequently, both regimes are at best uneven in the grant and distribution of rights and benefits.

A forward-looking examination of the link …

Lessons From The Past And Strategies For The Future: Using Domestic, International And Comparative Law To Overturn Sodomy Laws, Charlene Smith, James Wilets

Seattle University Law Review

This Article will first discuss the legal importance of challenging sodomy laws, even though those laws are rarely enforced. It will then discuss the importance of incorporating international and comparative law in formulating these challenges. In Section II, Professor Charlene Smith will discuss past and future strategies, focusing on the topics of equal protection, morality, and the difference (or lack thereof) between acts and status. In Section III, Professor Jim Wilets will explore incorporating international and comparative law into domestic challenges to U.S. sodomy laws. This Article will demonstrate that there is binding Supreme Court authority requiring all U.S. courts …

Uprooting The Arguments Against Same-Sex Marriage, John G. Culhane

Cardozo Law Review

No abstract provided.

Violence Against Women In South Africa: The Role Of Culture And The Limitations Of The Law, Penelope Andrews

Articles & Chapters

This paper describes the role of culture in perpetuating violence against women. It does this by contextualizing violence against women in South Africa within the grand project of transformation taking place there, and highlighting the possibilities of fundamental restructuring, with respect to rights and equality for women, when the feminist project intersects with the non-racial project. The paper, therefore, visits a familiar question, namely, the obstacles to transformation when the eradication of racism takes precedence over the elimination of sexism, as it historically has in South Africa. In addition, this paper describes recent attempts by the legislature and courts in …

Sexual Orientation & Human Rights In American Religious Discourse, Gerard V. Bradley

Journal Articles

Sexual Orientation & Human Rights in American Religious Discourse, edited by Saul M. Olyan and Martha Nussbaum (Oxford, 260 pp., $29.95)

The editors of this volume fear that "reasoned debate" about homosexuality is imperiled. Indeed Martha Nussbaum in her introduction reports that she was "surprised" to "discover" that she could engage in such debate with religious thinkers who take a less permissive view than she in the Colorado Amendment Two "gay-rights" litigation.