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Murfreesboro anti-LGBTQ ordinance on hold for BoroPride event – Tennessee Lookout [1]

['Sam Stockard', 'More From Author', '- October']

Date: 2023-10-24

The Tennessee Equality Project and Murfreesboro officials reached an agreement putting the city’s anti-LGBTQ ordinance on hold Oct. 28-29 for a BoroPride event to be held at MTSU’s Miller Coliseum.

Under a court-approved deal, neither Murfreesboro Mayor Shane McFarland, City Manager Craig Tindall nor police or any other city official will enforce an ordinance dealing with “homosexuality” within the definition of “sexual conduct” at the event set for Saturday, according to a federal court order.

“We are relieved that the court has taken action to ensure that Murfreesboro’s discriminatory ordinance will not be enforced during the BoroPride festival. We look forward to a safe, joyful celebration of Murfreesboro’s LGBTQ+ community,” said Chris Sanders, executive director of the Tennessee Equality Project.

The organization and American Civil Liberties Union of Tennessee sued the city claiming the mayor and city manager discriminated against the BoroPride festival and violated its free speech by refusing to issue a parade permit during the past year and setting up a “sweeping and vague” ordinance censoring its speech and conduct.

The city issued a statement saying, “The parties agreed and the judge accepted an agreement temporarily suspending enforcement of an ordinance designed to specify certain civil penalties against indecency in public spaces and to protect children from indecent conduct. However, other existing state statutes and city ordinances and penalties regarding such conduct remain applicable.”

Murfreesboro spokesman Mike Browning did not respond to questions about whether the city would try to enforce other state and local ordinances designed to stop children from seeing LGBTQ performances.

In early June, a federal judge overturned Tennessee’s new law prohibiting drag performances in public spaces, ruling it unconstitutional. The decision affected performances in West Tennessee, and since then the judge’s ruling has been tested and upheld in East Tennessee, but not in the midstate.

U.S. District Judge Thomas Parker, in his June ruling, wrote that while the state has an interest in protecting minors, the law isn’t geared to do that. “Instead, that (the legislature’s) predominant concerns involved the suppression of unpopular views of those who wish to impersonate a gender that is different from the one with which they were born,” he wrote.







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[1] Url: https://tennesseelookout.com/2023/10/24/murfreesboro-anti-lgbtq-ordinance-on-hold-for-boropride-event/

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