Last week in a federal court in California, US District Judge Dean Pregerson allowed a case against Pepperdine University to proceed "on the basis it may have violated the prohibition against gender bias under Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972 by engaging in anti-gay discrimination against members of the women’s basketball team. Haley Videckis and Layan White sued the University, charging employees of the school with harassment by conducting a lesbian witch hunt.

At one point Coach Ryan Weisenberg held a team leadership meeting at which time he said that

lesbianism was a big concern for him and for women’s basketball, that it was a reason why teams lose, and that it would not be tolerated on the team

Adi Conlogue, an athletic academic coordinator of the team, allegedly in 2014 would hold meetings with each of the players to determine their sexual orientation as opposed to focusing on their academics, asking questions about their relationships and whether they slept with their beds together.

After complaints from the plaintiffs, coaching staff as part of an effort to force them to quit the team changed time cards to make it appear they were late to training periods, falsely accused them of academic cheating and made inquiries about whether they were dating. At one point, White attempted to commit suicide.

The two players were forced off the time and stripped of their scholarships.

Pepperdine argued that Title IX doesn't cover discrimination based on sexual orientation One court sided with Pepperdine, stating that the line between discrimination based on gender stereotyping and discrimination based on sexual orientation was "blurry at best."

[T]he line between sex discrimination and sexual orientation discrimination is ‘difficult to draw’ because that line does not exist, save as a lingering and faulty judicial construct.

--Judge Pregerson

Tico Almeida, president of the LGBT group Freedom to Work, said the Pepperdine decision “builds greater momentum” for nationwide legal protections to ensure LGBT people have a fair shot in employment, education and housing.

This California federal court follows federal courts from Alabama to Washington state to Washington, D.C. that have already ruled that sexual orientation discrimination is outlawed by existing federal statutes that ban sex discrimination. We encourage LGBT Americans who face discrimination to file claims with the EEOC and in the federal courts: Don’t let anybody tell you that you can be married at 10 a.m. and fired at noon.

--Almeida

[T]he view that anti-gay discrimination constitutes gender discrimination isn’t limited to federal courts. One state court in Massachusetts last week determined anti-gay discrimination constitutes gender discrimination under that state’s law as a result of a lawsuit filed by the New England-based Gay & Lesbian Advocates & Defenders.

In a 21-page ruling, Massachusetts Associate Justice Douglas Wilkins determined Fontbonne Academy, a Catholic girls school, violated the state’s prohibition on sexual-orientation discrimination and gender discrimination. The school rescinded a job offer as food services director to Matthew Barrett on the basis his same-sex marriage is inconsistent with church teachings.

It may be unnecessary to determine whether the same undisputed facts also amount to gender discrimination. Nevertheless, it is clear that, because he is male, he suffered gender discrimination when he was denied employment for marrying a person whom a female could have married without suffering the same consequences.

--Judge Wilkins

The Human Rights Campaign notes in a new report, Hidden Discrimination: Title IX Religious Exemptions Putting LGBT Students at Risk, that 56 schools have requested exemption from Title IX since 2013.

There is an alarming and growing trend of schools quietly seeking the right to discriminate against LGBT students, and not disclosing that information publicly. We believe that religious liberty is a bedrock principle of our nation, however faith should never be used as a guise for discrimination. Prospective students and their parents deserve greater transparency, and we urge the Department of Education to take action by helping to increase accountability and to ensure that no student unknowingly enrolls in a school that intends to discriminate against them.

--Chad Griffin, HRC

Stacey Long Simmons, the National LGBTQ Task Force Action Fund’s director of public policy and government affairs, said court decisions determining anti-gay discrimination constitutes gender discrimination under the law are welcome, but they’re not universal and an explicit federal LGBT law is necessary.