The United States Supreme Court made a landmark ruling on same-sex marriage in June. While that was definitely an important victory, John Oliver reminded us how far we still have to go before we reach complete and total acceptance during Sunday night's episode of Last Week Tonight.
That's because LGBT discrimination is still not illegal everywhere in the U.S. In 31 states, people are still at risk of losing their jobs and homes and being refused service at businesses just for being gay.
Oliver showed clips of interviews with same-sex couples that have lost their jobs or were refused service at a restaurant or even a pediatrician's office. He didn't cover too much new ground here for anyone who keeps up with the news, but the fact that there are so many stories like these out there, and that they keep happening, is kind of the point. During the segment, Oliver was mostly just amazed that this sort of discrimination would continue to occur in this day and age.
Looking to the future, Oliver argued that LGBT civil rights should be taken out of states' hands and made into federal law to stop this kind of discrimination once and for all. He even asked the campaigns of all of the presidential hopefuls if they would support federal LGBT anti-discrimination laws.
Democratic candidates Bernie Sanders, Lincoln Chafee and Martin O'Malley all said they would, a spokesman for Rand Paul said the campaign would "pass" on the question, and all of the other candidates' campaigns did not provide any sort of response. Clearly, this is something that's to be continued.
Watch the full segment from Sunday night's episode of Last Week Tonight below.
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