Via Shutterstock

Via Shutterstock

Virginia lawmakers recently introduced two new bills that would be both progress and a step back for our neighbors to the south. One would effectively ban celebratory gunfire (how that’s not already a law is beyond me), while the other aims to revive Virginia’s infamous “Crimes Against Nature” law.

This morning, the Legislative Black Caucus introduced legislation that would criminalize celebratory gunfire, the Virginian-Pilot reports. The law—dubbed “Bredon’s Law” after a seven-year-old Virginia boy who died this summer after being struck in the head by a stray bullet—would make it a felony for one to “shoot a firearm without a ‘discernible or designated target’ within any Virginia city or town or within two miles of an occupied building.” A violation of the law, if it were to pass, would be a Class 6 felony, resulting in a punishment of one to five years in prison. Celebratory gunfire that causes a death would be punished by five to 40 years in prison.

Additionally, a new bill introduced by Republican Sen. Thomas A. Garrett would, effectively, bring back a lot of Virginia’s “Crime Against Nature” anti-sodomy law, which was deemed unconstitutional by the federal appeals court last March. The legislation would classify that “engaging in consensual sodomy is not a crime if all persons participating are adults, are not in a public place, and are not committing, attempting to commit, conspiring to commit, aiding, or abetting any act in furtherance of prostitution,” but in doing so, would deem that minors engaging in oral sex are committing a felony.

Garrett’s bill aims to “amend and reenact” the Crimes Against Nature law, which former Virginia gubernatorial candidate Ken “The Cooch” Cuccinelli fought so hard to uphold. Think Progress writes that “this bill would allow oral and anal sex between consenting adults (in the privacy of their own homes) — but would still treat any oral and anal sex in those categories differently from vaginal intercourse, thereby continuing to unfairly distinguish same-sex sexual behavior for harsher punishment.”

Next week, the Virginia Senate will convene for a 60-day legislative session, during which both of these bills will be considered and reviewed by the Senate’s Court of Justice committee.