A law passed by NC Republicans bans the two transgender Americans in the picture above from restrooms that match their physical appearance unless they can get revised birth certificates.
READ THE NEW NORTH CAROLINA LAW HERE HB 2
The bogeyman will get you if you don’t watch out! As a child, I heard that myth from adults who wanted me to be properly frightened of dark places, new ideas and people who looked or sounded “different”. I never met him, but somehow I inferred that the bogeyman was a lot like the Jews, Negroes, Catholics, and Gypsies that we were expected to fear. Children learned, without being explicitly taught, that some of “those people” were nice but many of them were dangerous and “we” should avoid them. When I was a little older, I began to hear about “queers” and the awful things that they did to boys, so if anyone acted “that way” I should stay away from him. Most people of my age learned some version of the myth. If not from parents, it seeped in from the world around us.
By now I’ve been fortunate to have personal and work relationships with individuals from those groups. I learned that there is nothing about their religions, race, culture, ancestry, sexual orientation or gender identity that makes them dangerous or threatening.
The City of Charlotte passed an ordinance which extended its non-discrimination policies beyond the traditionally protected groups to include discrimination based on “marital status, familial status, sexual orientation, gender identity, and gender expression”. The new rules apply to public accommodations, public transportation, and the practices of businesses that have contracts with the City. North Carolina’s Republican legislature and governor have called the bogeyman back into service to overturn that ordinance.
With only stories and fear-mongering, the Republicans created the myth of the transgender bogeyman who will “get” you or your children if you don’t watch out. Then they called an emergency legislative session and introduced him to justify passing a law that not only overruled Charlotte’s ordinance; it also banned local governments from setting minimum wages and took away existing rights of individuals to file discrimination suits in state courts. By eliminating the role of state courts in protecting many civil rights, they turned discrimination concerns over to the federal government. They did all that in only one day. When you’re running from the bogeyman there is no time for thoughtful deliberation.
In more than 250 American cities that have laws similar to Charlotte’s, there is no evidence of an increase in sexual assaults and no pattern of men pretending to be transgender so they can commit crimes in women’s restrooms. In reality, transgender people are generally the victims, not the assailants. About half of transgender people have been victims of sexual assaults.
Bank of America, Wells Fargo, IBM, Red Hat, and others among the crown jewels of the North Carolina economy want the law repealed. Because of the law, Pay Pal announced today that it has cancelled plans to locate their global operations center in North Carolina. The state lost 400 new jobs. Leaders of these companies are realists who know that discrimination, hate, and fear are bad for business. But the most serious damage is not to the economy. It is to the lesbian, gay, transgender, and bi-sexual people who have been clearly told that they are not welcome in North Carolina.
My niece and nephew are raising a bright, energetic transgender teenager. He looks like a slender teenage boy but because he’s anatomically female North Carolina Republicans insist that he use the women’s washroom. His mother shared these thoughts with me, “As a mom with a transgender child, I feel anything but protected or safe. Quite the opposite in fact. I am a mom and he is my child and I worry about something as simple as him walking into a bathroom. Unfortunately, some people think that a bathroom is related to sexual behavior and predators…Predators are criminals who won’t stop because there is a sign on the door that says men or women only. If criminals obeyed signs, we could use them to get rid of heroin! Seriously? Criminals don’t work like that. As you know, my son is looking at a university in NC. Now, we’ll have to consider whether it is safe for him to travel there and stop for a restroom. It’s sad. Very, very sad.”
Years ago, public acceptance of marriage equality left North Carolina’s Republican leadership behind. Their constitutional amendment to prevent it yielded only unnecessary expenses and animosity. This Deja-vu law is similar. It might be funny if it wasn’t so painful. Sadly, the new bogeyman sports an American flag and a Christian cross on his lapels while he demands laws to hurt people who are different from him. He’ll get you if you don’t watch out.