“Compromise requires give and take from all sides, and we are pleased this proposal fully protects bathroom safety and privacy.” — Phil Berger, Senate leader, Tim Moore, House speaker, the Great State of North Carolina.
The proposal to which they refer repealed the controversial House Bill 2, passed last March. HB2 mandated that all citizens use the bathroom that corresponds with the gender stated on their birth certificates.
You’ve got to give it to North Carolina. In our long history, no state has ever spent more time and money ensuring the bathroom safety and privacy of its citizens. It is a tempest in a pee pot.
The reason for passing the original bill was to make sure a transgender person does not use a bathroom that corresponds to her identity or appearance, but uses the bathroom that corresponds to the certificate. Think Caitlyn Jenner in the men’s room. When it was passed I amused myself by thinking of Jenner, as she appeared on the cover of Vanity Fair, exchanging pleasantries at the urinal with House members in the men’s room in the North Carolina State Capitol. Be careful what you wish/vote for.
North Carolina has suffered from adverse publicity and other consequences as a result of this legislation, but the legislature stood firm until . . .
The NCAA warned the state that it could lose the opportunity to host championship events through 2022.
With the University of North Carolina reaching the Final Four, this threat finally got legislators’ attention. The NBA had already moved the All-Star game from Charlotte to New Orleans, and the thought of losing further ball games was a bridge too far, thus the compromise.
It is easy and tempting to see this as a sideshow, well, because it is a sideshow. But the implications are fascinating.
HB2 was, of course, mean-spirited, unnecessary, discriminatory, bigoted and unenforceable. The notion of bathroom monitors checking birth certificates is absurd on its face. Gender identity is fluid, not binary, and guessing any individual’s gender or sexual identity on the basis of physical appearance is a fool’s errand. The “protection” issue is particularly disingenuous. To my knowledge, the number of transgender offenders in recent years is precisely zero. I hasten to add that in my many years of public bathroom use, I have never seen another human’s genitalia. I am, apparently, less curious than legislators in North Carolina.
The transgender folks I know well are the least likely humans to bring any attention whatsoever to their bathroom use. They are the ones most in need of protection and privacy, given the rising incidence of hate crimes in recent years, thanks to hateful acts like HB2 and the alt-right thugs in the White House.
The “compromise” that pleases Berger and Moore is displeasing to anyone who cares about equal protection under the law. On Thursday it repealed the directly offensive language in HB2 and replaced it with a moratorium on any local non-discrimination ordinances. In layman’s terms, this means North Carolinians would still be free to discriminate, but dare not take any step to ban discrimination. Clear? As you might imagine, the transgender community and allies are not enthused. It’s a bit like a state-level version of a states’ rights strategy. The state government is kicking the can down the dusty rural road, knowing that backwater towns can and will put up “Real Boys Only!” signs, but Charlotte can host the Final Four or NBA All-Star game.
Since we don’t seem to have a functioning federal government anymore, I find all of this strangely encouraging. The NCAA, hardly a paragon of civic virtue, took a stand along with many other commercial enterprises. Money talks. The Associated Press estimated that North Carolina stood to lose more than $3.7 billion in revenue if HB2 was not repealed or amended.
I suppose it is a sign of how far we’ve fallen when the exemplars of social justice are America’s corporate interests (I consider the NCAA a corporate interest). But rich social justice warriors are better than no social justice warriors at all.
Perhaps next the NCAA and NBA can refuse to grant the Final Four or other events to any state that fails to guarantee equal pay for women. Or any state that fails to provide health care to all citizens. Or any state that fails to protect the environment. If economic leverage can advance social justice, so be it.
Steve Nelson lives in Sharon and New York City, where he is the head of the Calhoun School, a private school. He can be reached at steve.nelson@calhoun.org.