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Well, scratch North Carolina off your vacation list. Against heavy pressure from major businesses in the state, N Carolina has voted solidly
against the laws concerning the use of rest rooms by LGBT people. The Klan rides again ! Many business leaders are thinking of moving
out ot the state.
Karen
Comments
On a brighter note
You might enjoy this podcast from Sandi Toksvig on advances over the years in being an Out, Lesbian comedy presenter in the UK http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p03my2jp#play
Rhona McCloud
NC state government.
The "Attorney General (if I have that right) of NC has said that he has no intention of defending N's bigotry against lawsuits. The Big Cheese in NC has said "As the state’s attorney, he can’t select which laws he will defend and which laws are politically expedient to refuse to defend"
So let me get this right... Kim Davis can refuse to do her job because of claimed conscience/religious freedom, but the AG has to do his job despite his conscience/common sense appreciation of what a waste of time defending the law change would be. That's clear then.
You don't have a Constitutional Right ...
to common sense.
(This was meant very sarcastically.)
No, Kim Davis went to Jail
No, Kim Davis went to Jail for not doing her job. The Attorney General or someone from his office is required to defend the law, no matter how bad or illegal it is. He can recuse himself, if he can find a reason, but he has to defend it. He also has to appear to being doing a good job of defending the law.
He doesn't have to do a good
He doesn't have to do a good job. He just has to go through the motions. If the writing is on the wall for a case dealing with something really stupid, he (or one of his minions) can simply stack up the information and hand if over to the judge and jury, and let it be judged on its own merits.
I mean, look at how badly the D.C. rep did when arguing D.C. vs Hellerman in front of the Supreme Court. It really was a Keystone Cops moment. He set a new bar for how incompetent you can be in front of a judge and media.
I'll get a life when it's proven and substantiated to be better than what I'm currently experiencing.
Different point
My point was not the legality of it, but rather that the same people who supported KD for 'following her conscience' will blow a fuse at the idea of someone doing the same thing for a reason they don't agree with.
It ain't over, 'til it's over
Take heart. A NY Times story suggest that NC may lose Federal money over it's discriminatory law; so it ain't over 'til it's over
Hugs
Patricia
Happiness is being all dressed up and HAVING some place to go.
Semper in femineo gerunt
Ich bin eine Mann
Title IX......
Very true - it has been suggested that the new NC law is a violation of Title IX, which would result in the loss of extremely large sums of Federal money. Not to mention the negative impact of companies pulling business out of the state and the loss of convention and tourism dollars, especially to places like Charlotte. I will be extremely interested to see what happens to the NASCAR season as the governing body of that organization has also come out in opposition to the law, as has the NBA and many other organizations who either have events planned or regularly held in NC.
More importantly, I would love to see the state try to enforce that law in a Federal building!
Perhaps this will all be decided by The US Supreme Court before it gets that far; one can only hope that reason and decency will prevail over the gross stupidly and prejudice the state government has demonstrated.
D. Eden
Dum Vivimus, Vivamus
Fighting back
I would not be surprised to see a similar law here in Florida soon. If it happens, I believe the best way to resist or fight back would be Civil Disobedience by all who can (I know, many can't). I can't imagine how Gainesville or Alachua county jails would cope with 100 or more T-folk arrested for peeing while T over a weekend.
Careful, any tgirls arrested
Careful, any tgirls arrested will be thrown into the men's holding cells, NOT GOOD!
Men's cells
I have unfortunately had the chance to experience how Charleston SC treats Transwomen who have been arrested. Overall I have to give them an 80% grade. Everyone waits in the same holding area, a rather large waiting room with 2 televisions mounted on the ceiling. There are holding cells along the sides for those who need segregation for violence or whatever reason, clear plastic walls to ensure nothing untoward happens.
Seating is segregated by sex to a degree. Women had thier own 1/3 of the room... and as a transwoman I was seated with them but a little separate. Had I been post op I would simply have been treated like any other woman(I asked).
In the course of processing they offered "Administrative Segregation" which basically means I get a cell to myself. Its solitary confinement, cruel in some ways but far far better than putting me in with the male population. The other female prisoners stood up for me when they took me away, they were angry that i was being put into the male isolation cells.
They made me wear the male jumpsuit and boxer shorts(I did manage to not hand over one of my thongs while dressing out so i didn't have to totally humiliate myself.). The female uniform is pants and a top... trust me, peeing in a jumpsuit is a whole variety of effed up. Even the COs(Correctional Officers... Guards but don't call them that) were like "Now tell me again why we have a woman in the men's cells?"
All in all... they tried to minimize the humiliation. I was searched by a female officer, with another woman in the room per standards, In every possible way they recognized my gender status.
I think the reason I was in there was quite stupid, as did the judge in the end. As much as having to go to jail overnight can be said to be a not negative experience this one was, although they did have to take extra time to figure out exactly what to do with me.
I'm sure its different elsewhere, I know many others have had horrible experiences. I don't wish it on anyone... no matter how much they try to detraumatize it having cuffs clapped on you and being stuffed into the back of a police car is a seriously messed up experience. Horrifically uncomfortable too... there's just no way to get comfortable with your hands cuffed behind you in that narrow space. For someone like me add fairly severe claustrophobia into the mix... I spent the whole trip in meditation trying to just not freak out, especially in the van where its partitioned into small compartments.
(Thanks Rhona) What
(Thanks Rhona) What differance does it make which enclosed stall a t-girl uses in the ladies, and very few FtoM's will stand at the urinol.
Jeeze, we've had gays standing shoulder to shoulder at urinols with cismen for decades, any problem?
Hateful law put in by hateful people.
Notice
I've noticed they don't seem to have a problem with F2M people using the male restroom, I haven't seen that brought up by these bigots anywhere. Its only the M2F people. Aren't the men afraid of women saying they are men in order to spy on them? Perhaps we need to stage a few incidents where a bunch of T-men as well as GG women all line up to use the men's lavatories. I've seen little devices kinda like funnels that allow women to piss the same as men do. I'd love to see one of these bigots walk into the men's lavatories and see women all lined up and using the urinals? A Kodak moment, for sure!!
I went outside once. The graphics weren' that great.
NC laws
My story "A night at the Theater" is based on this controversy.
THE WAY To Fight This Law
Much grief is going to rain down on NC for this stupid HB2 law. States and cities banning officials from any nonessential trips. The Feds cutting off blocks of aid. Businesses curtailing their NC activities.
But that's not what's going to overturn it. This will:
Some fully transitioned, butch and ripped transmen getting themselves arrested by befuddled police for going into the WOMEN'S room like the law says they SHOULD because they were born girls. Then, suing everyone involved! Local police departments, and counties won't be able to afford the settlements. The publicity will destroy the politicians who pushed this epic dumbness.
Overt discrimination: what's the point?
What confuses me is the following: in the long run, the arc of American history tends away from hate and discrimination. Progress is slow and unsteady and sometimes reverses for a while, but the trend is clear. Republican politicians as a whole are not dumb, so I have to think they can think strategically.
So, what do they expect to gain by instituting overt discrimination, thereby laying legal groundwork to make LGBT a protected class?
I think the forces of oppression ultimately will have shot themselves in the foot with this one. Hope so.
Maybe We do Need a Wall?
Perhaps we do need to construct a wall to keep out all the undesirables. But the Mexican border isn't where there is a need. The wall should be around the more "backward" areas of the country so that they can continue to live like it's the "good old days" (probably pre- Civil War).
Michelle B
Birth Certificate
Birth certificate needed to visit N C just make sure you have it before you go to the ladies room , how do they enforce this that is the question , then they claim it is a privacy issue who is looking under the stall door .
NUTS I tell you all of they are NUTS
They also don't recognize or
They also don't recognize or enforce divorce proceedings such as court ordered child support from other States; as a dear friend found out to her dismay, after her ex-husband got his company to transfer him there. Apparently he did know this in advance of the order.
SHAME ON THEM ALL in their State government.
In the words of Ron White, a
In the words of Ron White, a comedian: "You can't fix stupid." And these idiots are definitely stupid.