​Transphobia, clear as day

The North Carolina State Legislature held a special session last Wednesday, fast-tracking House Bill 2 through to Governor Pat McCrory, who immediately signed it—all within 24 hours. The bill not only forces transgender students to use the bathroom or locker room of the gender they were assigned at birth, but also changes how people can pursue claims of workplace discrimination and prevents cities and counties from establishing minimum wage benchmarks for private employers. Fueled by the unsubstantiated fears of bathroom assaults by trans individuals throughout the nation, this law directly threatens gender-nonconforming and working class residents across the state.

The bill quickly sparked outrage across the state and the country, resulting in protests and multiple denouncements from corporations and organizations with connections to North Carolina. Activists in the area and working nationally have also declared their intentions to sue the state to prevent it from enforcing the law until the question of whether it is a discriminatory law is answered. Groups like the American Civil Liberties Union have also said that the legislation endangers federal funding to public secondary schools and universities under Title IX.

As a private university, Duke released a statement on the bill’s passage shortly after it was signed, promising that our campus’s gender neutral bathrooms and policies related to gender identity will not be affected by this bill. Though a large percentage of the undergraduate student body hails from North Carolina, the state is a temporary, albeit formative, home for many more of us. As long as we live here, we ought to care about it and the residents with which we share it. Putting up a mental wall between our campus and Durham and the broader state is not the approach of a dutiful community citizen.

Duke students have political clout. We impact area elections, drawing voting laws that are confusingly complex, exclusionary or both that result one way or another in fewer students going to the polls. We also find ourselves in a better position than most to organize and execute protests to voice concerns and arguments. We lack the threats of ire from employers or penalties in the form political retaliation that others face.

As most students have found, the questions is less of why and more of how to advocate against this shameful piece of legislation and voice their frustration. Before the next election rolls around, take time to see which politicians are pushing these types of bills or relying on similarly unsubstantiated evidence or thinly-veiled phobias. Do your research, go to the polls and vote them out if that is where your views lead. Additionally, showing up to demonstrations in solidarity or working with any of the relevant organizations in the Durham-Chapel Hill area are great ways to get involved. Even writing an email to the governor or state representatives makes a difference. Collective action driven by individual contributions is an accessible but powerful means to realize change.

We need to protect and support each other. It is important to understand that this bill is not just transphobic, but also possibly a violation of the Constitution’s 14th Amendment. Our fellow North Carolinians and classmates are having their rights stripped from them by a bill that allowed for no debate or input by trans people or workers it affects. We cannot sit idly by and watch an infringement on the economic livelihood and freedom of gender expression be tolerated under unsupported claims of “public safety.” An attack on one of us, is an attack on all of us.