North Carolina's Bathroom Bill:
Persecuting LGBT People Under Cover of "Non-Discrimination"

April 18, 2016 | Revolution Newspaper | revcom.us

 

From a member of the Revolution Club:

February 22, 2016, North Carolina’s largest city, Charlotte, joined 18 states and over 200 cities and counties in passing an ordinance intended to prevent discrimination against lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgendered people in “places of public accommodation.” The ordinance included a measure that allowed transgendered people to use public restrooms that correspond to the gender with which they identify. Charlotte’s anti-discrimination ordinance was set to go into effect on April 1.

The reality—supported by actual facts and evidence—is that life for LGBT people in the USA is a horror... suffocating, dangerous, and traumatic in a million ways. Even with all the culture changes going on, it is still the case that outside of a few neighborhoods in a few big cities, or some college campuses, if you are lesbian, gay, transgender, or bisexual, wherever you go you face insults, threats, humiliation, and physical danger.

But before the Charlotte ordinance could go into effect, the North Carolina General Assembly stepped in to block it on March 23. For the first time in 35 years, the state assembly called an emergency session to pen its own “non-discrimination law,” House Bill 2 (HB2—since dubbed the “Bathroom Bill”). The assembly debated the bill for only 12 hours, during which Senate Democrats walked off the chamber floor in protest while the remaining Republicans gave the legislation unanimous approval. The governor, Pat McCrory, signed HB2 into law the same night, thus putting into effect the most anti-LGBT law in the U.S. to date.

Since January of this year, over 200 anti-LGBT laws have been proposed around the U.S.—a tidal wave of reactionary backlash against the U.S. Supreme Court decision legalizing gay marriage. Essentially, HB2 is an amalgam of these reactionary laws, which shroud their hateful intentions with the façade of “religious protection” and “non-discrimination.”

However, HB2 is unique in several ways: it includes a preemption clause which overrides and prevents city and local governments from passing their own non-discrimination ordinances (which might include LGBT protections). It also requires all government-controlled facilities—including schools and universities—to assign all multiple occupancy bathrooms and locker rooms to a single sex and prevent anyone who doesn’t match that biological sex from using the facility. The law nullifies Charlotte’s and six other jurisdictions’ LGBT protections and blocks any other local or city government from providing these protections in the future. In addition to dismantling and preventing laws to protect LGBT people, the bill prevents cities and local governments from establishing a minimum wage higher than the federal requirement of $7.25, nor does it allow local governments to form legislation requiring companies to provide employees with paid sick leave.

North Carolina’s HB2 and the 200 other bills and ordinances proposed nationally that aim to deny rights to LGBT people are outrageous—cruel and oppressive. They seek to demote whole sections of people whose sexual orientation and/or gender identity do not conform to “traditional” gender norms to second-class citizens. They claim the law is to protect women and children from sexual predators (falsely equating LGBT and specifically transgendered people to sexual predators), despite the fact that there is absolutely ZERO evidence to support this allegation in cities with ordinances protecting LGBT people’s use of public accommodations and a world of evidence that LGBT people are victimized in every corner of society.

THINK ABOUT IT! What kind of system even conceives of a law as absurd as this? What kind of system calls emergency sessions of its legislature to pass “non-discrimination” laws that are actually intended to enforce discrimination?!?!? What kind of system would even consider using its law enforcement to police who can and cannot use the restroom—and deem it moral, let alone rational, to base this right on evidence of one’s genitals? The answer: a thoroughly rotten, illegitimate, criminal system that needs to be done away with at the soonest possible moment!

Societal views toward gender and sexual orientation, as well as all other human institutions, have evolved and will continue to evolve. The oppressive ideas that flow from notions of “traditional morality” stem from the inception of class society, the division of society into oppressor and oppressed. These relations gave rise to patriarchy (men dominating women) and consequently, the enforcement of strict societal mores regarding sexual orientation, gender, as well as marriage and sex more generally. Jolts and shifts in human society have transformed these relations in numerous ways, however despite the outward appearance of these institutions, class society is inextricably bound to patriarchy.

A WHOLE NEW WAY IS POSSIBLE—THROUGH REVOLUTION

As long as society is divided into oppressor and oppressed, the vast majority of humanity will continually be subjugated to needless suffering and real human beings who do not fit into the mold of what is considered “acceptable” by the dominant group at that time will continue to be discriminated against, abused, violated, and killed.

HUMANITY SHOULD NOT ACCEPT THIS ANY LONGER. WE DON’T HAVE TO LIVE LIKE THIS!

We’ve reached a point in human history where it is possible for humanity to break free from tradition’s chains and build a society free of oppression and exploitation—this is COMMUNISM. While leading the Revolutionary Communist Party, USA, Bob Avakian has developed a new synthesis of communism which draws lessons from previous attempts at human emancipation, synthesizing and developing both a strategy for revolution, but also a basic model for the type of society that could be brought into being through that revolution and contribute toward the goal of human emancipation globally. The Constitution for the New Socialist Republic in North America (Draft Proposal) exemplifies what this new society would look like and provides the framework for a new society Day One after the current system is overthrown. The Constitution goes into great detail, laying out the overall framework of society and its functioning, but also the laws, regulations, and rights of the people. In regard to the latter, with the establishment of the new state power—anything even remotely resembling the so-called “Bathroom Bill” would be off the table—NO MORE OF THAT!

Even after the establishment of socialism, many of the ideas and backward relations from the old society would carry over. Unlike the capitalist-imperialist system that currently fronts as the defender of freedom and democracy, the basic rights of the people—ALL PEOPLE—would not be up for vote, the legislature would not be allowed to tear away the rights of the people based on non-scientific arguments and religious superstition. On the contrary, our constitution bans all discrimination against people whose sexual orientation doesn’t fit into traditional, patriarchal forms and norms. Beyond that, it outlines a society whose educational system and culture brings to light the real history and background of backward prejudices, and how they stem from different forms of oppression—changing not only laws, but hearts and minds. (See “Same-Sex Marriage: A Basic Right, a Just Demand,” Revolution, April 7, 2013.)

As communists, we stand with the fighters who are demanding their basic human rights and going up against these bigoted laws and fascist politicians. Also, as communists, we seek to build and strengthen this resistance as part of building the overall movement for revolution. As part of strengthening the movement for revolution, we will continue to struggle for many more people to engage the work of Bob Avakian, challenge traditional ways of thinking, stand with others who are under the system’s boot, all while deepening their understanding of the cause and solution to... ALL OF THIS! We will continue fighting the power, and transforming the people, for revolution and challenging YOU and millions of others to bring a liberated world into being.

 

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