A Battle Won

You all remember North Carolinian’s hateful HB2 and the bill that later passed HB142?

The bathroom bill that banned us from using the bathroom of our gender identity; well we won a court ruling there.

Federal court rules North Carolina cannot ban trans people from restrooms
LGBTQ Nation
By Gwendolyn Smith
October 1, 2018

A federal court has declared that House Bill 142, the law that replaced North Carolina’s discriminatory House Bill 2, doesn’t bar transgender people from using public facilities – including restrooms.

Federal Judge Thomas Schroeder issued the decision Sunday evening, adding that, “Nothing in the language of Section 2 (of HB 142) can be construed to prevent transgender individuals from using the restrooms that align with their gender identity.”

This effectively returned North Carolina to pre-HB2 days as far as trans restroom use is concerned.  Transgender people in the state may use restrooms that match their self-identity, not based on, for example, their birth certificate.

This is good news… but.

With Trump packing the courts with anti-LGBT, anti-women, Bible thumping judges don’t expect out victories to continue.

The fight for LGBT rights still has a long ways to go.

Fayetteville in a battle for even considering helping gays
Charlotte Observe
By The Observer Editorial Board
September 07, 2018

So this is how far we’ve come in the enlightened state of North Carolina in 2018: The Values Police raise hell if a city dares to even listen to complaints around discrimination for sexual orientation.

Crippling North Carolina’s reputation with the discriminatory HB2 wasn’t enough. With that embarrassment erased from the books, the obsession with looking down upon gay and transgender people has to take other forms.

The latest battlefront: Fayetteville, where the Human Relations Commission has the gall to want to update, for the first time in 50 years, the ordinance governing it. The City Council on Monday night was scheduled to debate the commission’s request to add “sexual orientation, gender identity and veteran status” to the list of categories for which the commission can investigate complaints, the Fayetteville Observer reports.

This update is such a threat to the way of life in North Carolina, apparently, that the NC Values Coalition – a small group with more bark than bite – feels the need to come to the rescue of those Fayetteville businesses that want to be left in peace when discriminating against gay employees or customers.

And of course NC Values Coalition is shouting “Religious Freedom” and you can bet your bottom dollar you will see a court case come out of this and the case going all the way to the Supreme Court. And with Kavanaugh you can say goodbye to our rights the bigots will be able to hide behind their Bibles.