Bad Laws Have Consequences

There has been much made of North Carolina’s recent law that asked people to use the public restrooms and public locker rooms corresponding to their sex at birth. The law has since been replaced by a similar law. However, those in favor or making every bathroom or locker room open to anyone according to what sex they identify with at that particular moment have overlooked a few possible negative consequences.

On April 6th, WBTV posted an article about a recent incident at Central Piedmont Community College. The incident itself is disturbing, but the school’s response to the incident is even more disturbing.

The article reports:

A Central Piedmont Community College student was shocked to find a man in the women’s bathroom allegedly trying to take her picture under a stall door. She was equally shocked, she said, when she reported the incident to police and they told her what happened was not a crime.

Catherine Barker said she was in a stall in the first-floor women’s bathroom in the Belk Building on CPCC’s Central Campus when she suddenly noticed something that didn’t feel right.

“I noticed a person come through the vertical crack in the bathroom stall and then bend down, so I jumped up and went out the door and they were headed out the bathroom and I said ‘you look for somebody?’ and the guy started fumbling and mumbling with his phone and trying to get his phone away so I blocked him from the door so he wouldn’t get out,” Barker recalled days later in an interview with WBTV.

Barker said she grabbed the man’s phone and, eventually, led him to a campus security officer to report the incident.

But she said campus security officers told her there was nothing they could do.

“They said that there’s no proof that he has any pictures so they can’t do anything to him,” she said she was told by campus security officers.

The article goes on to describe the lack of action by the college:

Federal law requires colleges and universities to keep a daily log of all crimes—or incidents that could potentially be crimes—that are reported on campus. The requirement is part of a federal law known as the Clery Act, which is aimed at alerting those on colleges campuses about crimes that occur nearby.

Documents provided by CPCC security show Barker reported Monday’s incident in the bathroom to authorities as soon as it happened.  But a review of the school’s crime log the next day found campus security had failed to list the incident in its daily crime log. 

WBTV obtained access to the crime log after multiple security officials first refused to provide the log and, later, demanded to know why a reporter wanted to see it. The Clery Act requires a crime log be made available upon request to anyone who asks to review it.

Instead, the page for Monday’s crime log was blank with a message that said “no data for daily crime log.”

The article concludes:

Catherine Barker, the student who reported the man she thought was trying to take a picture of her while she was in a bathroom stall, said she no longer feels safe on campus.

“It’s just a really uncomfortable feeling to have somebody take that away – one of the most private parts of the day. And he’s not welcome there,” she said.

Barker said she tried to report this incident to Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department but was told CPCC’s contracted police agency, Allied Universal, has primary jurisdiction over the incident.

She said she has one message for college administrators.

“The administrators, first and foremost, made me feel unsafe,” she said.

We have heard a lot of ruckus from various sports groups about not being willing to come to North Carolina because North Carolina wants men in the men’s room and women in the women’s room (and locker rooms). What about the parents who don’t want to send their daughters to college in North Carolina because their daughters may not be protected on campus? The way the college handled this incident is a disgrace. There should have been a warrant to search the man’s phone, and he should have been arrested if the phone had incriminating pictures on it. Does anyone actually believe that this was the first or last time that the person attempting to take pictures in the ladies’ room had done that? Who will protect the students if he decides to go further than pictures? Would you send your daughter to college there?

 

 

Looking Past The Obvious

HB2 is a controversial piece of legislation passed in accordance with the North Carolina Constitution. Efforts to repeal it recently failed. Actually, the Democrats in the North Carolina legislature (yes, I said Democrats) have blocked repealing it four times.

American Lens has the story and reports:

May 2016
The Charlotte Observer reported that a bipartisan group of Charlotte City Council (CLTCC) members went to Raleigh to meet with House Speaker Tim Moore to try to facilitate a deal where the council would repeal their ordinance in exchange for the state making significant changes to HB2.

In response, the Democrat-controlled council, led by Mayor Jennifer Roberts – and after heavy-duty lobbying by liberal LGBT groups – refused to put on the table the possibility of repealing the city’s controversial non-discrimination ordinance, which passed in February. The ordinance included a ban on sex-segregated facilities like showers, locker rooms, fitting rooms, and bathrooms in both public and private businesses.

June/July 2016
Charlotte’s WBTV News reported that a bipartisan deal to broadly amend HB2 was axed after political strong-arming from then-candidate-for-governor Roy Cooper (emphasis added):

September 2016
The NC Restaurant and Lodging Association said in a press release they had “received assurances this week from legislative leadership” that they were ready to move on a repeal of House Bill 2 provided that the Mayor Jennifer Roberts and the CLTCC agreed to repeal their ordinance

…December 2016
In a surprise flip-flop from their September stance, the CLTCC voted on Monday the 19th – over a month after the election- to repeal their February ordinance as part of an alleged deal “brokered” by Gov.-Elect Cooper in an effort to motivate the NCGA for a HB2 repeal.

A special session was called by Gov. McCrory in response and Republican members of the House and Senate began informally caucusing on Tuesday in advance of the Wednesday special session.

One small problem blew everything up, though. As it turns out, Mayor Roberts and the CLTCC did not repeal the February NDO in full as they’d previously announced.

So why did the Democrats vote against repeal? Because that keeps the issue on the table to be used to sway voters who do not truly understand the implications of the Charlotte ordinance.. Do North Carolina parents of high school girls want high school boys in their daughters’ locker rooms? Do North Carolina women using locker rooms at fitness facilities want men in their locker rooms? Keep in mind that the non-exclusive locker room part of the Charlotte ordinance that HB2 eliminated did not distinguish as to what private parts a person actually had. A fully equipped male (if he claimed to be transgender) was allowed to use the women’s locker room and women’s showers. I am not sure that every women in North Carolina would be happy to find a man in her gym locker room.

The purpose of leaving HB2 in place was to continue to bring outside money into the coffers of Democratic candidates in North Carolina. It’s not about rights–it’s about politics.

Why North Carolina Should Not Repeal HB2

HB2 was known as the ‘bathroom bill.’ What wasn’t mentioned was that it also applied to high school locker rooms, health club locker rooms, and other public locker rooms, generally assumed to be segregated according to sex. As long as HB2 was in place, your high school daughter in the high school locker room was not in danger of being walked in on by the high school football team or any member thereof. Now the Governor of North Carolina has decided that since Charlotte says it will repeal the law that made HB2 necessary (the Charlotte bathroom bill was unconstitutional according to the North Carolina Constitution), he wants the legislature to repeal HB2. Well, not so fast. Let’s look at some of the events surrounding the original dust-up.

Yesterday, The Daily Haymaker posted an article about the repeal of HB2.The article reminds us:

Let’s go back to the point about Charlotte’s initial move being unconstitutional. Now, WHO is responsible for dealing with actions that violate the state constitution?  Why, the elected attorney general.  If he refuses to do his job, as he has soooooo often,  the state has to shell out money to go to court itself.

So, Roy Cooper neglects one of the primary responsibilities of his job.  Gets caught lobbying businesses to avoid North Carolina because of HB2.  He spends nearly a whole year lying about HB2 to voters.  Now, the drive by media is ready to coronate him as a HERO.

So, what happens now — after HB2 is repealed — and, say, Carrboro tries something similar?  We have ANOTHER useless bastard in the attorney general’s office who likely ignores it.  And we’re right back into it.

The idea to repeal HB2 is a trap. It is the carrot over the door to the trap that the Republicans are supposed to walk into.

I need to state here that I do not think transgender people pose a threat to anyone. The threat exists in unstable people claiming to be transgender who are no such thing. The threat exists in a dare on the part of high school boys to go into the girls’ locker room. The threat exists in someone claiming to be transgender taking pictures in the dressing room at Target (that has already happened). The transgender population represents less than 1 percent of the American population. Why are endangering women and children for less than 1 percent of the population? Do you really believe that most family men want men or boys in the locker rooms used by their wives and daughters? Do you really believe that high school girls want boys walking into their locker rooms?

Leave the law in place–it represents common sense–men’s bathrooms and locker rooms for men and women’s bathrooms and locker rooms for women. It’s really not that hard.

Letting The 3.4 Percent Rule

There is an attempt being made by 3.4 percent of Americans to control the actions of the other 96.6 percent Americans. No–I am not talking about the wealthy–I am talking about the LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual, or transgender) community. I have no objection to members of that community being whoever or whatever they choose to be, but I do object when they try to impose their lifestyle on the majority of Americans. Most Americans are tolerant, but that doesn’t mean we have to condone something we believe is wrong. That battle recently came to a head in North Carolina when the City of Charlotte (in violation of the home rule provisions of the North Carolina Constitution) declared all restrooms (and locker rooms) open to whatever sex the occupant considered themselves. Aside from the problems with the law itself, only the North Carolina legislature has the power to write a law that impacts public buildings in the state. The legislature then passed a law requiring people to use the restroom (or locker room) corresponding to the sex they were at birth. Some companies and organizations have chosen not to do business in North Carolina because of this law, known as HB2. Meanwhile, many of those companies and organizations continue to do business in countries that execute homosexuals in cruel ways.

Breitbart posted a story on the continuing controversy on Wednesday.

The article reminds us:

GOP leaders in North Carolina are pushing back twice as hard against the Democrat-led alliance of business, gay and transgender advocacy groups which is now trying to damage the state’s economy in the run-up to the November gubernatorial election. 

…GOP leaders have been trying to finesse this transgender issue, because voters strongly oppose the transgender push while business leaders are pleading for an end to the Democrat-organized economic war against the state’s business community. But Gov. Pat McCrory and his deputies have now decided to go on the offensive against the far-reaching and unpopular transgender agenda, which would gradually stigmatize and outlaw the public’s recognition that the two sexes — men and women, boys and girls — want a civic society that supports their equal and different preferences. 

The problem here is not the LGBT community itself–it does not represent a danger to anyone. The problem is that there are disturbed people who will take advantage of an all-access law for their own nefarious purposes. I have no doubt that there would be abuses of the all-access law, particularly at the high school level. Do you really want the high school football team in your daughter’s high school locker room? Most Americans think that would be a really bad idea. Separate facilities for transgender students would easily solve the problem.

The Billy Graham Evangelistic Association issued a statement by Franklin Graham.

Here are some highlights from that statement:

The ACC website proudly features Toyota as an “Official Corporate Champion,” yet Toyota maintains factories and distribution centers in several of these discriminatory countries, including Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Egypt. Where is the moral outrage of the presidents of Boston College, Clemson, Duke, Florida State, Georgia Tech, Louisville, Miami, UNC, North Carolina State, Notre Dame, Pittsburgh, Syracuse, Virginia, Virginia Tech and Wake Forest?

Indeed, the ACC’s member schools compete in 25 sports divided by gender—12 men’s sports and 13 women’s. Though gender issues may be becoming more complicated in higher education and other parts of society, the athletic conference you serve as commissioner doesn’t seem to have any problem distinguishing between the two genders—male and female. Yet, when a state like the one I live in seeks to make the same distinction with regard to use of public bathrooms in an effort to protect its citizens from those who would use the men’s room today and the women’s room tomorrow, the academic elites who comprise your conference fake a moral outrage that is frankly shameful.

Ironically, the NCAA is more discriminatory towards transgender people than the public policy they apparently wish to see as law in America. For example, opponents to legislation like NC House Bill 2 support permitting people to use the bathroom which corresponds to the sex they identify with on a given day—meaning someone might feel like a man today and a woman tomorrow, switching bathrooms at will.

Yet even the NCAA doesn’t allow such casual gender identity for participation in collegiate athletics. The NCAA Policy on Transgender Student-Athlete Participation states, “Any transgender student-athlete who is not taking hormone treatment related to gender transition may participate in sex-separated sports activities in accordance with his or her assigned birth gender.” This is precisely what supporters of HB 2 have been requesting—that people use public restrooms in accordance with their assigned birth gender.

I think I represent the views of millions who would rather preserve gender-specific public bathrooms—a mainstay for generations—than to attend a football game in my state to determine the champion of a conference governed by politically-correct, morally hypocritical academics.

Mr. Graham concludes:

Commissioner Swofford, you maintain your conference’s decision is “one of principle” and that “core values…are of utmost importance.” Well, millions of us who oppose your decision do so as a matter of principle and core values—values of privacy, safety and protection of our sons and daughters in public restrooms, and the principle that God created just two genders and assigned them at birth.

Please don’t make political pawns of student-athletes who just want to play football or basketball in North Carolina, and don’t continue to offend millions of Americans who endorse thousands of years of gender-specific bathrooms while you continue to accept corporate sponsorship money from companies proudly conducting their business in countries that discriminate against homosexuals to the point of death.

We need to be tolerant, but we need to protect our citizens and our children also. It is possible to do both of these.