My curiousity was peaked with your “pushed off a building” comment as I didn’t realize how much of megacorporate America was invested in Iran and ISIL controlled territory-- so your “do I really have to cite” opener was totally uncalled for.
Flogging people is, to me, worse than denying them a wedding cake or the restroom they prefer. Any company who does business in Saudi Arabia but won’t do business in North Carolina is hypocritical and cowardly.
Actually, I think that American corporations have a perfect right not to do business with those they disagree with, unless they have a monopoly such as utililty companies do.
sure. it’s worse. What about the transwoman who was repeatedly raped because the state of GA put her in men’s prison and then denied her the hormones she’d been on for the past 20 years?
I agree that it’s hypocritical. Capitalism is hypocritical. You want people to stop doing business with the Saudis, then you need to dismantle the interstate system of trade. It won’t happen otherwise. The only reason that corporations pulled out of states like NC, Mississippi, and threatened to do so here, was because they knew they had political support there. They are also American corporations making decisions about their domestic situation.
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*Whispers *
Maybe he’s starting to catch on that capitalism is a poor mechanism for actually solving issues of equity and justice. Maybe our pinko commie ways are rubbing off.
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Hey, so, I could actually really use some help here. I live in North Carolina and there’s been a tremendous amount of noise in the news lately about HB2. Before you flame me about this, please hear me out, because I’m here to discuss and learn, not try to preach. I feel like one of two things are happening: Either I’m missing something hugely critical, or other people can’t read. Or maybe I’m having a Donald Rumsfeld moment: “I don’t know what I don’t know.”
I don’t understand how HB2 is discriminatory against the LGBTQ community. In fact, I feel like the original Charlotte ordinance that started the whole mess was hugely anti-business and anti-privacy, and I feel like it’s a good thing it was stopped.
Here is the original HB2 law: http://www.ncleg.net/Sessions/2015E2/Bills/House/PDF/H2v0.pdf
The Charlotte ordinance is here: http://charmeck.org/city/charlotte/CityClerk/Ordinances/February%2022,%202016.pdf
The specific language I do not know, but the news coverage all indicate two things about it: It required public and private businesses operating in Charlotte to allow transgender persons to use a bathroom based on the gender they identify with, and it required all companies who wish to contract for labor in the Charlotte area to comply with the same regulation (even if, as I understand it, their headquarters was out of state, that HQ would still need to do this).
I think it was a great idea because I absolutely believe that no one should be discriminated against for any reason. I have enough issues understanding who I am as a person, and I am loathe to find fault in someone who is coming to terms with something as basic as their gender identity. At the state level, however, the ordinance was deemed overreaching.
HB2 specifically curtails the ability of localities like Charlotte from establishing laws contrary to state law (in part 2 of the law), and then in part one, HB2 establishes the state law regarding bathroom, changing room, and locker room access. This in effect neutralized much of the language of the Charlotte ordinance, but also ensured that other communities could not pass local laws which did, in fact, discriminate by not allowing any members of any minority, gender or otherwise, to use any bathroom, for example.
Specifically, HB2 states that individuals must use bathrooms based on the gender of their birth certificate, and I understand this is the heart of the issue. However, the law also does two things which I believe are hugely important: Firstly, it continues to allow all private businesses to handle the matter in ways which they deem fit, which was previously the case and which remains the case in most of the US, and it requires all public institutions to have either single-occupancy bathrooms or make acceptable accommodations otherwise.
On the face of it, I believe the upset is regarding transgender persons from being singled out. I have two friends who are transgender, one of whom has had sexual re-assignment surgery, and one who has not. The one who has updated her birth certificate and now she’s female, in every sense of the word (she’s really cute, too) and uses female bathrooms without anyone having any idea whatsoever. Previously, though, she always preferred single occupancy bathrooms because what she was going through was a private and individual ordeal. It wasn’t a thing to bring up. Frankly, I prefer single occupancy bathrooms, because it’s always an awkward thing using restrooms in public. At my college, we had a guy who was caught multiple times pleasuring himself in the boy’s bathroom, inside a bathroom stall, with a mirror on his person.
Anyway, my point is that how I read the language of HB2 is that it is very anti-discriminatory in that the individuals who have completed their transition (ie, are anatomically consistent with a male or female gender) are unaffected, and it is 100% against the law to discriminate against them in any way, shape, or form.
Individuals who are still in transition, however, are technically singled out, but in my current opinion, it simply allows every person who uses a bathroom to have privacy – anyone can use the single occupancy bathrooms, up to and including a transitioning person, so it does not automatically “out” you as in-transition to use said bathroom.
I believe it allows the state to apply a fair, privacy-centric approach to safely determining what constitutes gender – namely, having the externally visible anatomic parts of a male or a female. Seattle has a similar rule as what Charlotte passed, and then this happened: http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/wa-man-women-bathroom-test-transgender-ruling-article-1.2535150
I believe that individual was doing this intentionally, but because he expressed himself to be transgender, he was not technically breaking any law, and attempting to remove him from the bathroom would actually be breaking the law. He legally violated the privacy of potentially dozens of people. It’s a hugely slippery slope with no easy, right answer. Using the approach that North Carolina has crafted, in my current opinion, seems to provide a safe, fair middle ground.
Additionally, on April 12th, Gov McCrory has updated state HR policy language to specifically address this, updating the language to include a ban against “unlawful discrimination, harassment or retaliation on the basis of race, religion, color, national origin, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, age, political affiliation, genetic information or disability.”
The key words there are sexual orientation and gender identity, which makes NC state law even more progressive than existing federal law (albeit, federal law IS largely being interpreted as having the same language).
See here: https://ncgovernor.s3.amazonaws.com/s3fs-public/documents/files/McCrory%20EO%2093_0.pdf
This is for public, NC-state institutions, of course. Businesses in North Carolina are still allowed to have their own policies, and this is where I really take issue with PayPal. Granted, PayPal was coming to Charlotte with a $3.7 million dollar tax incentive, but HB2 specifically granted them even more freedom to do business than they would have had otherwise.
Additionally, with part 3 of the bill, which is HUGELY anti-worker (it negates our ability to sue for discrimination at work at the state level), the law again comes out even more staunchly pro-business. (Full disclosure: McCrory is seeking legislation to roll back part 3, http://www.wral.com/mccrory-wants-lawmakers-to-reverse-part-of-hb2/15637742/)
And as other posters have brought up here, PayPal does business willingly in countries which are hugely oppressive against minorities of all kinds, up to and including the death penalty. Their move in North Carolina just seems hugely hypocritical to me.
Anyway, sorry this was so long. Thanks for reading this far, and really, I truly do appreciate constructive input. I’ve been lurking on BoingBoing for over a decade and I appreciate the freedom of thought that exists here.
(edit: updated grammar mistake and found charlotte city ordinance)
Now I want to make some slap stickers that say “Stuck in Leviticus” to apply to racist/homophobic bumpers.
Or maybe that is my next death metal band name… it’s a phrase with legs…
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Evangelicals have called companies like Apple and Disney “corporate bullies,” to whom Mammon matters more than morals.
Apple? You mean the company that has:
- The highest market cap on the planet
- A CEO who is unapologitically gay?
I suspect – just suspect, mind – that there may be a bit of disagreement there as to the nature of “morals.”
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There are a few differences. Not least is that there’s a big difference between “doing business in” and “having major operations in” – Apple, for instance, does more than sell their products in the USA; recruiting in the UAE is not quite the same thing.
Sorry, that Goethe quote is pure shit. We live in a global society. We are talking about international companies and entertainers who do business all over the world. If they can hammer North Carolina over a bathroom law they should have the balls to say something about a place where they can execute people for being gay. Holy shit, we are talking about killing people. That seems like something to get outraged about. But what do I know. I guess they are just sweeping their own front door and it’s none of my business according to Goethe.
Just wondering, would you have been against the boycott of South Africa ?
Can’t say, but you sound highly knowledgeable on what other people ought to be outraged about. Outraged, it seems. Keep your own side of the street clean, first.
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No, for reals!
When my parents were young homosexuality wasn’t even legal in most of the country. When I was in high school it was still considered extremely edgy and controversial to include a gay character in a sitcom. Even the most socially progressive politicians weren’t willing to fight to legalize same-sex marriage until a handful of years ago, and already it’s treated like No Big Deal in most of the country.
There are obviously still plenty of bigots out there but we’ve seen a real sea change in public attitudes toward LGBTQ people in the last generation. Even using the WORD “bigot” to refer to people who would deny equal rights is a new concept, because opposing equal rights used to be the norm rather than the exception.
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I suppose the problem here is Christians and anti-theists who look at the written law but not case law or legal discussions. In actuality capital crimes described in Leviticus etc were incredibly hard to bring to trial much less convict. I don’t expect Christians to have any knowledge of the relevant Talmud but those that claim to operate on reason and knowledge could at least read one of the two relevant wiki articles.
Ping also @Garymon
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We hold Americans to higher standards than people who live in dictatorial shitholes. Its a double standard and hypocritical, but easy to justify.
We know companies are still just looking at their bottom line here. In the US, that means opposing discrimination because it generates bad PR and bigots are usually a small, crappy market. Abroad it means playing nice with the local dictatorships.
Damn right!
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Nobody really gives a flying crap how ancient Biblical laws were carried out. Christians always used Leviticus as a way to sound tough and avoid all that touchy-feely stuff about the meek inheriting the earth and turning the other cheek. Jews ranging by sect used it from an excuse to be obnoxious to the less observant to finding carve outs and exceptions in the interest of humane behavior and common sense.
The harsh reality is that bigots look for excuses to give their hate social sanction. Proof-texting the Bible is a sure fire way to do that. This way one can say, “I am not really a bigot, I am just faithfully adhering to my religious faith.”
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Yes, few people care about a well rounded understanding of a topic when they can just cherry pick what they like and go win the internet.
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I’m not sure you got my point but you seem to be looking for a fight which I’m not going to engage in.
What do you mean, “would I have been”?
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