Speaker 1: All Zone Media.
Speaker 2: Welcome Dick It Happened Here a podcast about things falling
Speaker 2: apart and also sometimes about how claiming that you were
Speaker 2: going to put things back together and then not doing
Speaker 2: it makes things fall apart even worse. I am your host,
Speaker 2: Mia Wong, and today we are going to be continuing
Speaker 2: with part two of my interview with David Forbes, an
Speaker 2: editor and journalist with the Trans News Network in the
Speaker 2: Asheville Blade, about the history of the North Carolina Democratic
Speaker 2: Parties progressive veneer over their agreement with Republican policies, and importantly,
Speaker 2: how the Democratic Party's original response to the anti trans
Speaker 2: bathroom bills from twenty sixteen paved the way for where
Speaker 2: we are today. So enjoy. Let's talk about the original
Speaker 2: bathroom bills, because I think there's some knowledge well, okay,
Speaker 2: I don't know. It's been almost a decade. Yeah, so
Speaker 2: I think people may have forgotten how this all start.
Speaker 2: Is let's talk about the first bathroom bills, what happened,
Speaker 2: and then how the Democrats kind of ensured that they
Speaker 2: would stay in place.
Speaker 3: Sure, so there is the big one everyone knows about
Speaker 3: is HB two because it became kind of internationally famous
Speaker 3: as the North Carolina bathroom Bill, and even I think
Speaker 3: for folks who memories may have faded, it has come
Speaker 3: up recently as kind of a benchmark, and often a
Speaker 3: misinterpreted one. Is we're about to get into for how
Speaker 3: far things have shifted, because on paper it looks like
Speaker 3: this really horribly backfired, and in some ways it did.
Speaker 4: Initially.
Speaker 3: HB two was a bill that was kind of slapped
Speaker 3: in last minute. It clearly drew from the larger anti
Speaker 3: trans far right policy circles which North Carolin Republicans are
Speaker 3: highly connected to. Those kind of Dems often kind of
Speaker 3: view themselves their own little like institution, like where the
Speaker 3: Democratic moderorate.
Speaker 4: It's like North northund Democrats have always been at their best.
Speaker 3: People of that ttuation when we talked about the Republicans
Speaker 3: here were like, Okay, we're now in power, which they
Speaker 3: were starting in twenty eleven. Let's try out this stuff
Speaker 3: from ALEC, Let's try out this stuff from some obscure
Speaker 3: right wing think tank. And that meant they were plugged
Speaker 3: in when in the wake of Obergafell, and also in
Speaker 3: North Carolina as well the year before, you'd had equal
Speaker 3: marriage for that whole swath of the South was kind
Speaker 3: of imposed by a federal court order or recognized by
Speaker 3: federal court order. So they were like, Okay, this isn't working.
Speaker 3: There is not just more. There is more de facto
Speaker 3: on the ground popular acceptance of equal marriage. Now that's
Speaker 3: not the wedge it was previously. So what do we
Speaker 3: shift to? What we shift to? Trans people? And so
Speaker 3: North caronl legislators very eager to try out far right policies.
Speaker 3: The Caron GOP is far right even by Southern standards,
Speaker 3: which is interesting because the state's very split as far
Speaker 3: as like votes and demographics go. So twenty sixteens rolled
Speaker 3: around four years earlier, the Dems had done the usual thing.
Speaker 3: They'd run a super conservative, super pro business, white guy Democrat.
Speaker 3: He got trounced by Pat McCrory, who was the former
Speaker 3: mayor of Charlotte, and Rain was like, oh, I'm a moderate,
Speaker 3: sensible Republican. I'm going to bounce out the legislature a
Speaker 3: little bit. But unlike too many outside the region and
Speaker 3: the state who kind of wrote a oka in North
Speaker 3: Carolina just becoming this red state now like other Southern
Speaker 3: states have, they knew their hole was actually really precarious.
Speaker 3: Now think jerrymandered extensively, so extensively that like North Carolina
Speaker 3: the same year as HB two pass stopped being recognized
Speaker 3: as a democracy by the the policiers the study. As
Speaker 3: a matter of fact, the district Carolina they did a
Speaker 3: whole commentary later that year that these were the most
Speaker 3: rigged districts, the most chairman districts they'd seen, not just
Speaker 3: in the US, but anywhere in the world.
Speaker 4: So that is where we live. That's where we lived
Speaker 4: for some time.
Speaker 3: But the governors like the statewide so he's in a
Speaker 3: more precarious position, and they wanted a wedge issue in
Speaker 3: their view to drive out conservative votes. They also hate
Speaker 3: trans people and want to hurt us. So this HB
Speaker 3: two said that trans people can't go into bathrooms unless
Speaker 3: they use the one matching their birth certificate in any
Speaker 3: state building in North Carolina.
Speaker 4: And this technically also.
Speaker 3: Includes like local government buildings, includes like social services, it
Speaker 3: includes like any educational setting pretty much. So this was
Speaker 3: clearly a slab dash affair. They didn't even have like
Speaker 3: an enforcement mechanism in there. But I did a few
Speaker 3: other things too, I think people forget about, which is
Speaker 3: it also stripped the ability of localities to make their
Speaker 3: own minimum wage rules. So it was also an attack
Speaker 3: on labor because those always go together and not unrelated.
Speaker 3: Trans and queen people are only working class demographics, which
Speaker 3: I don't think get setting up, and also essentially users
Speaker 3: on reaction to Charlotte adding gender identity to its existing
Speaker 3: non discrimination ordinance. There's old was a local one, but
Speaker 3: in reality, you know, if chart had never done that,
Speaker 3: they would have done a bill like this pretty shortly. Anyway,
Speaker 3: it was kind of just the excuse. And they also
Speaker 3: struck down all non discrimination ordinances across the state, like
Speaker 3: local non discrimination ordinances. So this is a broad attack
Speaker 3: with trans people as kind of the point of the spear,
Speaker 3: as it were, like the ones most in the front lines.
Speaker 4: It's a familiar pattern.
Speaker 3: You go after trans rights, you're also going after broad
Speaker 3: rights for any marginalized group because non discrimation stuff is
Speaker 3: being struck down left and right, and also your attacking
Speaker 3: labor yep. So you know, it really kind of set
Speaker 3: the model for things to come. HB two sparks a
Speaker 3: massive international backlash. I think the indestment was four hundred million.
Speaker 3: The state lost four hundred million, as companies pulled out,
Speaker 3: events pulled out. There was a boycott, a fairly effective one, honestly,
Speaker 3: that was started as grassroots though gay inc Groups and
Speaker 3: even like just random nonprofits, and some Democratic Party officials
Speaker 3: later joined in on it. So the money being hemorrhage
Speaker 3: left and right, McCrory's being turned into a national laughing stock,
Speaker 3: if anything, is proving a rallying point for the other side.
Speaker 3: Because twenty sixteen rolls around, and in a year where
Speaker 3: Trump takes North Carolina and generally the Republicans do fairly
Speaker 3: well throughout the South, even in a swing states like NC,
Speaker 3: McCrory loses. He loses to the Attorney General, Roy Cooper
Speaker 3: is a Democrat. Now, I would never say his prograins
Speaker 3: we're about again some major betrayals he did. He was
Speaker 3: more willing to say, at least perfunctory statements about trains
Speaker 3: rights than any northbound Democratic politician as a statewide level
Speaker 3: before and honestly since, including the current governor. And yeah,
Speaker 3: he proceeded to win, so he gets in office. North
Speaker 3: Carolina gentry are historically plenty fine with big A treatment,
Speaker 3: but the Republicans had by this point broken one of
Speaker 3: their cardinal rules.
Speaker 4: Which is they fucked with the money.
Speaker 3: Yeah, because like the state was losing money, they were
Speaker 3: losing business deals, corporate headquarters and stuff. And this is
Speaker 3: a lot of what the status quo, very anti labour says.
Speaker 3: Quote that North Tide Democrats and Republicans had generally both
Speaker 3: supported in varying ways was in danger. And you know
Speaker 3: some of them person who were losing money. So they
Speaker 3: basically tell the Republicans in early twenty seventeen to knock
Speaker 3: it off, like, Okay, you've gone far enough.
Speaker 4: It didn't work, you lost the election.
Speaker 3: They still do the Jerry manner had a lot of
Speaker 3: power in the state legislature, but they didn't have the
Speaker 3: governor's office anymore, so you know, repeal this like we're
Speaker 3: getting too much BAP publicity. And what really escalated it
Speaker 3: was basketball is kind of a religion in North Carolina,
Speaker 3: especially college basketball, and the NCAA said, look, we'll pull
Speaker 3: the tournament out of HB two is still in the books.
Speaker 3: And at that point there became like these back and
Speaker 3: forth sessions. Earlier in December, there was this compromise effort
Speaker 3: where supposedly Charlotte would strike its non discrimination stuff on
Speaker 3: its end.
Speaker 4: It was currently.
Speaker 3: Liket of legal challenge. They'd gone to court to fight
Speaker 3: to uphold it. And this should have been a warning
Speaker 3: sign the governor, Governor ELEC Cooper at that point broker
Speaker 3: kind of this deal where okay, Charlotte, you take trains
Speaker 3: people out of your non screaming short and insa of
Speaker 3: your own accord and the state will repeal HB two.
Speaker 3: Well that didn't happen. They did the first part, and
Speaker 3: then the let's sae legislators were like, okay, well that's nice,
Speaker 3: we're not doing anything about this. That should have been
Speaker 3: a lesson about complying in the advance, but it didn't
Speaker 3: really seem to take sadly, so HB two was sow
Speaker 3: in the books by March, you know, March madness is
Speaker 3: coming up and all that. And so they finally do
Speaker 3: a repeal and this is still hailed as oh, look
Speaker 3: like back in the day, like even Republicans, some Republicans
Speaker 3: would like repeal a trans bill when it got this
Speaker 3: big backlash. Their federal funding was being threatened as well
Speaker 3: for the state. I was not like federal education funding
Speaker 3: and all. That's not what happened though, And what happened
Speaker 3: I think is actually was a lot more ominous and
Speaker 3: a lot more revealing. What passed instead was honest a
Speaker 3: second bathroom bill called HB one four to two or
Speaker 3: HB two point zero, as a lot of activists and
Speaker 3: queer folks in the ground transfer the Ground dubbed it.
Speaker 3: And what this bill did was it technically took out
Speaker 3: the bathroom ban, but it's put in a bunch of
Speaker 3: byzantine provisions about who could use the bathroom wins, so
Speaker 3: it would still take a court case for a trans
Speaker 3: woman to go use the women's bathroom. It kept all
Speaker 3: the anti labor stuff, and it kept all the non
Speaker 3: discrimination stuff struck down for years, like you couldn't pass
Speaker 3: local manuscration protections for years. And at this point the
Speaker 3: pressure is mounting the Democratic Party for the first time
Speaker 3: in most of a decade, their votes in the legislature
Speaker 3: actually matter because the Republican they're split between kind of
Speaker 3: the capitalists who are hate trains that we're using this
Speaker 3: as a wedge issue and now the money's being fucked
Speaker 3: with they're ready to repeal it, and some of the
Speaker 3: others who are like, no, no, we really are dedicated to
Speaker 3: hating trans people. Mistake can burn as long as trans
Speaker 3: people's lives are made more miserable. So they have the
Speaker 3: votes in their own caucus to pass this. So for
Speaker 3: once DEM's had a lot of power and they could
Speaker 3: have easily been like no floor or peel or nothing,
Speaker 3: and they probably would have gotten it through. They did not.
Speaker 3: They sided with the Republicans. They passed this mess that
Speaker 3: essentially kept the status quo. It was just barely enough
Speaker 3: for the NCAA, who even noted they even know their corporation.
Speaker 4: Basically they know it was.
Speaker 3: Reluctant that they were, you know, putting the tournament back
Speaker 3: in NC, but they did. The governor knew. Governor democratic
Speaker 3: governor signed it. I probably mentioned earlier. HB two passed
Speaker 3: with two Democratic votes in the first place. This is
Speaker 3: like not a new trend of this happening. Heck, anti
Speaker 3: queer stuff even well before that would often pass with
Speaker 3: Democratic support as well as Republican support, often be signed
Speaker 3: by democratic governors, so this is not an entirely new thing.
Speaker 3: And this is also a point where you can see
Speaker 3: gay ink splitting a bit because gay ink did actually
Speaker 3: have actually condemned HB two point zero, but once it
Speaker 3: became passed, they either offered tempted statements or they backed down.
Speaker 3: And so the US and from HB two wasn't okay.
Speaker 3: Back in the day, you know, nine years ago, trans
Speaker 3: rights used to be more of a consensus, even among
Speaker 3: moderate conservatives, at least basic protections for it. And a
Speaker 3: good example was how unpopular HBT was. It was repealed
Speaker 3: under all this backlash. It did get a backlash, yeah,
Speaker 3: but it wasn't really repealed. And as a matter of fact,
Speaker 3: what the far right learned was that when it comes
Speaker 3: down to it, the Democrats North Carolina, it turned out
Speaker 3: elsewhere will fold if trans rights has made an issue.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and you know, and you can watch everything that
Speaker 2: has happened since with trans rights has just been the
Speaker 2: Democrats folding over and over and over again and getting
Speaker 2: weaker and weaker language until we're in this place now,
Speaker 2: you know, Like and I think the thing that is
Speaker 2: a little bit different, is it Like you used to
Speaker 2: have to like claim you had done something yeah about
Speaker 2: the anti trans bill, and now you can just sign
Speaker 2: it yeah, and it becomes law. And this is something
Speaker 2: that has does played out across the coach, Like there
Speaker 2: have been a lot of states where democratic governors have
Speaker 2: signed anti trans bills, yes.
Speaker 4: Or vita pro trans bills like in California. Yeah.
Speaker 2: And you know even in states where like Pritzker, the
Speaker 2: governor of Illinois, has been being held up as like
Speaker 2: the big pro trans people I've seen. I see like
Speaker 2: even trans leftists doing this. And you know, like there
Speaker 2: are a lot of things in Illinois that are very
Speaker 2: good for trans people because of the weird Pritzker corruption,
Speaker 2: his sister is trans. And also the moment the government
Speaker 2: was like, oh hey, we're gonna like sort of make
Speaker 2: a big show of threatening like healthcare funding, Pritsker just
Speaker 2: folded and let all these hospitals stop providing transcrir to youth,
Speaker 2: even though it is literally a violation of Illinois like
Speaker 2: of Illinois ANSI discrimination legislation.
Speaker 4: Yeah, they just back down and refuse to do it. Yeah.
Speaker 2: And the way that this starts is that there is
Speaker 2: a gap between the rhetoric of someone like Pritzker being like, oh, no,
Speaker 2: like we support trans rights. Trans rights are in an
Speaker 2: important civil rights issue, and then you watch them like
Speaker 2: allow a bunch of hospitals in Illinois to stop providing
Speaker 2: care to trans kids. And the place where that ends
Speaker 2: is more and more Democrats just straight up voting for
Speaker 2: this stuff.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 2: And it's and the Democrats, you know, as you're talking
Speaker 2: about with with HB two is like, you know, there
Speaker 2: were there were Democratic votes on that one.
Speaker 3: Yeah, HB one four two especially, Yeah, the compromise, Billy,
Speaker 3: but even HB too itself. Yeah, there were there were
Speaker 3: Democrats who score that too.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 2: And so this is this is I think the critical
Speaker 2: part of this is that, like this stuff only can
Speaker 2: happen with the support of the Democrats. And that's why
Speaker 2: it's happening. It's because yes, because like and this is
Speaker 2: this is something that's incredibly important right now. We're like
Speaker 2: all of the ship that is happening, all these Republicans
Speaker 2: are doing are hideously unpotty, like thirty percent approval ratings
Speaker 2: across the board for like all of this just hideously
Speaker 2: hideously hated. The only way it can happen is if
Speaker 2: the Democrats go collaborationists inside with the Republicans, and that's
Speaker 2: what they're doing now.
Speaker 4: Things always need whislims.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and they're relying on the image of resistance to
Speaker 2: distract everyone from the fact that they're helping these policies
Speaker 2: go through and if you want to stop them, you
Speaker 2: have to stop them from collaborating.
Speaker 3: I think I also brings up kind of the third
Speaker 3: element in this. You've got the bar always fascist, increasingly
Speaker 3: fashist Republican Party. You've got the increasing collaborations Democratic Party,
Speaker 3: and especially on queer and trains rights. You have gay
Speaker 3: inc which, and I go into some examples in the piece.
Speaker 3: After HB two point zero they put out some preferrenctory statements,
Speaker 3: but then they turned to gatekeeping, and the ensuing years
Speaker 3: they very consistently tried to stifle any activism that was
Speaker 3: more radical or more principled to try to get this
Speaker 3: stuff off the books, and especially if it came to
Speaker 3: holding Democratic officials feet the fire. I literally have an
Speaker 3: example in the article that I was physically therefore and
Speaker 3: witnessed where a director of the canvass and Equality sees
Speaker 3: the mic as it was being passes in candidates to
Speaker 3: answer a stronger question and from some transactivists and change
Speaker 3: the question to something that didn't actually put any pressure
Speaker 3: on them at all, like just kind of absurd, petty
Speaker 3: stuff like that. But the coom of effect has been that,
Speaker 3: you know, they turned to thinking about their political careers
Speaker 3: and their fundraising. And when push comes to shove again
Speaker 3: and again, they've shown they won't hold Democrats' feet to
Speaker 3: the fire. If anything, they will tell the Trains people
Speaker 3: trying to hold their feet the fire to shut up.
Speaker 3: So if you know that the lobby, the official lobby
Speaker 3: that's supposed to, you know, ostensibly, on some level stand
Speaker 3: up for some mild version of trains and queer rights,
Speaker 3: will never give someone any shit for breaking ranks. Not
Speaker 3: even like we condemn officials so and so and their
Speaker 3: bigotry or whatever more we are sorely disappointed in or
Speaker 3: anyone of the boiler play things. They won't even go
Speaker 3: that far. That's too far for them. So you have
Speaker 3: Democrats collaborating and a gay ink structure that has taken
Speaker 3: the energy and funding out of lave of the queer activists,
Speaker 3: but will absolutely will not fight when Democrats are involved.
Speaker 3: So if you're fascist, all you have to do is
Speaker 3: get some Democrats involved.
Speaker 4: Yeah, and that's that's how you give VICHI friends Like
Speaker 4: that's yeah.
Speaker 3: And honestly, this is it's a question I put to
Speaker 3: folks because you know, look, I'm honestly dealing with the
Speaker 3: North crownd Democrats. Is one of the things that made
Speaker 3: me an anarchist. So yeah, so it's you know, I've
Speaker 3: not had any faith in them for a very very
Speaker 3: long time. But for folks that you know, kind of
Speaker 3: do put a little more energie into electoral processes, I
Speaker 3: just you know, a questions the piece I think are
Speaker 3: worth asking them, Like what's the point of people who
Speaker 3: are just going to support your enemies?
Speaker 4: Yeah? What's the point of.
Speaker 3: People that you elect, maybe even like get out you
Speaker 3: know and dock doors or whatever to get elected, who
Speaker 3: then don't do the one thing they're elected to do?
Speaker 3: And God asked too for some of the folks who
Speaker 3: support some of these gay ink ords, I was like,
Speaker 3: if they won't fight, now, what is the point of them? Yeah,
Speaker 3: why do they deserve any support from us as a community?
Speaker 3: Or is it far past time to look to other alternatives?
Speaker 3: There was only lesson hbto taught as well, which is
Speaker 3: if you want even the most die hard bigot to
Speaker 3: start losing their nerve, to attack their money and their power,
Speaker 3: and then you don't stop if so, say all you
Speaker 3: have to compromise with a pragmatic solution, You ignore them,
Speaker 3: laugh in their faces, do whatever. But you keep pressting
Speaker 3: them because that was their thing. HQ too, there was
Speaker 3: a really effective campaign to boycott and it did have
Speaker 3: a substantial effect. You know, the lovely weapon of vicious
Speaker 3: mockery really came in handy, and even the rulgas didn't
Speaker 3: like becoming a national laughing stock, so there were less
Speaker 3: about how stuff could be fought as well. And the
Speaker 3: more radical history in North Carolina. You know, there are
Speaker 3: there are quer radicals here and you know, my city
Speaker 3: was hit by a massive hurricane last year and honestly,
Speaker 3: it was a lot of US radicals getting out in
Speaker 3: the ground that kept things from getting even worse. And
Speaker 3: you know, and just folks on the ground pitching in
Speaker 3: outside of government structures, not waiting for the official nonprofits
Speaker 3: who were either devastated or had not planned for this.
Speaker 3: So there are other alternatives, you know, and or heck
Speaker 3: that the hell.
Speaker 4: I have to remember, I could curse here.
Speaker 3: That the fact that civil rights we the low attention
Speaker 3: has gone to sitidence and there was a lot of
Speaker 3: organizing in those movements.
Speaker 4: It's a lot more Miltont than folks.
Speaker 3: Remember that also went along three decades of riots and
Speaker 3: cities throughout the state before the old order even began.
Speaker 4: To budge a little bit.
Speaker 3: And the lesson from that North caround Democrats and North
Speaker 3: Caunta status quo. And I see throughout the South and
Speaker 3: throughout the country it only budges even starts to move
Speaker 3: when the cost of continuing the way it is become
Speaker 3: far too high.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and our job is to impose that cost. Yes,
Speaker 2: because if we don't impose that cost, they're going to
Speaker 2: keep pushing and they are going to continue to write
Speaker 2: us out of existence until they have the guns to
Speaker 2: do it.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 3: And on that is that is a mentality I think
Speaker 3: a lot more people need to need to absorb. And
Speaker 3: I think one of the lessons from you know, fighting
Speaker 3: the far right at some points for my entire like
Speaker 3: adult life basically even a little bit before then in
Speaker 3: North Carolina is that the more you fight than the
Speaker 3: weaker they are. But also, and this is this is
Speaker 3: something one of the more experience transfernds us South I
Speaker 3: know has emphasized, you won't always win, you can always
Speaker 3: inflict a cost. And I think a little more like
Speaker 3: thinking outside of elections, a little more bloody minded determination
Speaker 3: can really come in handy of the sense of like
Speaker 3: if our enemies are like, Okay, court rules against us,
Speaker 3: We're still pressing the attack. Okay, election goes against us,
Speaker 3: We're still pressing the attack. I think we can do
Speaker 3: way meaner and way better than they than they do
Speaker 3: on that front. Something goes against us, that's nice. We're
Speaker 3: still pressing the attack. You know, there's nothing in this
Speaker 3: healthscape of an empire we have to abuy by, especially
Speaker 3: not in the South.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: Yeah, So if something doesn't go our way once, Okay, learn, regroup, redouble,
Speaker 3: make sure you inflicted some costs, go out and inflict
Speaker 3: more of them.
Speaker 4: They're not invincible, trust me.
Speaker 2: Yeah, another gender is possible.
Speaker 4: You just have to go out and fight for exactly.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so I think on that note, David, where can
Speaker 2: people find your work?
Speaker 3: You can find my stuff for trans News Network at
Speaker 3: Transnews dot Network, including this most recent piece. And you
Speaker 3: can find some of my local reporting as part of
Speaker 3: the Ashville Blade co op at Ashville Blade dot com.
Speaker 2: Awesome, and y'all at both the trans News Network and
Speaker 2: the actual Blade, I've been doing a bunch of absolutely
Speaker 2: incredible work. Thank you, and I encourage you, for one
Speaker 2: to support both because ideally the function of journalism is
Speaker 2: to be the targeting mechanism of the class and these
Speaker 2: these are two groups of working class trans journalists.
Speaker 4: To do it and both organizations are worker run. I
Speaker 4: should add yep, this.
Speaker 2: Has been a get happen here, Go fight them.
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