We have been talking about transgender people a lot lately. People are being dragged out of restrooms because they don’t perfectly fit the gender role they are “supposed” to have. One girl in North Carolina got dragged out of a women’s restroom by police because they thought she didn’t look like a woman.
Many musicians are boycotting North Carolina because of this ridiculous law. It’s gotten serious… a Beatle is boycotting the state.
A transgender rock star, Laura Jane Grace, performed in North Carolina in protest. She took a powerful stand against this law at her show in Durham Sunday when she burned her birth certificate on stage. She told the audience, “Bye, gender!” as the paper went up in flames.
Here is what she said about HB2 in April when Buzzfeed asked if she was going to cancel her North Carolina show:
“I think the real danger with HB2 is that it creates a target on transgender people specifically. When you feel targeted as a trans person, the natural inclination is to go into hiding. But visibility is more important than ever; to go there and have the platform of a stage to stand on and speak your mind and represent yourself.”
Last week, Attorney General Loretta Lynch said that she will be suing. She says that these laws are overtly discriminatory and she compared this struggle to the Civil Rights movement in the 1950s and 1960s:
“It was not so very long ago that states, including North Carolina, had other signs above restrooms, water fountains, and on public accommodations, keeping people out based on a distinction without a difference. We’ve moved beyond those dark days.”
Lynch also said that the government can limit federal funding to the state if they do not stop these discriminatory practices.
Here’s what Grace said of the protest:
As if a birth certificate is some kind of eternally binding document. I never had any say in what was put on it.
— Laura Jane Grace (@LauraJaneGrace) May 16, 2016
Here are some reactions to what she did:
Never want the photos of @LauraJaneGrace burning her birth certificate to stop
— Sarah (@itssarahemily) May 17, 2016
You'll never be as cool as Laura Jane Grace. https://t.co/ZFWYb9lJy9
— Oh my G A D! (@superdupergad) May 17, 2016
Here is an interview with Laura from the Twitter series “True Trans:”
Featured image via Twitter.
