TO THE EDITOR:
On April 12, the Graduate and Professional Student Federation became the second of the University’s student legislative bodies to pass a resolution condemning House Bill 2. You would not know this fact by reading The Daily Tar Heel.
While the DTH’s article concerning that Senate session addresses important points, the author made a decision to highlight as most significant the current debates over student governance. In choosing to focus on these divisions in our community, they ignored one of the most important pieces of legislation under consideration — a resolution in which the GPSF joined with Student Congress to declare what being a Tar Heel means. Both SCR-97-363 (passed by Student Congress) and Resolution 16-16 (passed by the GPSF Senate) adamantly declare that HB2 is not the Carolina Way.
Instead, Carolina is inclusive, and House Bill 2 hampers our ability to be so. Both legislative bodies deemed the law discriminatory against the LGBTQ+ community, reaffirmed the protected status of all groups listed in the existing University anti-discrimination policies, called for the repeal of the law and/or the adoption of state laws protecting all groups listed in those policies, and sent their respective resolutions to legislators, administrators, and faculty on behalf of the student body.
The students of the University need to know that their representatives — whether in Student Congress or in the GPSF —stand together on this issue. Students can expect their representatives to continue to honor their protected statuses and to continue to advocate for the equal rights of all students on this campus.
Brian Coussens
Graduate student
Religious studies
