TO THE EDITOR:
As a transgender alumnae, I’ve followed House Bill 2’s aftermath with obvious personal interest. However, the conversation took an unproductive turn with the narrative surrounding the UNC College Republicans and the allegations of their mistreatment of a trans student. The club’s response was criticized as insufficient, and since critics will undoubtedly claim they’d delete the evidence, there are only two ways to definitively prove the exchange occurred: (1) the accuser shares their message history with a third party, or (2) the club asks Facebook to use their logs to prove the messages never existed (which assumes the club can compel a giant corporation like Facebook to do anything).
So in the absence of irrefutable evidence, I assume this exchange didn’t happen. Even though I generally don’t agree with most Republican positions, I still believe they deserve the benefit of the doubt.
If this exchange is fake, the questions become, by whom and for what purpose? Some will argue this is an example of liberals falsifying discrimination to portray conservatives as hateful bigots. Others will say this was a conservative planted false-flag to portray trans advocates as liars. But those arguments would also currently lack substantiated evidence. Kind of like how House Bill 2 was justified by conservative lawmakers in the first place.
So instead of immediately attacking anything and everything we dislike as dangerous and dishonest — be that trans women or social conservatives — maybe we should simply agree to think more critically and fairly about problems and solutions.
Danielle Piergallini
Class of ’06
