An Open Letter to Governor Cooper and State Legislators in North Carolina

Dear Governor-Elect Cooper and North Carolina General Assembly,

I am a 15-year-old transgender boy living in Greenville, North Carolina, and I want to tell you about how HB2 affects kids like me.

Since the day the bill was put into law, my friends and I have experienced things nobody should have to go through at any age. I was bullied so badly in public school that I had to withdraw completely and start homeschooling. Every day my peers would push me around the halls. They repeatedly called out slurs as I walked past and I’ve had people threaten to beat me up or even kill me, just for being myself.

And it’s not just me. I know there are many other people who have experienced similar traumatic experiences just for trying to be themselves. Regular people, just like you and me, are being put through this every day because there are individuals who would rather act with fear than with love. Fear is a powerful emotion beyond measure and those who are scared can easily get angry. When people tap into this innermost emotion they often act without reason or logic and to their targets, like me, it is nothing short of terrifying.

I believe HB2 is a hateful bill. It unleashed so much hate in the people who surround me in my life. To make matters worse, it doesn’t appear that legislators even took the time to think through how this would affect people like me. It was rushed through in a one-day session in response to a nondiscrimination ordinance in Charlotte, and none of the committee members had time for a thorough review. Even so, the bill was approved and signed by Governor McCrory that night.

A couple months later, I decided to send him an open letter asking to meet. I planned to explain what it’s like to live under HB2 as a transgender teen, to help him understand what my life was now like. After a few weeks of emailing back and forth with his scheduler, I was left feeling betrayed when my request went unanswered.

I never had the chance to meet with Governor McCrory and so now I am asking you to give me the opportunity to have an honest, respectful conversation about the impacts of this bill on my life. I feel it is the least I deserve after a bunch of legislators made a decision that forced me into homeschool. I would like to explain how HB2 has changed my life and so do my friends. As your constituents, we deserve to be heard and treated genuinely as the decent human beings we are. Nothing less.

Thank you for your time.

Sincerely,

Skye Thomson