More on Erin Paré's transphobia and yet another scandal growing at Lee Roberts's UNC

Rep. Erin Paré’s transgender-dress-code has already made a ripple in the national news. A leading LGBTQ publication, The Advocate, published a prompt writeup about Pare’s provocation and local outlets in other states have begun to report on this ugly bill. I don’t know if Paré anticipated a national backlash. If she didn’t, she’s dimmer and more naive than her public image would suggest. If she expected national attention but didn’t care about the consequences, she’s a reckless transphobe and a perfect exemplar of the right-wing General Assembly.

OK. Paré’s strange strictures on the transgender community’s ability to live openly in public are likely to command more national attention. Anti-trans legislation is ubiquitous in red states. But Pare’s bill is much more like HB2 than the cookie-cutter oppression that’s spread across Red America in recent years. It is unique, original, and ridiculous. Like the North Carolina-born bathroom bill, Paré’s legislation subjects trans people to a type of public repression never (to my knowledge) seen before. And it’s simply twisted and bizarre and makes Paré, and the state, look like deluded, backwater bigots.

I am quite confident that there will be an intense backlash if like Paré’s proposal passes. We are not Mississippi. In this case, I do not mean that we are more progressive. Rather, I mean that we aren’t just one of a dozen or so Southern states with cretinous reputations. We have the unique status of having introduced ourselves to the world as anti-trans bathroom warriors. The first. The original. The “pioneers in bigotry,” as the New York Times said. If we pass a provocative, eye-catching anti-trans bill, the reaction will be worldwide, outraged, and/or at best incredulous. I don’t know if the nation still cares enough about trans rights to hammer us with economic sanctions. The transphobic virus has spread. But I know we will be reascending to the global stage for the most embarrassing possible reason.

UNC Chancellor Lee Roberts has another scandal on his hands. At least that’s what it sounds like. UNC football General Manager Michael Lombardi has apparently committed some sort of misconduct related to “human resources.” I won’t be irresponsible and speculate on what he did until hard information comes out.

But hard information is what Lee Roberts has made conspicuously scarce.

In response to this looming football fiasco, Roberts has attempted to deflect questions and prevent the story from growing. This is the way Roberts, a political operative once employed by the scandal-ridden McCrory administration, likes to respond when UNC’s Republican overlords make another piece of damaging news. He just affects a knowing smirk and mouths platitudes that he clearly does not believe. The best thing I can say about his secretive crisis-management style is that he doesn’t seem to actively enjoy controversies, as his bosses on the UNC Board of Trustees clearly do.

Roberts’s reticence is predictable but foolish. In the era of social media and stricter consequences for wealthy men’s misconduct, Lombardi’s story is almost certain to come out, perhaps soon. The administration’s efforts to suppress the facts will only stoke a greater appetite for the truth and undermine what little is left of their ethical credibility. I’m not a public relations expert. You don’t have to be. It’s clear that the UNC administration cannot hide anything from a world that has seen this great institution misgoverned by a little blue car full of bad-faith clowns. I don’t know what Lombardi did, or if he did it. But if there’s an ugly truth to reveal, I do not believe Roberts will be able to keep the broader world from seeing how his football program is once again bringing disgrace on the University of North Carolina.

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