April 15, 2016 6:26 AM

Sometimes you find out that people really don't suck

It’s a beer with a message - and its brewers say it’s a simple one. Responding to North Carolina’s HB2 law that voids cities’ anti-discrimination rules, two of the state’s brewers are creating a new beer: the Don’t Be Mean to People: A Golden Rule Saison. Three dozen breweries have signed up to sell the beer on their draft taps; cans of it will also go to people who’ve donated to the project’s fundraising campaign, which currently stands at nearly $18,000 - far more than the original goal of $1,150. While it may seem like a symbolic gesture, the beer also signals resistance to the controversial legislation from within North Carolina’s burgeoning beer industry, which last year accounted for $1.2 billion in economic impact, according to the Brewers Association.

It certainly seems as if North Carolina is getting very publicly pummeled these days…and not without good reason. Lost in the Sturm und Drang over the anti-transgender bill passed by its knuckle-dragging Legislature and Governor, though, is the truth that the vast majority of people in the Tarheel State are decent, caring people committed to a “live and let live” ethos. The question of how good people could elect a hateful, bigoted cabal of Conservative “Christian” culture warriors is best left for another time. I’ve been to North Carolina twice, both times thoroughly enjoying both the place and the people. While I’m sure the haters, bigots, and homophobes aren’t difficult to find, they didn’t make their presence felt during the times I’ve spent in North Carolina.

It would be- and certainly has been- very easy to condemn North Carolina as a state that hates. The anger and recrimination generated by the newly discovered commitment of North Carolina Republicans to protecting the sanctity of the Tarheel State’s restrooms has created quite the (well-deserved) backlash. Then again, can you fault them for wanting to protect their defenseless women and children from marauding bands of transgender sexual predators?? Seriously, though…isn’t it time for people to stop making up reasons to camouflage their bigotry and fear of those who think, believe, live, and/or love differently than what might be considered “normal?”

The truth is that HB2 is helping to bring people together in ways that couldn’t previously have been imagined. It turns out that in the main most people don’t suck.

Don’t Be Mean to People will be released sometime in the middle of May. As for what it’ll taste like, Myers says they’re going for a beer that’s “bright, crisp, grainy, and fruity. And above all, delicious.”

The two brewers say they’ll donate 100 percent of the profit from the new beer’s sales to two North Carolina-based groups: EqualityNC, which opposes HB2 as part of its advocacy efforts, and QORDS, which operates summer music camps that focus on gay and transgender youth….

“We’ve gathered support from dozens of our fellow brewers,” says Keil Jansen, Myers’ partner in the venture, “and we have the ability to make a significant social impact by working together for a greater good.”

Sometimes, when humanity caves to its darker angels, people decide to band together to demonstrate that we need not be defined by those who hate and discriminate. As sad and distressing as it is that hatred and homophobia have won this skirmish, they cannot and will not prevail over the long term. Those who wallow in discrimination and self-superiority are standing on the wrong side of history, and in time they will inevitably be well and truly defeated. That may not happen this year or even next, but just as there are occasional skirmishes in the battle for women’s rights and civil rights, the battle for LGBT rights will be fought over the long haul. As with the struggle waged by women and African-Americans, it will no doubt be a case of “one step forward, two steps back.”

I hope to live long enough to see the day when someone comes out as gay, lesbian, transgender, or whatever other form of sexuality they may claim as their own…and the response will be a collective yawn. It really shouldn’t matter how someone lives and/or loves; it should only matter that they do…for life is richer and far more satisfying when one loves and is loved in return.

Why anyone could be narrow enough to have a problem with that is something I can’t wrap my head around. Eventually, the dinosaurs will die off and humanity can get on with the task of being excellent to one another. In the end, love will win…it just may be awhile before we’re able to definitively declare victory.

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This page contains a single entry by Jack Cluth published on April 15, 2016 6:26 AM.

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