Cosette Singh: Basketball trumps LGBT community

March madness everywhere. It’s not just for college basketball championships anymore.

Sport and the threatened loss of revenue unified enough of the N.C. General Assembly to agree a bill to calm the N.C. Bathroom Crisis, the nationally pilloried House Bill 2.

This compromise, viewed either as a pragmatic first step or a sellout to moneyed interest such as those courting the ACC and NCAA, sailed through our fractured and contentious governing institutions. It is touted to restore North Carolina’s reputation.

The unifying spirit of bipartisanship along with the statewide celebration of the Tar Heels’ 2017 championship bid gives little comfort to those still vulnerable to discrimination. Their interests were judged below even those stained by NCAA investigation of two decades of a corrupt university administration, an investigation described as a “reluctant striptease.”

For those left out in the cold, this new bill may not be much of a fig leaf.

This story was originally published April 8, 2017 at 6:00 PM with the headline "Cosette Singh: Basketball trumps LGBT community."