For those of you who don’t know me personally, I go to school at North Carolina State University. I spent the past nine months in Raleigh, North Carolina. Upon returning back home after finishing my second semester, I was always asked about the best and worst parts of college in North Carolina. While it’s always hard to say what the best part of my new life in a new state is, recently it’s become very easy for me to tell people the thing that bothers me most about North Carolina.

HB2.

House Bill 2, more commonly referred to as HB2, has created a media firestorm since being passed on March 23, 2016. The bill is known for specifically targeting transgender citizens by requiring them to use restrooms, locker rooms, and changing rooms of the gender found on their birth certificate. While this topic alone is more than enough for a large debate, that’s not all HB2 does. It also takes away the right to sue in state court for employment discrimination based on sex, race, religion, ethnicity, and sexual orientation. It blocks local governments from enacting laws and ordinances that protect the rights of LGBT citizens.

HB2 has been controversial since its genesis. There have been protests for its repeal across the state, boycotts by celebrities who refuse to perform, and big name companies refraining from doing business in the stat. Most recently, we saw a legal battle with the U.S. Department of Justice over the constitutionality of the bill. People from all over the place want to give their opinion for or against HB2, and because this is America, each one of those people is entitled to voice their opinion.

And it’s because this is America that I think this bill is so outrageously discriminatory and shockingly narrow-minded. This country was founded with the purpose of providing a haven for a group of people facing oppression and discrimination. While our history has engaged in a long battle to provide rights for all people, we have slowly been making strides toward greater equality and acceptance. In recent years, I thought our country had come pretty far. HB2 proved to me and many others that we have so much further to go.

As a country, we’ve seen similar discriminatory legislation before. These laws banning where people can use the bathroom is strongly reminiscent of those “separate but equal” accommodations made before the Civil Rights Movement. We can now clearly see that forcing people to eat at a certain restaurant, go to a certain school, and drink from a certain water fountain based on race is completely and utterly wrong, yet many people in our country can’t make the parallel between that discrimination and that which we are currently facing.

It all boils down to the same thing every time; people are scared of change and what they don’t understand. But it’s 2016. We know more about human sexuality, gender, and sexual orientation than we ever have before. We’ve dispelled the myths that homosexuality is a mental disorder, or that being gay is a choice. Hopefully, soon, we will be able to see that transgender people being able to pee in a place where they feel safe and comfortable poses no threat to the rest of society.

Once you get past the blatant discrimination and misplaced fear, some people have posed concerns separate from transgender people. Some say that they’re worried that pedophiles and rapists will dress up as the opposite sex and use the same bathroom as their victims by posing as transgender people. What these people fail to realize is that other states have already banned discrimination against transgender people in public restrooms and locker rooms. Colorado, Connecticut, Hawaii, Iowa, Maine, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Nevada, New Mexico, Oregon, Rhode Island and Vermont all allow transgender citizens to use the bathroom of the gender they identify with. Another commonality between all 12 states? They all have reported that there has been no increase in sex crimes because of their non-discrimination laws—and these states were just the 12 that reported in this particular study. There are 17 states and over 200 cities in the U.S. that have this kind of non-discrimination legislation.

We’re losing money every day, which is hurting our economy. We’re losing potential students who would otherwise be coming to our prestigious universities in the fall. But, most of all, we’re being looked down on by the rest of the country and many other countries.

I love going to school in North Carolina, but I don’t love this hate. I’m calling on citizens of North Carolina and citizens everywhere else to speak out against this discrimination. I want to tell everyone who supports this law—and Governor of North Carolina, Pat McCrory—to prepare to be on the wrong side of history. Repeal this awful legislation before you make things any worse for North Carolina.