The danger of “LGBT” teachers.

[HondurasKeiser]

So when you you imagine this off-the-books extra-curricular indoctrination of students about sex and gender is happening during the average school day?

Over 4,000 high schools have GSA clubs, which have school faculty sponsors. In many, many schools the whole counseling staff is geared to promote this new account of sex and gender, whether or not the parents are OK with that, and parents may not be informed about what is going on in those conversations at all. In fact, parents who disagree may be seen as toxic.

To me, that is a real danger.

So now it is student clubs that are a danger? Every club at a school is required to get a faculty sponsor just so that they have a place to meet. That's just routine. Are you going to ban all student clubs in high school? Or just the ones with "gay" in their name? That will last about as long as it takes the first group of students to take the school to court for unlawful discrimination. Students actually have a constitutional right to form clubs under the First Amendment.

And yes, there are some toxic parents out there. I had a student a couple of years ago at a different school who was badly beaten by his stepdad and thrown out of the house and forced to couch surf with friends through the end of his senior year because the parents found out he was gay. That is the very definition of a toxic parent.

I think if you took a moment to investigate what people are saying here instead of just sneering at us you might find that we had something of a point.

was speaking with [redacted] today [redacted] prefers the pronouns they/them,” the counselor writes in an email to the teacher, according to Fox News. “’She’ is fine too, but [redacted] likes ‘they/them’ the best,” it continues.
If you are emailing home, it may be best to use she/her when referring to [redacted],” the counselor concludes in the email.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10795095/Pennsylvania-school-blasted-conspiring-conceal-students-decision-identify-non-binary.html

from the same state

The school district employs the use of a “gender transition team” that includes government officials and doctors who are charged with curating plans to help young children transition in school.

Policies last revised in 2019 state that “all students have a right to privacy and this right includes the right to keep one’s transgender status private at school.”

The school district stresses throughout its policies that it will not disclose any information to parents except in certain narrow circumstances, such as children giving consent or by legal requirement.

To address transgender claims from children, the school district also conducts a “secret psychological evaluation” of students as young as five years old, according to the lawsuit. The “gender transition team,” which the district calls a student support team, will then draft a “timeline for the transition in order to create the conditions supporting a safe and accepting environment at the school.”

District policy also requires that the school allow children to use restrooms and other facilities not aligned with their biological sex. In addition, school faculty and other officials are instructed to address children who say they are transgender with a “preferred pronoun” and alternative name.

“A court-ordered name or gender change is not required, and the student need not change his or her official records,” the district policy states.

AFL says this policy allows the school to conceal from parents whether their children have a different identity in the classroom.

“This effectively requires school personnel, at the request of a student, to use certain pronouns or names with the student at school, but a separate name and pronoun with parents at school or in correspondence sent home,” the lawsuit reads. https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/2793292/pennsylvania-school-district-sued-secret-gender-transitions/

At least 168 districts governing 5,904 schools nationwide have rules on the books that prevent faculty and staff from disclosing to parents a student’s gender status without that student’s permission, according to a list compiled by the conservative group Parents Defending Education and shared with The Post.

The 3,268,752 students affected by such policies go to class in all kinds of districts — large and small, affluent and poor, urban and rural, red and blue — stretching from North Carolina to Alaska.

The non-comprehensive list includes two of the largest school districts in the country, Chicago Public Schools and Los Angeles Unified School District — along with other city jurisdictions like DC Public Schools, Baltimore City Public Schools, San Francisco Unified School District, Portland Public Schools, and Seattle Public Schools.
https://nypost.com/2023/03/08/us-public-schools-conceal-childs-gender-status-from-parents/

The Department of Education also advises teachers to create “Gender & Sexuality Alliance” clubs targeting students as young as elementary school, using private communications and fictitious names to conceal the nature of these initiatives from parents. In private, however, the trainers are straightforward about their objectives: these clubs, using cover names such as “Leadership Club” or “Everyone for Equality,” are explicitly designed to advance left-wing gender “activism” and to promote gender “fluidity” beginning in elementary school.

Finally, the Department of Education teaches school employees how to facilitate the sexual transition of children under their care, while keeping the process a secret from parents. The trainers explicitly tell educators that they should keep a student’s new name, pronouns, and sexual identity confidential, including from family, unless otherwise directed by the child. “Schools should be using the name and pronouns that students go by,” says Phillips-Knope, citing Title IX guidance from the Biden administration’s Office of Civil Rights. Even if a student is suicidal, the department recommends that school officials keep the student’s sexual transition a secret from parents. “If you’re sort of into that area of like, ‘you’re going to hurt yourself or somebody else,’ and you have a duty to report—I mean, the law is really clear about that—you can also talk to parents, though, about like that ‘your kid is having suicidal thoughts,’ without outing them, without saying why,” says Phillips-Knope. “You can say, ‘We have some concerns, your child has shared this,’ [but] I would one-thousand percent recommend working with the student to let them guide that process. - City Journal”

The New York Times just published a big story by Katie J.M. Baker about the question of whether and under what circumstances it might be appropriate for schools to hide from parents the fact that their kid is seeking to change their name and/or pronouns and/or other stuff because they believe they are trans.

To call this a loaded subject is an understatement. I think it’s really one of the most incendiary areas of the youth gender discussion, perhaps because it’s among the only ones where it’s possible parents of minor children might not get final say over what’s best for them. Parents get very freaked out by the idea that their kid’s school is hiding something from them. And this isn’t limited to conservative parents at all — Baker’s story features plenty of pissed-off liberal ones.

The policy in question, which has been enacted at schools across the country (Baker doesn’t provide any stats about how common this practice is, and I don’t think any exist), is quite simple. If a child wants to change their name, pronouns, and so on, and they simply say they don’t want their parents to know, that’s that: The school will go ahead and allow them to socially transition at school, and will keep it a secret from their parents. It puts a lot of power in the hands of kids who are in some cases very young, very troubled, or both. - Jesse Singal

Jessica Bradshaw found out that her 15-year-old identified as transgender at school after she glimpsed a homework assignment with an unfamiliar name scrawled at the top.

When she asked about the name, the teenager acknowledged that, at his request, teachers and administrators at his high school in Southern California had for six months been letting him use the boy’s bathroom and calling him by male pronouns.

Mrs. Bradshaw was confused: Didn’t the school need her permission, or at least need to tell her?

It did not, a counselor later explained, because the student did not want his parents to know. District and state policies instructed the school to respect his wishes.

“There was never any word from anyone to let us know that on paper, and in the classroom, our daughter was our son,” Mrs. Bradshaw said.

The Bradshaws have been startled to find themselves at odds with the school over their right to know about, and weigh in on, such a major development in their child’s life — a dispute that illustrates how school districts, which have long been a battleground in cultural conflicts over gender and sexuality, are now facing wrenching new tensions over how to accommodate transgender children.

The Bradshaws accepted their teenager’s new gender identity, but not without trepidation, especially after he asked for hormones and surgery to remove his breasts. Doctors had previously diagnosed him as being on the autism spectrum, as well as with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, PTSD and anxiety. He had struggled with loneliness during the pandemic, and, to his parents, seemed not to know exactly who he was yet, because he had repeatedly changed his name and sexual orientation.

Given those complexities, Mrs. Bradshaw said she resented the fact that the school had made her feel like a bad parent for wondering whether educators had put her teenager, a minor, on a path the school wasn’t qualified to oversee. https://www.nytimes.com/2023/01/22/us/gender-identity-students-parents.html

[Szdfan]

I think if you took a moment to investigate what people are saying here instead of just sneering at us you might find that we had something of a point.

I think schools are in a really difficult position. On the one hand, I understand why some parents are upset that schools didn't inform them about what they know regarding their childrens' sexuality. I would be upset if something like that happened to me. On the other hand, schools do have an obligation to keep their students safe. Not all parents or families are safe for their LGBTQ children. Like Ken, I'm aware of a number of situations where kids were kicked out of their homes because they identified as LGBTQ. This didn't involve sexuality, but I've called CPS because of suspected abuse.

So yes, I understand why parents are upset, but the other part of that conversation also has to be, why don't children feel safe telling their parents about their sexuality? Why do these students feel they have to hide this part of themselves?

[ohio jones]

The church has always come into conflict with science. The early church rejected the notion of the atom and later atomic theory. The 16th century church rejected the modern astronomy of Copernicus, Galileo, and Kepler. Up to this day, conservative elements of Christianity reject modern biology and modern geology.

So it is no great surprise that conservative Christianity would reject modern psychological sciences when it comes into conflict with that world view.

This line of reasoning only makes sense if one assumes that "modern" is unquestionably right. I see little reason to consider it axiomatic that "modern" astronomy and modern psychological sciences are equally true, and that a biblical worldview is necessarily false.

[Szdfan]

So when you you imagine this off-the-books extra-curricular indoctrination of students about sex and gender is happening during the average school day?

Over 4,000 high schools have GSA clubs, which have school faculty sponsors. In many, many schools the whole counseling staff is geared to promote this new account of sex and gender, whether or not the parents are OK with that, and parents may not be informed about what is going on in those conversations at all. In fact, parents who disagree may be seen as toxic.

To me, that is a real danger.

So now it is student clubs that are a danger? Every club at a school is required to get a faculty sponsor just so that they have a place to meet. That's just routine. Are you going to ban all student clubs in high school? Or just the ones with "gay" in their name? That will last about as long as it takes the first group of students to take the school to court for unlawful discrimination. Students actually have a legal and constitutional right to form clubs at school.

And yes, there are some toxic parents out there. I had a student a couple of years ago at a different school who was badly beaten by his stepdad and thrown out of the house and forced to couch surf with friends through the end of his senior year because the parents found out he was gay. That is the very definition of a toxic parent. And that is the real world.

My school has a chapter of the Fellowship of Christian Athletes. We sometimes have students who have prayer meetings at the flag pole before school. Does this mean that the school is promoting Christianity?

Schools have an obligation to treat all of their students the same. They have an obligation to keep all of their students safe. To me, it feels that when schools treat their LGBTQ students like they're normal and not like they're freaks or mentally ill, they get accused of "promoting homosexuality." I don't think that's a fair characterization.

[Bootstrap]

My school has a chapter of the Fellowship of Christian Athletes. We sometimes have students who have prayer meetings at the flag pole before school. Does this mean that the school is promoting Christianity?

Schools have an obligation to treat all of their students the same. They have an obligation to keep all of their students safe. To me, it feels that when schools treat their LGBTQ students like they're normal and not like they're freaks or mentally ill, they get accused of "promoting homosexuality." I don't think that's a fair characterization.

I am only familiar with one GSA chapter at one school. But at that one, there was a great deal of encouragement to explore sexuality, and members of the chapter were exploring their sexuality with each other. And parents were not even aware that their children were part of this.

I really do see that as a problem. I would like parents to have a say in what activities their children are involved in.

[Ken]

I think if you took a moment to investigate what people are saying here instead of just sneering at us you might find that we had something of a point.

And what do you think that point is?

The main question raised in most of your articles is whether or not students have a right to privacy apart from their parents. Or whether parent's rights are 100% paramount and override anything the student wants. This is a legal question that goes far beyond the very narrow topic of trans. I don't know exactly where I come done on this issue but I recognize it is far larger than just the recent obsession with trans kids and their pronouns.

The issue also cuts both ways. If parent's rights are paramount, then the state has absolutely no business interfering with the right of parents to seek whatever medical treatment and accommodations they deem best for their children without the government intervening. The hypocrisy of the anti-trans movement is that they want to have it both ways. They want parents rights to be paramount when it comes to student's privacy but then erase parent's rights when it comes to deciding on medical care or social acceptance for their children.

Personally I think parent's rights should generally take precedent in nearly all instances. Which means that schools should not be deliberately withholding information from parents. And it also means that the state should not interfere in any way with the private medical or mental health related decisions of parents. We already have in place procedures for the legal emancipation of minors should they have irreconcilable differences with their parents. That should be enough.

But the issue of whether or not parents should be informed is a completely separate issue with whether or not schools should accommodate students who are LGBT in the same way that they accommodate all other students. Don't conflate the two issues, they are separate. In my experience, it is a small minority of parents who are unaware of who their children are. And in all my years of teaching I have never had a student ask me to hide something with their parents. Well, that's not entirely true. I have had students beg me for temporary leniency on grades so they don't get grounded for the weekend "Mr. Ken, can you please just not put that grade in until Monday?" But that is about it.

What is the percentage of students who have some type of LGBT identity in school and are hiding it from their parents? I have no idea. I expect it is a pretty small percentage of the total number of school students who express some sort of LGBT identity in school. In my experience, the parents are not only in the loop, they are the ones coming to the school asking for things like bathroom accommodations for their child. If you actually believe in parental rights then you should support this. And you should support the rights of all parents to see their children welcomed and accommodated in the public schools whoever they are and whatever their identity is.

The other stuff about student clubs is just unsubstantiated scandalmongering that traces back to Christopher Rufo. Who is not a remotely credible source on any of this.

[Bootstrap]

I think if you took a moment to investigate what people are saying here instead of just sneering at us you might find that we had something of a point.

And what do you think that point is?

I think he knows what that point is. Is it that hard for you to see it? Give it a try .... without disparaging, just try to summarize what you think his central point is. Shouldn't require more than a sentence or so.

[Ken]

My school has a chapter of the Fellowship of Christian Athletes. We sometimes have students who have prayer meetings at the flag pole before school. Does this mean that the school is promoting Christianity?

Schools have an obligation to treat all of their students the same. They have an obligation to keep all of their students safe. To me, it feels that when schools treat their LGBTQ students like they're normal and not like they're freaks or mentally ill, they get accused of "promoting homosexuality." I don't think that's a fair characterization.

I am only familiar with one GSA chapter at one school. But at that one, there was a great deal of encouragement to explore sexuality, and members of the chapter were exploring their sexuality with each other. And parents were not even aware that their children were part of this.

I really do see that as a problem. I would like parents to have a say in what activities their children are involved in.

Parents do have a say. But the actual law of the land says that students have the right to form clubs without the interference of the school. Congress passed the Equal Access Act in 1984 and it was signed into law by that famous liberal president Ronald Reagan. This law:

Forbids public schools from receiving federal funds if they deny students the First Amendment right to conduct meetings because of the “religious, political, philosophical, or other content of the speech at such meetings.”

Passed by 88 to 11 in the Senate and 337 to 77 in the House of Representatives, it was motivated by the Supreme Court ruling in Widmar v. Vincent (1981), which guaranteed these protections on public university campuses. It was part of an ongoing effort by religious conservatives to secure a presence for religion in public schools in the wake of the Court’s decisions in Engel v. Vitale (1962) and Abington School District v. Schempp (1963), forbidding school-sponsored prayer and Bible reading.

Congress had made repeated attempts to overrule the Court or strip it of jurisdiction in “school prayer” cases. Many states, meanwhile, had introduced legislation requiring a moment of silence in public schools. In 1984 President Ronald Reagan promised a constitutional amendment to put matters concerning prayer in schools in the hands of state and local authorities.

Despite the previous rejection of equal-access proposals by various federal and state courts as violations of the establishment clause, ”school prayer” advocates, after failing repeatedly in their efforts, turned their attention to passing equal-access legislation. Because 1984 was an election year, Republicans had a strong incentive to make good on promises to “put God back in the schools,” whereas Democrats wanted to avoid being seen as anti-religious.

Supporters of the Equal Access Act of 1984 promoted it as protection of the “free exercise” rights of students, whereas strict separationists voiced concerns about its use of public facilities for religious purposes. However, its protection extends to political and philosophical content as well, allowing the argument that exclusion of religious meetings would violate the required government neutrality toward religion.

Upheld by the Supreme Court in the case of Board of Education of the Westside Community Schools v. Mergens (1990), the Equal Access Act of 1984 has been the source of considerable controversy and litigation since its passage.

The Mergens litigation arose after Nebraska public school officials refused to allow student Bridget Mergens and classmates to form a Bible club in school, arguing that the Equal Access Act violated the establishment clause; the argument was rejected by the Supreme Court.

Some schools sought to avoid allowing controversial clubs to form by eliminating all other noncurricular clubs, and other schools redefined existing clubs as “curricular,” asserting their presumed benefits for the curriculum.

Ironically, although the intent of the original promoters of the Equal Access Act of 1984 was to give Christian groups a presence on campus, the act has precipitated controversy because of the emergence of non-Christian groups such as Wiccans. Recently, attempts to form gay and lesbian groups have kept the Equal Access Act of 1984 in the spotlight.

Source: https://firstamendment.mtsu.edu/article ... t-of-1984/

[Neto]

Curiosity: If a child is using a secret name (not revealed to their parents), what name is on the report cards? Wouldn't some students be offended in either case, no matter which is used?

[Bootstrap]

I am only familiar with one GSA chapter at one school. But at that one, there was a great deal of encouragement to explore sexuality, and members of the chapter were exploring their sexuality with each other. And parents were not even aware that their children were part of this.

I really do see that as a problem. I would like parents to have a say in what activities their children are involved in.

Parents do have a say. But the actual law of the land says that students have the right to form clubs without the interference of the school. Congress passed the Equal Access Act in 1984 and it was signed into law by that famous liberal president Ronald Reagan. This law:

The Equal Access Act of 1984 primarily ensures that non-curriculum-related student groups have the same access to public secondary school facilities as other extracurricular groups. If a school allows one non-curriculum related club, it must afford the same opportunity to all student-led groups, regardless of the religious, political, or philosophical content of their meetings. (This summary was created partly with GPT.)

It says nothing at all about parent's rights to decide whether their children participate. It says nothing at all about whether parents have a right to be informed if their children participate.

Some schools seem to believe the parents have very few rights here. In effect, that means that their children are exposed to things their parents have no knowledge of, in settings where people agree not to tell the parents. The beliefs and values of the parents are undermined. So is the role of the parents. Sometimes, the relationship with the parents is also undermined, the parent's beliefs are labeled as toxic, and the parents are labeled as toxic as well. Children are effectively taught to see their parents this way.

To me, that's the real danger.

What would you do if you suspected that might be happening in your school?