By Timothy Magrath
Much has been written about a recently passed law in Florida to prohibit the discussion of sexual orientation in schools from kindergarten to 3rd grade. Critics of Florida’s legislation prohibiting discussion of sexual orientation in public kindergarten to third-grade classes say it targets already marginalized LBGTQ people and groups, while supporters of the law accuse critics of being “groomers” who support steering children to be sexually abused by gay pedophiles, or some other horrid fate. The critics of the legislation have also said the language is so vague that it would curtail any discussion of sexual education or orientation well beyond the third grade, and it empowers parents to sue while expanding legal liability to school systems across the state.
Is this really a problem? Or is this a Republican effort, led by presidential aspirant Gov. Ron DeSantis to demonize an already marginalized group, especially transexuals who have been in the political crosshair of Republican politicians across the country, to further their political aspirations? Is this really how Republican legislators and governors spend their time when they could be working on the real issues that affect their constituents, including infrastructure, climate change, jobs, health care and livable wages? Can anyone imagine kindergarten teachers inculcating young minds on sex?
All the first- and second-year teachers I have ever met were kind, caring people. Teachers convincing first graders to have sex a certain way is beyond bizarre. And the party of tort reform is expanding school systems’ liability to any parent who suspects a sexual conversation has taken place in the classroom, including any conversations about “mommy and daddy.”
One can imagine liberal parents, countering those sipping the Fox News Kool-Aid and the Ivermectin crowd by suing school systems for pushing stories with mommy and daddy heroes.
This legislation should have been named the Lawyer Full-Employment Act, as already stretched school resources will have to be used to defend them from wackadoodle litigation. Way to spend tax revenues.
Teachers pressed and insulted over the last years of the pandemic will be driven even more out of their loved profession. Why not praise our teachers and give them raises and tell them they are appreciated instead of suing them?
The mission of many Republican leaders is to demonize opposing views. Rep. Newt Gingrich (R-GA) in the early 1990s began spreading caustic words to aspiring congress members, and the political discourse has not been the same since. Now right-wing Q-Anon wing nuts believe Democratic leaders are pedophiles and even more “mainstream” MAGA Republicans consider the opposing party to be full of traitors, scum, criminals and socialists.
We are citizens of the same country -- friends and neighbors, not political enemies. But GOP leaders seem intent on dividing rather than uniting, first by political party, to “own the libs,” and then by attacking Mexicans and other immigrants, Muslims, minorities, and now people with different sexual or gender preferences. The party who has advocated forever for less government wants to monitor who is sleeping with whom and persecute them if they do not conform.
At this rate it will not take long for a Republican to go lower than Christina Pushaw, DeSantis’s Press Secretary, who tweeted that anyone opposed to this legislation must be a groomer.
It gets worse. Gov. DeSantis pushed for, and just signed, legislation that removes Disney’s special improvement district simply to punish one of the state’s largest employers for opposing the “Don’t Say Gay” bill. We are not born with such bigotry, but rather we are trained by our parents, and apparently by our political leaders. Speak out against bigotry in all forms, as The Walt Disney Company has done, or remain silent and foster division and hate.
Magrath is associate professor of political science and director of the Beall Institute for Public Affairs at Frostburg State University (Maryland).