It’s no wonder Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell won’t release a Republican policy platform for the midterms. Everything they do is awful. Their platform might as well say, “Eat shit, America. You’re stuck with us now.”
After Cronenberg-ing our country to the point where 10-year-old rape victims are now forced to travel out of state to end their pregnancies, conservatives are putting the screws to LGBTQ kids in new and creative ways.
The public school board in Leon County, Florida, has decided to slap scarlet letters on trans kids so ignorant parents can feel a little less skeeved out by who their children are playing with. Last week, the board approved an “LGBTQ Inclusive School Guide” that includes a lot of horrible, cruel, grotesquely un-American things.
What drew the most debate was a provision that a school will notify parents — by form — if a student who is "open about their gender identity" is in a physical education class or on an overnight trip.
Some teachers and students during the Tuesday night meeting said the policy will “out” LGBTQ+ students — revealing their sexual orientation or gender identity without their permission.
Everyone got that? LGBTQ kids are a danger to your kids because they’re different. And we can’t have that!
Of course, Florida decided to officially get into the bully kids business when Ron DeSantis, the dude who put the goober in gubernatorial, decided to sign the state’s vicious Don’t Say Gay bill, which can only be described as a hammer blow to LGBTQ kids’ self-esteem.
Needless to say, not everyone was pleased with Leon County’s cruel tack.
“The notification to all the parents can create a very stressful and unwanted situation to trans and LGBTQ students,” Leon High School student Kailey Sandell said at the school board meeting, where the guide was approved 4-0. “A lot of times kids assume that kids are gay or trans; they will easily be able to hurt them.”
Lauren Kelly-Manders, a 34-year-old Tallahassee resident who sits on the city’s LGBTQ+ Advisory Council and came out while attending Leon High School, told the Tallahassee Democrat, “Sending out a parent notification could be seen as placing a target on a student’s back.”
Gee, ya think? What better way to reduce someone to second-class-citizen status than forcing them to come with a warning label?
Anyone who felt alienated or picked on in school knows how devastating this will be for these kids. While the guide does say that students’ sexual orientation and gender identity “should not be shared with others without their input and permission,” exactly how long will that hold up in this McCarthyist environment?
I can laugh off a lot, but conservatives are cutting to the bone now. This is flat-out nauseating. Let’s target some of our most vulnerable children in the most craven and lurid way imaginable, because ‘Merica!
We are now the United States of Fuck You If You’re Not a White Cisgender Male. This cruelty has to stop. You know what to do.
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