Is there no distinction between teaching children about "sex" and teaching children about families and relationships? Because a casual reading of the bill certainly appears to threaten the latter, where the "this is reasonable" proponents seem to be pushing for the former interpretation.
Classic "disingenuous use of partisanship to talk past each other", but it's funny how the ostensibly "limited government" people are seemingly unworried about the potential for overreach in this case.
> Is there no distinction between teaching children about "sex" and teaching children about families and relationships?
Show me where the Florida law says anything about "families and relationships?" Young kids don't view parental relationships as inherently sexual, and therefore talking about different kinds of families doesn't require talking about sexuality.
That is, in fact, pretty much the point of the law--to prevent teachers from using discussions of families as a vehicle to talk about sexuality and sexual attraction to third graders.
> An act relating to parental rights in education; amending s. 1001.42, F.S. ... prohibiting classroom discussion about sexual orientation or gender identity in certain grade levels or in a specified manner [0]
This is the sort of deliberate, disingenuous misapprehension that I'm talking about. You understand that the phrase "sexual orientation" is widely interpreted as "what gender of person a person has relationships with", right? As in, it's not just about "sex" in the prurient, not-safe-for-children sense.
> 3. Classroom instruction by school personnel or third parties on sexual orientation or gender identity may not occur in kindergarten through grade 3…
I read this to prohibit discussion of sexual attraction with kids third grade and under. I don’t read this to prohibit incidental mention of someone’s same-sex spouse.
In practice, there is no problem if a teacher shows video incidentally including a straight couple. If it contains a gay couple, however, suddenly that could count as "classroom instruction" of sexual orientation. The teachers are left with the unenviable position of interpreting a vague law, resulting in it being safest to exclusively show kids straight couples.
Teaching happens the entire time kids are at school even when just talking to their teachers so a teacher mentioning their family, their kids, their spouse, changing their last name because they got married, changing from Miss to Mrs, wearing a wedding ring are all expressions of human sexuality.
Sexuality \Sex`ual"ity\, n.
The quality or state of being distinguished by sex.
--Lindley.
[1913 Webster]
They wrote the law so they could punish those they don't like and ignore violations by those they support.
Teaching happens in every interaction a child has in life.
If the purpose of schools is to undo the instillment of parents' values (or lack of them), we should at least be honest about it. That's the assumption behind most debates of this type.
If the purpose of schools is to teach specialized skills that most parents don't have, then we should cut the crap so that kids can learn them.
If the purpose of schools is to babysit kids so that their parents can be used as human batteries for Nestle and Kroger, then God help us.
>Teaching happens in every interaction a child has in life.
Which means that having a law that says teaching human sexuality can't happen is impossible to do without turning the teachers into uncaring robot like beings.
They could have banned the teaching of sexually explicate material but they chose not to.
> Which means that having a law that says teaching human sexuality can't happen is impossible to do without turning the teachers into uncaring robot like beings.
How archetypally liberal to define the difference between humans and “uncaring robot like beings” in terms of being able to talk about “human sexuality.” It’s really an obsession isn’t it.
What conservatives want (and can't say) is to prevent schools from telling young children that families without two opposite-sex parents are normal, when their parents disagree with that. That's fundamentally a value-judgment that doesn't have a black-and-white answer, but if it's interfering with math class, they have a point.
A same sex teacher having a wedding ring on or mentioning their spouse during math class would be teaching the kids about same sex relationships. It it was interfering with classes they would be showing examples of it but, to my knowledge and research, they haven't shown this.
You should read the actual text of the law. It's directed to "instruction" on "sexual orientation" or "gender identity." It's meant to prevent an off-hand mention of someone's same-sex spouse from turning into a discussion of sexual attraction and sexual orientation.
All activities in the classroom typically fall under the category of instruction not just the formal segments. This law is one of those laws meant to be used against the wrong people while ignoring when the correct people do the same sort of things.
Teachers by definition act in loco parentis; if parents disagree with other adults about values, that's a separate issue, but teachers shouldn't be overriding kids' parents on ideology.
> Teaching happens the entire time kids are at school even when just talking to their teachers so a teacher mentioning their family, their kids, their spouse, changing their last name because they got married, changing from Miss to Mrs, wearing a wedding ring are all expressions of human sexuality.
But that's exactly the problem. Parents want to insulate their young children from discussions of "human sexuality." We have strong social conventions to be able to talk about things kids are exposed to--weddings, etc.--without expressly talking about sexuality. Many parents, however, no longer trust teachers to adhere to these social conventions.
That isn't how the law is written. They could have, perhaps, actually written it that way but they didn't. I will leave it to the reader to infer their true intentions.
This rule is addressing other actions by government, such as the choice of government funded schools to adopt an ideology that a majority views as dangerous to their children — and represents a limit on government power.
You're making a hypothetical argument that is only tangentially-related to the actual bill as-passed.
The bill that was passed is deliberately vague. Beyond that, it empowers private citizens to sue teachers in their personal capacities for any alleged transgression.
This is crazy. The status quo was that this question would be left up to school districts, with boards that are elected at the local level. If a teacher was not complying with school district policy, then the recourse was to fire the teacher.
The bill you're arguing in favor of hijacks control from local voters, overrides the expressed preferences of parents and local voters, and relies on civil lawsuits to enforce a state policy.
What educational materials are you referring to? In Florida, the responsibility for choosing educational materials, negotiating with publishers, etc, was at the school district level.
Schools need to adhere to the Common Core subject areas, but what materials they use in teaching that was up to the district.
Recently, Florida's state-level Department of Education has been restricting the textbooks that school districts can use, but this is more of a reject list, than an accept list.
If the local area has a subpopulation with enough political power to ban the teachings of things they don't like, such as basic science, should they be allowed to do that given the harm it will cause the kids and society?
Yes — I believe in democratic societies where if a majority feels something is dangerous, they have a right to make policy around that issue.
I also believe in constitutional republics where we have overriding laws which protect minorities — but that doesn’t apply in this case, as there isn’t an inherent right to discuss sex with other people’s young children.
>I believe in democratic societies where if a majority feels something is dangerous, they have a right to make policy around that issue.
So it would be acceptable for those same religious people to stop females from getting the same sort of education males receive? The damage done to others by such actions has to be taken into account.
> I also believe in constitutional republics where we have overriding laws which protect minorities
I addressed that already.
> The damage done to others by such actions has to be taken into account.
This is something said but not done: look at how the male minority is treated in education, where the female majority speaks about equality while engaging in institutional sexism against the minority.
If Democrats want me to believe they are genuine in those principles, they should apply them consistently.
If the rule is meant to address actions by state government agencies and educational organizations (as your other comment implies), why is the execution of the bill only actionable at and/or below the school district level?
There’s many mechanisms by which a school can be influenced and covering them all at a high level is difficult. In trying to set specific process controls, you merely encourage gamesmanship: “this wasn’t done by the board — we voted to outsource our decision to a NGO!”
A more effective mechanism is to define the standard (ie, don’t talk to kids below 9 about sex in schools) — but give enforcement powers when that standard is breached to the people actually impacted by that breach. This law gives people a tool to hold government accountable when it breaches the norms expected by the community, eg when they groom children.
Thanks for citing a Washington Examiner opinion piece as evidence of your assertion. Sometimes teaching kids about sexuality is meant to educate them so they don't grow up ignorant an can make informed decisions. Some people are against that.
Those who think that females should have as much education as males are explicitly saying that they want the females to be more ignorant than the males.
It is absolutely the case in certain circumstances.
I know several evangelical parents who want their kids ignorant about sexual health because they think teaching kids about sexual health will lead to them engaging in sex. Of course, thats not how it works, and these kids just end up engaging in sex while totally uninformed or in some cases filled with disinformation (for example, being told that condoms don't work - the parents think if the kids believe there is no safe sex that they won't have sex - but the kids end up having sex and don't use a condom because they believe it doesn't work).
I paraphrased your comment, but I think I captured the essence of what you said accurately:
> to keep stoking the fires of the culture wars. When they get their people denouncing the opposition as “groomers”, they are achieving their objective.
