Florida PE teachers object to trans locker room policy

[GrinitchSpinach]

The fabulous R0wan pointed this up on the Trump thread, but at first it was being reported only in somewhat dodgy-looking right wing publications. I found a mainstream news source for it and thought it deserved its own thread.

From the Tampa Bay Times:

The issue arose in September, when a Chasco Middle School student who was born female told teachers he is male. He asked to be considered a boy and to use the boys’ restroom and locker room.

The school’s two physical education teachers objected to supervising the locker room, where children change clothing and may take showers.

"I told them (Chasco administrators) I have an issue with it," teacher Stephanie Christensen said in an interview.

She said she wanted the school to inform others involved that it was allowing a transgender student into the locker room. The district has said it would not do so, because it did not want to violate the privacy rights of the transgender student.

"Part of my concern is, if students are allowed to do this, the other kids and their parents have a right to know," Christensen said. "It’s their privacy, too."

She and teacher Robert Oppedisano, who refused to monitor the locker room, contacted the Liberty Counsel to seek protections and advice. Christensen said they felt their jobs were in jeopardy, after they were told locker room supervision is a key part of their work and also that they could not discuss the situation with other students who were affected.

District employee relations director Kathy Scalise said the employees were reminded of their responsibilities. "But have we threatened them with their jobs? Absolutely not."

www.tampabay.com/news/education/k12/Religious-rights-group-protests-Pasco-s-treatment-of-transgender-students_172966092

(for non-US posters, btw, middle schoolers are generally between 12 and 14 years old)

The teachers then got in touch with Liberty Counsel, a right-wing evangelical Christian legal organization. Liberty wrote to the district to object to the policy. The issue was discussed at a school board meeting October 17 and the board expects to have further discussions in the weeks ahead.

Where it gets hairy, from our perspective, is that this complaint is being pushed by Liberty Counsel, who are at the same time lumping this in with a parent complaint about the school Gay-Straight Alliance Club. The women at Hands Across the Aisle emphasize that they believe sex protections must be fought for on a rational legal basis without relying on religious objections, and I think they're right. I am very curious to know how Christensen and Oppedisano found their way to Liberty Counsel rather than any kind of neutral legal representation...

I am very curious to know how Christensen and Oppedisano found their way to Liberty Counsel rather than any kind of neutral legal representation...

I'd guess it's because any neutral representation would have its reputation and business trashed by TRAs.

That's why we keep finding ourselves with what would normally be very strange bedfellows.

Possibly because US organisations who will take this stance are few and far between. Maybe only an evangelical, right wing Christian organisation is all the teachers can afford to turn to!

Do we have any American MNers who could help us understand the possibilities and ramifications?

I'd assume Liberty Counsel are taking the case pro bono - sadly they would be very unlikely to find a left wing organisation willing to do that.

But I would also guess these teachers are of the religious right themselves. Not people whose side I'd normally want to be on, but maybe their religion gave them the ability to take a stand here, when a left wing teacher might been similarly uncomfortable with the situation, but not had a support network and community and legal apparatus backing them up to object to it.

There was a post on another thread I think, or I may have read it elsewhere, about a large group of parents in Florida who stormed into a school when they discovered their kids were being fed genderist bollocks.

The leaders were a lesbian feminist and a Baptist minister.

I would be interested to learn more about that, Prawn. Having a google now...

Meanwhile I think David Whitley of the Orlando Sentinel outlines the current murky legal situation well:

Orange County Public Schools and Seminole County Public Schools handle things on a “case-by-case basis.”

What that actually means is pretty hazy, but there’s reason for the uncertainty.

Under the Obama administration, public schools were directed to allow students to use bathrooms that aligned with their gender identity, even if that conflicted with the gender on the student’s birth certificate.

The Trump administration rescinded that guidance and has left it up to individual school districts to determine how to accommodate transgender students.

School districts take their cues from courts. The Supreme Court declined to address the issue last year and lower courts have been inconsistent in their rulings...

...Which opinions might bind or persuade local districts is anyone’s guess.

www.orlandosentinel.com/opinion/audience/david-whitley/os-ae-transgender-students-david-whitley-0808-story.html

I think this will end up in the Supreme Court one way or another (not necessarily this particular case), and it's hard to imagine the new conservative majority enforcing the Obama "gender identity" interpretation of the word "sex" in Title IX.

It is interesting that in these Florida districts as elsewhere, TRAs argue that the feelings and needs of the trans child trump those of all other students, and moreover that these feelings and needs can only be met by compelling others (students, teachers) to treat biological sex as a fiction and gender identity as truth. In other words, TRAs and the school boards they influence have often rejected third spaces, single-occupancy private spaces, etc. They claim that the law makes some girls more equal than others...

In the meantime, male people are winning the girls' sports medals and scholarships, and who knows how many students are both uncomfortable changing and showering with people of the opposite sex, and afraid to say so.

Sarahjconnor posted this in the thread Is the word woman being eroded in other countries?

DM lives in Florida, they did a workshop in a local primary school and asked 6-9 year olds about their gender identity. One child told his parent in the car park and immediately a gang of between 30 and 40 parents stormed the school, destroyed all the documents from the workshop. The police arrived at the teachers request, but they supported the parents.

That's how they deal with it in Florida

I believe the charge into the school was led by an incongruous pairing of the local Baptist minister and a butch lesbian who runs her own construction yard. But I can't take what my mother says as gospel as she embellishes everything.

For those who don't know, the Supreme Court is just like it says, there is no higher authority, and once they settle a case, that's pretty much it. It would take 50 years or more to legally overturn it, if ever.

I am quite terrified of the liberals right now. They appear to be crazy. Rape is love, penis is vagina, and lesbians are bigots for not having sex with creepy men. I certainly am not a fan of Trump but... can't have penises in the women's prisons etc.

So in this particular case, if this child is female on the birth certificate but now physically looks male (which I suppose because otherwise the other students and parents would know without having to be told by the teachers), which lockers should they use?

Should have seen our female PE teacher , she was very hairy and muscular ,
I met her about 20 years ago in a lesbian bar , she was just as butch

Unless they just moved to the area from somewhere without the internet, it's likely everyone knows the child is really a girl, no matter what clothes she is wearing.

The child should change in a private space.

The legal representation by the Liberty Counsel is most certainly free. The Thomas More Society also does free legal representation for cases like this. Individuals, companies, and trusts make donations to these lawyer groups allowing them to take on cases and pay staff. In addition, lawyers not directly employed by such societies can donate time and expertise.

The child in question most likely looks as female as she ever did, Skippingabeat. It is most unlikely that she has had any kind of operation.

The issue of teachers telling other students is to give fair warning so as to avoid surprise or to allow for modesty or to prevent a situation arising where the trans/female student would be told by the male students that she should go to the correct shower room. The issue of telling parents arises because parents might object, might mount a campaign, might refuse to give permission for their students to attend PE.

Thank you for the explanation mathanxiety

Should have seen our female PE teacher, she was very hairy and muscular. I met her about 20 years ago in a lesbian bar, she was just as butch
Could you explain the relevance of this post in relation to this thread? It's escaping me.

" "It’s their privacy, too.""

No, it's not. The trans lobby doesn't care for anyone else, in this case anyone else's privacy, other than trans.

I'm very very very confused about this story.

Even the ultra woke* would realise that this is a terrible idea for the transboy and put them in serious risk.

They would also know that asking a male pe teacher to supervise a female student in the locker room is a bloody stupid idea. Going to be horrendously uncomfortable for the male teacher not to mention goes against basic ideas of safe guarding which aren't only there for the student but for the teacher's protection too.

*The ultra woke do not live in Land O'Lakes though, which leads me to wonder what the hell is happening and why does this school think it is under some sort of obligation to do this?

The ultra woke do not live in Land O'Lakes though, which leads me to wonder what the hell is happening and why does this school think it is under some sort of obligation to do this?

As to why the school thinks it is under some obligation to do this, I am sure it is because they are trying not to get sued. Since legal rulings on challenges to the Obama guidelines have been mixed, schools and districts are basically left to guess for themselves which way the legal tide will ultimately turn, and Pasco County seem to be betting on genderism to win out in the end. I'm not so sure they're right about that.

As to how it has happened in the land of the unwoke: According to this article, the Pasco County School District hired one Jackie Jackson-Dean as an "LGBT liaison." www.outcoast.com/metros-ash-foust-discusses-new-gsa-mixers-supporting-pasco-county-lgbtq-youth/

Jackson-Dean is described as a school psychologist but is not listed on staff at Chasco Middle School.

Liberty Counsel's press release names her as "lead author of a “Gender Support Plan” and “Best Practices Guide” adopted without school board approval." www.lc.org/newsroom/details/102418-fl-schools-shocking-plan-1

Also from LC's press release:

The school psychologist also abused her position as the Gay Straight Alliance (GSA) club advisor, in directing students from Pasco GSA clubs to non-district, outside “resources” and “support groups” like METRO. Without parental permission, METRO is providing contraception, HIV/AIDs “PrEP” drugs, and sexual activity counseling to children, and encourages them toward homosexual behavior. METRO also arranges meetings for “youth” ages 13-22 years old, again without parental permission. Despite having no policy of written parent permission for these referrals, Pasco has failed to subject all METRO personnel or affiliates having contact with Pasco children to background checks.

LC are clearly horribly homophobic but I think they have a point about these off-site meetings for minor children...