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DeSantis Expands ‘Don’t Say Gay’
High school teachers in Florida can’t say it
In early 2022, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis banned classroom instruction relating to sexual orientation and gender identity — essentially, any mention thereof — in Grades K–3. It was officially called the “Parental Rights in Education Act” and informally known as “Don’t Say Gay.” It took effect over the summer.
A year later, he’s now expanding the ban through Grade 12. It might take effect this summer. [Update: Yes, the ban was approved.]
Grades K-3
The original K-3 ban led to resignations by gay teachers last May even before the law took effect.
Though “Republicans tried so hard to frame it as a bill prohibiting sex-ed,” as Jack Petocz commented on Twitter, they had other measures in mind. “The law goes into effect in 2 days, and teachers are literally being ordered to scrape off rainbow safe-space stickers from their classroom doors.”
“According to representatives of the [Orange] county’s teacher association,” WFTV reported in June 2022, “teachers and staff members will be disallowed from wearing rainbow articles of clothing, including lanyards distributed by the district last year. Elementary-level teachers reported being discouraged from putting pictures of their same-sex spouse on their desk or talking about them to students.”
That discriminatory treatment (as stated by ACLU attorney Josh Block) violates the U.S. Supreme Court ruling in Bostock, the federal civil rights law known as Title IX, and the Equal Protection Clause in the U.S. Constitution. DeSantis does it anyway because he can.
For example, after the U.S. Depts of Education and Agriculture issued guidance saying that Bostock prohibits anti-LGBTQ discrimination, the Florida Commissioner of Education released a statement in July 2022 saying that schools should ignore this guidance.
DeSantis’s homophobic law “was never about ‘protecting children.’ It was always about eliminating LGBTQ people from public life,” tweets Alejandra Caraballo, a clinical…
