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[0] The rise of progressive sexual and gender ideology in schools has come as a shock to parents, leading many to ask where it came from and how it became mainstream.
[1] Just a heads up for parents, this episode includes language that may not be appropriate for younger listeners.
[2] For this episode of Morning Wire, we talked to Daily Wire investigative reporter Marade Allorty about the range of issues parents are upset about, from sexually explicit curriculum for young children, to policies that tell teachers to hide children's gender.
[3] identity transitions from their parents.
[4] Thanks for waking up with us.
[5] It's Sunday, May 1st, and this is your special edition of Morning Wire.
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[13] So, Marade, I was a public school teacher just about 10 years ago, and no one was talking about bathrooms or gender identity.
[14] When did this go mainstream?
[15] Hi, Georgia.
[16] So based on when the headlines started appearing, progressive ideas about gender really became very widespread around 20 ,000.
[17] But in a lot of ways, the movement first hit the mainstream in 2016.
[18] In May of 2016, the Obama administration issued nationwide guidance instructing public schools to allow students to use whichever bathroom corresponds to their gender identity.
[19] At the time, the guidance was described as groundbreaking by human rights campaign president Chad Griffin.
[20] But for a lot of parents and teachers, the issue seemed to have materialized almost out of the blue.
[21] If you recall, this was less than a year after Bruce Jenner, now Caitlin, and Jenner came out as trans, and that was the first time a lot of Americans even heard the term transgender.
[22] It's difficult to establish a direct cause and effect relationship, but within a few months of the Obama administration's bathroom directive, we started seeing headlines about schools having lessons about gender.
[23] For example, in the fall of 2016, Charlotte Mecklenburg schools, a school district in Charlotte, North Carolina, introduced training materials for teachers that included the now infamous gender unicorn.
[24] Parents at Charlotte Mecklenburg protested because they felt the graphic was explicitly seeding gender confusion in kids.
[25] Now, why did parents think that this unicorn was going to confuse kids?
[26] Well, the gender unicorn is basically a colorful cartoon graphic that promotes the idea that sex is assigned at birth and that biological sex is distinct from gender identity.
[27] In other words, it teaches kids that genitals aren't really authoritative when it comes to identity.
[28] The unicorn also addresses things like sexual attraction being separate from romantic attraction, and it teaches that someone can be sexually and or romantically attracted to one or many genders.
[29] So that's a complex message for kids.
[30] Right.
[31] So that gender unicorn graphic was created in 2015 by an activist group called Trans Student Educational Resources.
[32] However, the gender unicorn was actually preceded by an older graphic called the Gender Bread Person.
[33] The Gender Bread Person was first published online by a blogger named Sam Killerman in 2011.
[34] He describes it as acute approachable model for understanding the social construction of gender And according to Killerman, the image went viral in social justice and education circles in the early 2010s.
[35] So these ideas were percolating in the early 20 teens and then broke out over the course of about five years.
[36] Where did they catch on first?
[37] Well, as you might expect, these ideas advanced the fastest in progressive areas, most notably California, Washington State, New York and New Jersey.
[38] But after that inflection point a few years ago, it became mainstream in rural and red areas as well.
[39] So what does gender ideology actually look like in schools?
[40] It seems like there's a bit of disagreement between parents and educators on this.
[41] Some parents obviously say that schools are indoctrinating kids, but the schools will deny that they're explicitly teaching these things to kids.
[42] Right, and it's a gray area because in many cases, gender ideology is implemented in the way teachers are instructed to interact with their students, but it's not necessarily addressed in the classroom itself in the form of a lesson.
[43] A great example of this is the parental notification policies in a lot of schools.
[44] In Washington State, for example, it's the official policy that teachers must conceal students' gender transitions from their parents unless the student gives the green light for their parents to know.
[45] At this point, several states have adopted similar positions, and numerous local districts have done the same independently.
[46] Earlier this year, Chicago teachers were told that they could even face disciplinary measures if they revealed a child's transition to their parents without the child.
[47] child's permission.
[48] One teacher in Washington State told me that last year she made the mistake of telling a parent that their child wanted to go by new pronouns, and she was called into the principal's office.
[49] This year, her school made sure they spent time going over the policies on transgender students and parental notification with all the teachers.
[50] So it sounds like there's an environment where students may talk openly with teachers about sexuality, but there's no accountability to parents.
[51] Exactly.
[52] But in some cases, parents are saying that schools are explicitly teaching kids about transgenderism.
[53] Tell us about that.
[54] Sure, so parent watchdog groups have been flagging these lessons on a one -off basis for a few years now, but in some states, these lessons are becoming part of the official curriculum.
[55] For example, come this fall, first graders in New Jersey's public schools will learn about gender identity as part of the state's new education standards.
[56] A sample lesson from New Jersey curriculum teaches first grade children that they might have, quote, boy parts, but feel like a girl.
[57] In fifth grade, the students will be introduced to puberty blockers and masturbation as part of the curriculum.
[58] And this is not exclusive to just public schools.
[59] Footage from a 2020 conference of the National Association of Independent Schools features teachers discussing how they teach preschoolers about gender identity.
[60] With the younger children starting in pre -K, we talk about their bodies, about the parts that they were born with.
[61] about penises and vaginas and whether that makes somebody a boy or a girl, but also their feelings.
[62] What do they feel like inside?
[63] Do they feel like a boy or a girl?
[64] What does their head say?
[65] In some cases, the material is presented in health or sex ed classes, but more often it permeates the student's entire school experience.
[66] For example, in one Washington State District, middle school students were given a COVID -19 survey that required them to pick whether they were male, female, transgender, not sure of their gender identity or something else.
[67] So that kind of illustrates how normalized and systemic this ideology has become.
[68] Right.
[69] And some schools are very open about embracing a social justice agenda, which some parents may actually really like.
[70] But I think part of the issue, too, is that some teachers are embracing this independently without that oversight.
[71] Right.
[72] This is an issue that a lot of teachers are passionate about.
[73] And in many cases, they've taken this up as a personal mission within their classrooms.
[74] Here's one of many, many videos on social media where teachers post about discussing gender and sexuality with students.
[75] I said, and I identify as a cis woman, and I explained what that was because they had no idea what I was talking about.
[76] And then I said, and I identify as gay.
[77] In my 17 years of teaching, I've never come out to my kids before.
[78] And I was so nervous to even say it out loud to them.
[79] But they didn't even bat an eye.
[80] It was really awesome.
[81] Here's another teacher talking about bringing queerness into the classroom.
[82] My classroom is one of the gayest places, probably on the planet.
[83] I want every student that I have to know that being queer is something that I am proud of, something that is not a secret in my life.
[84] It's something that I care about and something that connects me to other people.
[85] I introduced myself this year with my pronouns immediately.
[86] It was one of the first things that students learned about me. and I'm going to continue to gently correct 250 people every single day.
[87] So the concern among parents is that if their kids are exposed to ideas about gender being separate from sex, that the kids are going to more likely feel confused about their own gender.
[88] Is that a rational fear for parents to have?
[89] Well, the rates of trans identification have increased exponentially in Western countries.
[90] A study from the UK showed a more than 4 ,000 percent increase in diagnoses of gender dysphoria among natal females between 2009 and 2019.
[91] Similar increases have been noted in other Western countries.
[92] Brown University Assistant Professor in the School of Public Health, Lisa Littman, has studied the explosive growth of transgender identification among teenage girls, and she concluded that there is a strong social contagion element driving many of these cases.
[93] She noted that gender dysphoria tends to appear in social clusters with multiple girls transitioning at the same time.
[94] Littman received immense backlash for her work, but many parents say her theory describes their teen.
[95] So far, parents in at least four states, California, New York, Texas, and Florida have actually accused schools of encouraging their children to change their identities behind the parents' backs.
[96] Some have filed lawsuits.
[97] Now, what's the connection between the gender lessons and the related issue of graphic sexual content in schools?
[98] Well, actually, it's a very connect.
[99] issue.
[100] Take, for example, the book titled Gender Queer by Maya Kobabe.
[101] This book has become an extremely popular addition to school libraries, in part because it's been highlighted by the American Library Association.
[102] Parents have raised red flags about this book because it includes very graphic illustrations of gay sex, which parents say are indistinguishable from pornography.
[103] Another controversial book, also promoted by the American Library Association, is titled Lawn Boy, which includes graphic sexual descriptions of pedophilia.
[104] parents say these books are not only explicitly erotic, much more so than titles they read in school, but that they tend towards transgressive sexual themes like pedophilia and rape.
[105] They also tend to reinforce progressive themes about the nature of sex and gender.
[106] A lot of parents worry that exposure to erotic literature during the formative years will have long -term impacts on kids' sexualities.
[107] Here's one angry mom in Fairfax County, Virginia reading from both of these books at a school board meeting.
[108] Just a warning, this upcoming clip includes graphic adult language.
[109] After seeing a September 9th school board meeting in Texas on pornography in the schools, I decided to check the titles at my child's school, Fairfax High School.
[110] The books were available, and we checked them out.
[111] Both of these books include pedophilia, sex between men and boys.
[112] Both books describe different acts.
[113] one book describes a fourth -grade boy performing oral sex on an adult male.
[114] The other book has detailed illustrations of a man having sex with a boy.
[115] The illustrations include fallatio, sex toys, masturbation, and violent nudity.
[116] Pedophilia here.
[117] From the author, Maya Kobabe, quote, I can't wait to have your cuck in my mouth.
[118] I am going to give you the blood of your life, and then I want you inside me, end quote.
[119] From the author Jonathan Eveson.
[120] What if I told you I touched another guy's d 'I?
[121] What if I told you I sucked it?
[122] I was 10 years old, but it's true.
[123] I sucked Doug Goebbels' dick, the real estate guy, and he sucked mine too.
[124] This is not an oversight at Fairfax High School.
[125] This material.
[126] There are children in the audience here.
[127] Do not interrupt my time.
[128] Do not interrupt my time.
[129] I would like to remind everybody that we have a speaker.
[130] And my time is restored and my time is finished.
[131] These books are in stock and available in the libraries of Robinson.
[132] For high school students, ma 'am.
[133] And Annandale High School.
[134] Pornography is offensive to all people.
[135] It is offensive to common decency.
[136] It is the reason why the end.
[137] Ironically, her mic was cut and she was reprimanded because there were children in the room.
[138] She says that's exactly her point.
[139] If a book is too inappropriate for a school board meeting, it probably shouldn't be given to kids.
[140] So what are the forces behind this?
[141] Is this an organic movement?
[142] You mentioned one blogger.
[143] How did this become a mission for so many educators?
[144] Well, certainly activists lobby for this content to be taught in schools.
[145] For example, Glysson, the Gay -Lesbian Straight Education Network, which was formed in 1990, has lobbied extensively to transform education through LGBT policies and inclusion of LGBT content in curricula.
[146] But probably a more important driver in terms of disseminating ideas from the ivory tower down to classrooms is the teachers' unions.
[147] In recent years, teachers' unions have taken up gender identity as a central cause.
[148] For example, last year, the California Teachers Association, an extremely powerful union held a conference where they discussed the importance of recruiting students for LGBT clubs at school.
[149] One middle school teacher who spoke at the conference stated that teachers could, quote, stalk students' Google searches and listen to their hallway conversations in order to identify which kids might be gay and then invite them to join the LGBT club.
[150] The conference also revealed that teachers were purposefully keeping LGBT club membership lists private from parents.
[151] In 2020, the largest teachers union in the country, the National Education Association, teamed up with the Human Rights Campaign, the American Civil Liberties Union, a group called Gender Spectrum, and the National Center for Lesbian Rights, to create a transgenderism guide for schools.
[152] The guide is called Schools in Transition, a guide for supporting transgender students in K -12 schools.
[153] The guide states, among other things, that a student's age should never be a basis for denying them an opportunity to transition.
[154] Language from this guide is mirrored almost exactly in some state policies.
[155] Similarly, the second largest teachers union, the American Federation of Teachers, has also expressed support for these policies.
[156] The president of the AFT, Randy Weingarten, has stated that the mission for trans rights is very personal to her as a gay woman.
[157] And these groups are having a lot of success.
[158] Last month, the Biden administration's Department of Health and Human Services released multiple documents strongly endorsing, medical gender transition for minors, up to and including gender transition surgery for minors.
[159] So the trend is definitely towards more pro -trans policies.
[160] Well, there has also been some response in the other direction.
[161] I'm thinking specifically about Florida's new parental rights law.
[162] Right.
[163] Florida's parental rights bill is obviously one of the most high -profile signs that backlash is building, and it's likely that other states will follow suit.
[164] Overseas, the backlash is even stronger with several Western countries moving to restrain the use of hormones and medical intervention from minors.
[165] Here in the States, we're also seeing shakeups in school board elections across the country.
[166] So we're at an interesting crossroads right now.
[167] I think we're going to see states really diverge in how they handle this issue.
[168] Right.
[169] Well, that'll be interesting to see.
[170] Marade, thanks for reporting.
[171] Thanks, Georgia.
[172] That's Daily Wire investigative reporter Marade Allorty, and this has been a special Sunday edition of Morning Wire.
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