Don't Say Gay Reaches Ohio
Just in time for award season, the state makes its case for the 'Worse Than Florida' Oscar.
Ohio is one of the most gerrymandered states in the nation. Oh, wait. We’ve said that before. And before that. But the point here is that gerrymanders — like fair elections — have consequences, and this week we saw some of the worst. Governor Mike DeWine, famous here at Wonkette for giving trans kids a brief reprieve from the worst impulses of Ohio’s GOP legislative supermajority, has spent the last year hurting trans folks over and over to make up for that one act of kindness. This week’s example goes extra further to attack all the QTs and their alphabet friends by signing Ohio’s very first “Don’t Say Gay!” bill, HB 8. The bill is now a law and goes into effect 90 days from Thursday.
The bill is modeled after Florida’s, of course, thus the identical nickname even if it’s officially known as the Parents’ Bill of Rights. From The Advocate:
H.B. 8 prohibits educators from discussing “sexuality content” in grades K-3, and mandates that instruction at other levels be “age appropriate.” The bill defines “sexuality content” as “oral or written instruction, presentation, image or description of sexual concepts or gender ideology.” It does not define “sexual concepts,” [or] “gender ideology[.]”
Of course it doesn’t. You define those things specifically if you want to be really certain you get rid of exactly the content that’s causing a problem. You don’t define things specifically if your goal is to create a climate of self-censorship, where teachers are constantly afraid that a truly innocent bit of information will get them fired if their principal or a student’s parent interprets “gender ideology” a little more conservatively than the teacher herself. Is telling a first grader that it’s okay for boys to cook and do dishes and maybe even their own laundry “gender ideology”? Could be!
“Sexuality content” now can’t be taught without advance notice to parents (who have a right to opt their kids out). Thinking about telling Tim and Tina that they can’t bully Terri for having two dads? That might be acceptable under the “incidental” exception in paragraph G(5)(b), but it also might not. Better get a permission slip first!
The entire bill is so full of insane bureaucratic requirements that the Don’t Say Gay! label really sells the crazy short. Before each student starts classes each year, and again if a child transfers schools, every parent must be notified of all medical services available at or through the schools, as well as any “facilitated” by the school. What constitutes “facilitation”? Unclear! But we know that any time a student starts or stops receiving school counseling another notice must be sent.
Read the bill and it requires notice after notice after notice. If the child might be trans, definitely send a notice, but it’s not just that! Parents are now entitled to a letter from the school about any number of possible teaching topics, as well as any changes in “Student's mental, emotional, or physical health or well-being.” The bill spells out that this includes “Any request by a student to identify as a gender that does not align with the student's biological sex,” but it doesn’t stop there. Injuries, a change in academic performance, psychological trauma all have to be reported.
Meanwhile, parents can remove their children from school for hours per day for “religious instruction” without those kids being considered absent so long as they don’t miss “core curriculum subjects.” Religious instruction had previously been available subject to district discretion, conditions and limits, but no more. Now districts must release students for religious education, with no maximum number of hours away from the classroom.
As a whole, the bill goes somewhat farther than Florida’s law, and it’s unlikely to be interpreted leniently if legislators have anything to say about it. A year ago one of the sponsors and advocates for HB 8, state Rep. Beth Lear, actually said opponents of an anti-trans bathroom bill (now law) were better off dead:
“In Luke 17, Jesus says that if you cause one of these little ones of mine to stumble, it would be better for you to have a millstone hung around your neck and be thrown into the deepest sea,” state Rep. Beth Lear said while defending House Bill 183 in a committee hearing.
Lear also compared transgender people to animals in her defense of the discriminatory bill, continuing: “If I had a child who thought he was a bird, am I going to take him to a doctor who tells him the best thing to do is to let him explore being a bird? And oh, by the way, there’s a five-story building next door — why don’t you jump off and see if you can fly?”
She seems nice!
With bathroom bills, sports bills, anti-trans regulations on health care meant to be onerous enough to make care impossible without attracting the negative attention of a ban, and now HB 8, Ohio’s trans kids have suffered a horrifying wave of attacks for twelve months now, and with the GOP defeating a bill that could have ended their gerrymanders, nothing is getting better any time soon.
PREVIOUSLY IN OHIO!
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Let me explain to all the dumbass Repubs out there.
Trans people are not cars or trees or cats. They're human beings.
They're trying to change their bodies, yes, but they are becoming... another type of human being.
Also, they know their own bodies best, and they are not making anybody else do a damn thing.
"...Governor Mike DeWine, shriveled hobgoblin and rabid Republican bigot..."