The Radical Reshaping of K-12 Public Education: Gender Redefinition and Self-Selection - The American Spectator | USA News and Politics
The Radical Reshaping of K-12 Public Education: Gender Redefinition and Self-Selection
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Extreme ideologies are quickly taking root in U.S. K-12 public schools through new school policies, practices, and curriculums — with devastating effects on students. Unfortunately, Americans are mainly turning a blind eye instead of speaking up against political and social indoctrination that threatens our children’s education and the very fabric of our nation.

One radical development is in the area of sex/gender. Although the terms historically have been used interchangeably, a shift has occurred in recent decades, with sex primarily referring to a biological category or anatomy and gender referring to people’s thoughts or feelings about who they are. Over the past several years, schools have increasingly embraced the cultural redefinition of gender — from male and female to a host of created alternatives. Despite the biological reality of only two distinct sexes, schools embrace, and in some cases actively promote, students questioning and then self-selecting their gender based upon how they feel.

The Gender Unicorn

Starting as early as preschool and kindergarten, taxpayer money is funding radical sex education content. Just one example is the Gender Unicorn (an iteration of the Genderbread Person), a purple cartoon image featuring hearts and rainbows. Adopted in 2016 by the Charlotte-Mecklenburg school district in Charlotte, North Carolina, Gender Unicorn use has spread nationwide and into Canada. The Washington State ASCD Curriculum in Context Spring/Summer 2020 lists the Gender Unicorn as one of several “educational materials” for teachers. The Alberta Teacher’s Association includes the Gender Unicorn in their 152-page teacher toolkit aimed at cultivating LBGTQ-inclusive classrooms.

The character is designed to look endearing to young children, similar to the popular Barney or Boz. But this unicorn walks students through self-selecting their gender identity, their gender expression, the gender they’re physically attracted to, and the gender they’re emotionally attracted to. Each option includes not only categories such as women/men and feminine/masculine but also “other.” Even their “sex assigned at birth” is open to interpretation — it includes female and male but also “other/intersex.”

According to Ely Sanders, the Sexual Health and School Health Specialist for the Oregon Department of Education, “We have more and more kindergartners coming out and identifying.” Show young students the purple unicorn and ask them to choose from various options, and you’ll undoubtedly receive all sorts of interesting answers. Talk to any five-year-old for 10 minutes, and you will be entertained and likely given misinformation on any number of topics. But without prompting or exposure to these concepts from adults, young students would surely not form the suggested conclusions.

Most kindergarteners don’t know how to read, tie their shoes, or recite their home address. But instead of teaching the academic basics, schools are now actively promoting identity confusion, emotional harm, and insecurity — negative impacts that last a lifetime. It’s no wonder that child and adolescent mental health issues are on a steep rise when students are taught to question their own identity and select from an ever-growing list of confusing options.

Meanwhile, parents are widely uninformed about what’s occurring in classrooms related to this material. For example, a concerned parent of a second-grade student in Oregon reached out to the teacher after her child was exposed to the Genderbread Person without any prior communication. (Tragically, the teaching of gender identity and fluidity and other LGBTQ concepts in social studies and science often comes with no warning or option for parents to opt out their students). Her concerns were dismissed, and the request for a meeting with the teacher to discuss the issue was denied. Instead, the teacher directed the parent to the principal, who responded that gender identity is something our society historically has failed to address and claimed that it is a positive development that students are being taught about this topic now.

Furthermore, the principal said gender identity teaching could occur throughout the school year in all subject areas. While Oregon allows opting out in health classes, that option does not apply to non-health classes. This deceptive strategy by the school evidently meets the letter of the law by providing parent communication and opt-out privileges regarding “sensitive health content.” But it clearly violates the spirit of the law and circumvents parental control over preventing the indoctrination of their children.

Another example of this type of indoctrination occurred in Bethel School District in Washington State. Recently students were assigned to complete a survey related to COVID-19, in which students in grades six to 12 (i.e., as young as 10 years old) were asked to select their gender. Options included “male, female, transgender, questioning/not sure of my gender identity, or something else that fits better.” Next, the survey asked students to indicate their sexual orientation from the provided options: heterosexual, gay, lesbian, or “something else that fits better.” Parents were not informed of the survey content, which plants seeds of sexual orientation gender identity confusion. When questioned, the district spokesperson refused to respond other than to pass the buck, saying people could talk to the survey creators. One Washington parent fittingly asked, “Is the state’s intent to inject transgender and hyper-sexuality into everything they do?”

Bathrooms

The indoctrination of the young doesn’t end in elementary classrooms. Students of all ages are not only allowed but encouraged to use the school bathroom of their choosing: boys or girls, men or women, male or female. And in the name of “safety,” an increasing number of districts restrict faculty and staff from entering these student bathrooms to ensure nothing inappropriate or unsafe occurs.

This policy defies common sense. Anyone who has gone to school knows that bathrooms have always been a prime place for student misbehavior — cheating, bullying, drinking, doing and selling drugs, and more. Obviously, those making mischief fervently hoped that teachers and administrators wouldn’t barge in and put a stop to their activities. Imagine how bad things could get now that students know adults cannot enter the bathrooms. With zero supervision, a boy can walk into a girls’ bathroom at any time, stay as long as he wants, do what he wants — all without fear of an adult stopping him. One would think that the legal liability schools would be subject to from this kind of policy would give them pause. But clearly, in today’s schools, political correctness and ideology supersede protecting students and following common sense.

Locker Rooms

The same logic that gives ideology supremacy over all else also applies to locker rooms. Even changing clothes for P.E. class in the presence of same-sex peers can challenge the modesty and comfort level of many preteens and teenagers. Now imagine a locker room that allows students of the opposite sex to enter at will.

To understand how this would feel, imagine trying on a new outfit at the mall in a dressing room void of private stalls and shared with those of the opposite sex. To avoid embarrassment, most of us would risk buying the clothing without trying it on and endure the hassle of returning it if it didn’t fit once we tried it on at home. It’s baffling that many parents are putting up with their children being subjected to such conditions.

Athletic Fields and Arenas

But the madness doesn’t stop there. The new wave of self-selection of one’s gender identity has extended beyond bathrooms and locker rooms to athletic fields and arenas. Boys who describe themselves as transgender are given the opportunity to compete on girls’ athletic teams, which denies opportunities to girls who would otherwise have received positions on teams, playing time, victories, and school records.

Until recently, there has been a nearly universal acknowledgment that the biological differences between male and female bodies make it inappropriate for boys to compete against girls, or men against women, in most sports (there are a few exceptions, such as archery, sailing, and equestrian events, in which the size and strength of men are not necessarily advantageous). But now girls have to prove not only that they are the fastest, strongest, or most skilled female athletes but also that they can beat biological males who choose to identify as female.

Some may think it unlikely that biological boys will choose to compete as girls in high school sports. But the facts prove otherwise. Only 12 states prohibit the practice, while nine have no policy, and 10 states allow it after the transgender athlete has undergone a form of treatment. Nineteen states, plus Washington, D.C., allow it without any restriction related to the athlete’s testosterone level.

Some have gone so far in their advocation for transgender sports that they have lost sight of biological reality. CNN breaking news reporter Devan Cole falls into this category. Cole writes in an article entitled “South Dakota’s governor issues executive order banning transgender athletes from women’s sports” that “It’s not possible to know a person’s gender identity at birth, and there is no consensus criteria for assigning sex at birth.” No consensus criteria for assigning sex at birth? Every baby comes out of the womb with either XY or XX chromosomes and, in all but the rarest of conditions, unequivocally male or female specific body parts. These are plainly observable scientific facts. Cole’s absurd claim went viral, and CNN had no choice but to walk it back.

The Equality Act

The battle is not only being fought at the state level but also the federal one. Should the Equality Act, recently passed by the U.S. House, make it through the Senate, schools that aren’t currently allowing transgender access to bathrooms, locker rooms, and sports teams will likely be forced to implement such measures by federal law. Consequently, students who claim transgender status will be granted almost unrestricted privileges, while the vast majority of students who acknowledge their birth gender will have their rights slashed. As usual, parental consent is nowhere considered in all these fiats. As Douglas Laycock, a law professor at the University of Virginia, aptly warns, the bill goes too far: “It protects the rights of one side, but attempts to destroy the rights of the other side.” 

Parental Consent and School Deceit

Parental consent was once a basic requirement for educators — parents were deemed to have the final say regarding what was taught to their elementary, middle, and high school students. No more. Consent is not sought or granted. Instead, school personnel are instructed to deceive parents about what occurs during their student’s school day. Appallingly, these are not one-off situations but united, intentional efforts orchestrated by powerful organizations.

For example, consider Schools in Transition: A Guide for Supporting Transgender Students in K-12 Schools, a jointly produced document of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), the Human Rights Campaign, Gender Spectrum, the National Center for Lesbian Rights, and the National Education Association (NEA). In short, the guide demands that school personnel treat as a boy any girl who identifies as a boy, and as a girl any boy who identifies as a girl. Age, immaturity, and impact on peers are not worth consideration. Instead, the document reads, “A student’s age and maturity — or that of their peers — should never be a basis for denying a transgender student an opportunity to transition.”

It should give the public, especially parents of public school students, great concern when the ACLU gets involved. As attorney Alan Dershowitz observes, the organization “is no longer a neutral defender of everyone’s civil liberties,” but “has morphed into a hyper-partisan, hard-left political advocacy group.” The four activist groups are working in partnership with the largest U.S. teachers union, the NEA (which maintains a tight grip on the reins of teachers’ purse strings) to advance an activist agenda with members who, in turn, incorporate the material into their classrooms.

School administrators label as unsupportive and potentially dangerous parents who do not go along with their child or teen affirming transgender feelings or condoning transgender behavioral choices. The guide says, “Privacy and confidentiality are critically important for transgender students who do not have supportive families. In those situations, even inadvertent disclosures could put the student in a potentially dangerous situation at home, so it is important to have a plan in place to help avoid any mistakes or slip-ups.” In other words, school personnel are instructed to create plans to intentionally withhold information from parents and legal guardians. According to research by Ryan T. Anderson, “They want to set up a school environment so your child or grandchild can transition at school without you knowing about it … to avoid any ‘inadvertent disclosures.’ ”

More specifically, Anderson explains,

You could drop your son off at school at 8:00 a.m., and he would go to the principal’s office where a new wardrobe would be waiting for him. And he could change into a dress, put on nail polish, lipstick, makeup, and spend the day at school presenting as if a girl — be referred to by a new name and with a new pronoun throughout the school day. At the end of the day go back to the principal’s office, change back into his original clothes, take off the makeup, the lipstick, and the nail polish, and be picked up by you, without you ever knowing what is going on at school. They even have a way — and this is what they mean when they say they have a plan in place — to ensure that inside of school they’ll use the new name and the new pronoun but externally when communicating with you, the parents, they will go back to using the given name and the proper pronoun, entirely to undermine your role as parents.

In its subversion of parental rights to oversee the education and care of their children, the overreach and deceit by our public schools is a clear violation of the equal protection requirement of the 14th Amendment. Additionally, it is a violation of the 1974 Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act, which grants parents the rights to their children’s school records.

The move to subvert parental rights is not an isolated phenomenon. It is taking place in Montgomery County, Maryland, a Chicago suburb, the Metropolitan School District in Madison, Wisconsin, the New Jersey Department of Education, and the Los Angeles Unified School District, to name a few — and even at a national level through the NEA. Resistance is beginning to form, as the failure of school staff to communicate forthrightly with parents about their children and the disregard for obtaining parental consent have resulted in a handful of sizable court cases with more likely in the future.

Addressing Gender Dysphoria

According to the Mayo Clinic, gender dysphoria is “the feeling of discomfort or distress that might occur in people whose gender identity differs from their sex assigned at birth or sex-related physical characteristics.” The American Psychiatric Association defines gender dysphoria as “clinically significant distress or impairment related to a strong desire to be of another gender, which may include desire to change primary and/or secondary sex characteristics.”

Rather than working secretively and at odds with parents, schools should offer support services similar to those provided to students experiencing other significant distress such as anxiety, depression, and self-harm. Professional services are necessary, and traditional schools cannot always accommodate these students’ needs, which warrant specialized, expert care.

Journalist Abigail Shrier poses an important question: Why is it that 2 percent of high school students (female girls by majority) now describe themselves as transgender when prior to 2012, according to The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, transgenderism was associated with 0.01 percent of the population? Of these cases, almost none were teenage girls. Before 2012, the majority of individuals expressing gender dysphoria were boys ages two to four. Lisa Littman, Public Health Researcher at Brown University, conducted in-depth research regarding the sudden and dramatic shift from gender dysphoria claims, from predominately males to females and preschoolers to teenagers. Littman found peer influence and social media were key contributors. For example, online “influencers” “insist that if you feel uncomfortable in your body you’re probably trans,” as Shrier puts it. But what teenage girl hasn’t felt uncomfortable or unhappy with her body at some point?

Tragically, in some states an adolescent minor can walk out of a gender clinic with a prescription for gender-altering hormones without parental permission. Even the most liberal medical experts argue that these puberty-blocking medications aren’t safe: they cause loss of body density; a high risk of infertility for girls; sexual dysfunction; and lifelong, irreversible physical damage. The emotional damage of these drugs is just as severe, including thoughts and behaviors of regret, anxiety, depression, self-harm, and suicide. A renowned hospital in politically and socially liberal Sweden took a courageous step by becoming the first country to oppose the World Professional Association for Transgender Health promotion of puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones for children younger than age 16.

Gender Pronouns

Student confusion is further fueled by the new norm of public school teachers and administrators listing their pronouns. According to the Trans Student Educational Resources (TSER) website, “There are no ‘male/female’ or ‘man/woman’ pronouns. All pronouns can be used for any gender and are gender neutral.” And pronouns should not even be referred to as “preferred,” as that “can accidentally insinuate that using the correct pronouns for someone is optional.”

Even correct grammar takes a backseat to the new gender ideology. Beyond she/her/hers and he/him/his, students are instructed to refer to individuals with the plural they/them/theirs. New pronoun options include ze/zir/zirs and beyond. The TSER gender pronoun chart includes a bold warning: “these are not the only pronouns. There is an infinite number of pronouns as new ones emerge in our language.” Infinite? Prepare for a complicated future.

Concluding Thoughts

Given that the vast majority of students accept their sex and gender from birth, finding creative solutions for those facing transgender thoughts and gender dysphoria that do not trample on the rights of others would be reasonable. This might include, for example, a separate private bathroom available to any student. Ultimately, the care and safety of all children must be of utmost importance. Hindering the rights and safety of most students in an attempt to promote and foster student gender confusion in others, in secret from parents, is not only unconstitutional but also mistreatment of all students.

The radical reshaping of K-12 public education includes not only school policies and practices. Extreme ideologies are quickly infiltrating academic content. Part two of this series will examine the failure to teach civics and the redefinition of U.S. history.

Editor’s Note: This is part one of a three-part series. Click here to read part two: “Civics and History Failures.” Click here to read part three: “Critical Race Theory and Woke Academics.”

Dr. Keri D. Ingraham is a Fellow at Discovery Institute and Director of the Institute’s American Center for Transforming Education.

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