By The Vanguard
OAKLAND, CA – For the third time in about a month, California Attorney General Rob Bonta Wednesday issued a statement to a state school district board about a decision involving gender identity.
This week, Bonta disclosed a statement about a Temecula Valley Unified School District Board decision to “implement a mandatory gender identity disclosure policy that is detrimental to the well-being of LGBTQ+ students on Aug. 22, 2023.”
The policy, noted the AG, “requires schools to inform parents, with minimal exceptions, whenever a student requests to use a name or pronoun different from that on their birth certificate or official records, even without the student’s permission. The policy also requires notification if a student requests to use facilities or participates in programs that don’t align with their sex on official records.”
The AG Office noted the vote comes “just weeks after AG Bonta issued a statement denouncing Murrieta Valley Unified’s decision to implement a mandatory gender identity disclosure policy targeting transgender and gender nonconforming students.
“In June, Attorney General Bonta and Governor Newsom issued a joint statement urging the Board to provide information regarding its decision to reject the Social Studies Alive curriculum for grades 1 through 5, which highlights the contributions of various groups, including gay, bisexual, and transgender Americans.”
AG Bonta said, in a statement, “The rise in school districts adopting policies that target California’s vulnerable LGBTQ+ student population is of grave concern. My office is closely monitoring the situation and will not tolerate districts compromising the safety and privacy of transgender and gender nonconforming students. We will remain committed to ensuring school policies do not violate students’ civil rights.”
The AG Office said Bonta “has a substantial interest in protecting the legal rights, physical safety, and mental health of children in California schools, and in protecting them from trauma, harassment, bullying, and exposure to violence and threats of violence.”
The office noted, “Research shows that protecting a transgender student’s ability to make choices about how and when to inform others is critical to their well-being, as transgender students are exposed to high levels of harassment and mistreatment at school and in their communities.”
“Seventy-seven percent of students known or perceived as transgender reported negative experiences such as harassment and assault, and over half of transgender and nonbinary youth reported seriously considering suicide in the past year,” the AG Office added.
Bonta issued a statement denouncing Murrieta Valley Unified’s decision to implement a mandatory gender identity disclosure policy harmful to the well-being of LGBTQ+ students.
And, in early August, Bonta announced opening a civil rights investigation into “potential legal violations by Chino Valley Unified School District’s adoption of its mandatory gender identity disclosure policy,” and sent a letter to Superintendent Norman Enfield and the Board of Education “cautioning them of the dangers of adopting its forced outing policy, emphasizing the potential infringements on students’ privacy rights and educational opportunities.”
It might be more “effective” if the policy required schools to inform OTHER parents, rather than the parent of the child who makes such a request. I suspect that the attorney general and other state officials will get an increasing “earful”, if a policy like that was enacted.
Yes, let’s make this more heated.
It really shouldn’t be, to the “degree” it is (pun intended).
Someone else noted that it doesn’t seem likely that a child is going to be able to “hide” this from their parents in the first place.
Unless, I suppose, they can find and old-time phone booth to change in (like Clark Kent/Superman) on the way to or from school.
Is there some kind of modern “app” that can be used, instead?
That’s funny hearing that from you David. Like you never take a stance that makes things more heated?
Sometimes it’s unavoidable, but as a rule, I don’t think it’s advisable and certainly not intentionally attempting to do so.
Apparently, it’s “unavoidable” for you every day.
My initial comment was actually serious, in that it’s the parents of OTHER kids who might be concerned about a transgender student in “their” kids’ locker room, on “their” sports team, etc.
In fact, isn’t the latter the issues that the speaker at the library was concerned about?
I think the speaker at the library who got booted was most effective at inflaming and increasing the heat around the issue. A child, or an adult, for that matter, should never be outed for anything unless it is related to their danger to society at large. Certainly, just being transgender is in itself a danger to no one.
I think all the people who attended the meeting that wouldn’t let the presenter speak was the most effective at inflaming and increasing the heat around the issue and that includes the librarian.
That may be what you think, but if the speaker had respected the guidelines, a discussion could have been had without the heat and inflammation. So, I rule you out of order and incorrect in your assessment, Keith.
Are you also going to try and deny my free speech, Dave? Just as the librarian and several extremist type audience members at the meeting did to the M4L speakers?
I will point out you are only seeing half the problem here. I agree that the librarian acted inadvisably, but clearly the event organizers were attempting to be provocative. Just because you have the right technical legal right to do something doesn’t make it prudent.
I’ve watched the video of the event, the event organizers were just giving their talks when some in the crowd decided to disrupt and in the case of the librarian deny their free speech which they lawfully had the right to do. I didn’t feel they were being provocative at all. The provocative ones were the some of the people in the crowd who in my opinion were there for the purpose of shutting it down. Well they got their way. Hopefully the people who were denied their free speech rights will get their dues in the court of law.
Is this the future of women’s sports? Is everyone okay with this? Are people going to accept trans women athletes dominating women’s olympic sports? This was the subject of the M4L event.
No one including you Keith and me for that matter have any legal free speech rights on this site. The First Amendment only applies to government entities. This site is not run by the government.
The Moms for Liberty intentionally violated the Library’s policies so that event could appear on the national news. Otherwise, this would have just been something only Yolo County residents would have cared about. This {edited} group probably holds hundreds of such inflammatory events nationwide annually.
I don’t know if people understand how dangerous it is for someone to be outed without consent. It can be very dangerous because unfortunately there are many people in this world that are not tolerant. Making schools out their students to their parents is so incredibly dangerous. We don’t know if the parents are homophobic or transphobic. We don’t know what they believe. If we send a child home with someone after they found out they were trans, gay, lesbian, bisexual and such, we don’t know what could happen to that child. I said this in my article about Iowa’s new laws, but reporting a child for wanting different names or pronouns is simply too dangerous for the child’s wellbeing. We simply do not know every person’s stance on being gay or trans. I have friends with homophobic families, I have friends with accepting families, I have friends with families that are on the fence. It’s a gamble when coming out to someone, much more if the coming out or being outed is against your own will.
When is the AG going to start “warning” the librarian that what he did would likely be found to be illegal?
When this first came out, you agreed that the librarian acted “illegally” – which indeed is “inadvisable”.
You and other self-labeled progressives seem to have an ongoing problem with the Constitution.
Clearly you missed the point of “legal but not advisable”
You’re referring to those who protest school policy, while I’m referring to the librarian.
One is a group of citizens (with concerns that even you’ve noted are legitimate – in your own view), vs. a government employee (essentially representing the government itself).
It’s actually those who put forth protests that (in your apparent view) are “not advisable” which result in reaffirmation of the Constitution.
At this point, the pushback (and illegal actions by the librarian) demonstrate a desperate need to put forth “inadvisable” concerns, and back up the right to do so via a legal challenge.
In fact, the lack of action by both the ACLU and the Attorney General also show the reason that a legal challenge is needed.
My comment was looking at both put together rather than isolated.
There is no basis to look at what happened in “combination”, in regard to the law.
You are a conservative through and through Ron. You haven’t expressed a single liberal opinion on this site in the last 2 years. You should have attended that event. You could have joined the speaker at the front of a recognized hate organization.