The slippery slope of leftist policies seems to have turned into a freefall. As LGBT advocates try to make all public restrooms open to people of either sex, one school in Indiana is trying to control what teachers say by forcing them to support students that identify as the other gender. At Brownsburg High School in Brownsburg, Indiana, John Kluge was an orchestra teacher loved by both students and faculty. However, as soon as the district adopted a new policy telling teachers that they had to use the preferred name and pronoun of transgender students, Kluge was told that he had to either comply or resign. He chose the latter option.
He made no bones about why he was quitting. He said, “I’m being compelled to encourage students in what I believe is something that’s a dangerous lifestyle. I’m fine to teach students with other beliefs, but the fact that teachers are being compelled to speak a certain way is the scary thing.” Kluge has pled with the district to reverse its policy which openly squashes the First Amendment rights of teachers, but so far his pleas have fallen on deaf ears.
This kind of discrimination should not be happening on the campuses of our public schools. While there are certainly limits on how much teachers can say from the bully pulpit of their classrooms, forcing them to accept transgender student’s choices is going a step too far. There is a lot of scientific research which points to the fact that encouraging young people into the transgender lifestyle is detrimental to both their physical and mental health. That is why the American College of Pediatricians said that allowing children to transition from one gender to another is tantamount to “child abuse.” Clearly, the debate on the question of transgenderism is far from over. In the meantime, schools should not be allowed to force teachers to take a side on the issue. Teachers that care about their students should be allowed to look at the scientific reality that transgenderism hurts kids.
