2016 | Week of August 22 | #1165

Finally. Some good news from the courts—and some good news on the push to normalize gender non-conformity.

I realize some will disagree with me, but I believe one of the most important issues facing our society today is the transgender agenda. I’ve talked about this for several years in these commentaries because I believe this is a dangerous agenda, especially for our children. The push has quickened enormously in the last couple of years with Bruce Jenner’s affront to women and with the federal government making sure school boards and administrations are intimidated into passing policies that give special rights, protections and privileges to a small group of students while trouncing on the privacy rights and jeopardizing the well-being of the vast majority.

In Wisconsin we’ve dealt with numerous concerned parents and grandparents in school districts all across the state. The school districts, thanks to the LGBTQ activists in their midst, buy the lie that the federal government is requiring them to pass policies that allow boys who “identify as” girls to use the girls’ restrooms, locker rooms and shower rooms and vice versa.  It’s a difficult policy to stop once it gets rolling.

And that’s why it’s so important we have this good news on this issue.  This past Monday a Texas federal judge stopped the enforcement of Obama’s “bathrooms” edict, which, among other things, would have forced Wisconsin schools to allow boys into girls’ bathrooms, shower rooms and locker rooms.  Earlier this summer, at the direction of Governor Scott Walker and Wisconsin Attorney General Brad Schimel, Wisconsin joined this lawsuit that was initiated by Texas.

All of this was in response to what happened earlier this spring. This past May, President Obama’s administration sent a non-binding letter to schools across the nation with only a thinly veiled threat to take away Title IX federal funding if schools do not adopt the administration’s rule to allow boys into girls’ showers, locker rooms, bathrooms and vice versa. Included in the directive is allowing boys to play on the girls’ sports teams and girls’ on the boys’ teams, as well as urging faculty and staff to use “appropriate” pronouns when addressing transgendered students.

A total of 23 states are suing the Obama administration because of these dangerous guidelines and the gross overreach of the federal government into the right of states and individual school districts to self-govern, especially in the area of education.  This ruling makes it clear the federal government overstepped its authority and ignored its own policies and procedures. The ruling also makes it clear that no school district in the country, including here in Wisconsin, has to implement the policies in this “dear colleague” letter.

Recently, the U.S. Supreme Court also weighed in on this issue by implementing a temporary hold on a ruling from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit that would have forced a Virginia school district to implement a school bathroom policy that forces schools to allow boys into the girls’ restrooms and vice versa.

We should all be thankful Governor Walker and Attorney General Brad Schimel decided Wisconsin should join this lawsuit and are pushing back against this gross federal overreach. Our state and our schools should have every right to implement policies that protect the privacy rights of all students and not be forced under the heavy hand of the federal government into a different course of action.

This past legislative session State Representative Jesse Kremer (R-Kaukauna) and State Senator Steve Nass (R-Whitewater) introduced legislation that would protect the privacy rights of all students and not give a select few special rights and privileges.  Unfortunately, that bill did not pass. However, these legislators have said they will return with a similar effort in the new session.

The recent ruling in the case Wisconsin is involved with means no school district in the state can use the threatening letter they received this past spring from the federal Departments of Education and Justice as an excuse for pushing through policies that jeopardize the well-being of the vast majority of students. That’s good news for students, parents, and concerned citizens everywhere.

To really be helpful good news needs to be shared. We hope you’ll do just that and make sure those in your circle of influence know about this favorable court ruling on an issue that is coming to your community—whether you like it or not.

For Wisconsin Family Council, this is Julaine Appling reminding you the prophet Hosea said, “My people are destroyed. for lack of knowledge.”