The U.S. Supreme Court will take up a case filed by parents of school children who want to opt their kids out of any instruction on that includes books with LGBTQ characters.
The Supreme Court agreed Friday to hear a case about whether public schools must give parents of elementary schoolchildren a chance to opt out of instruction on gender and sexuality that they say goes against their religious convictions. [image or embed]
— The Washington Post (@washingtonpost.com) January 17, 2025 at 1:46 PM
From the Washington Post:
The case stems from a challenge by a group of parents in Maryland’s largest school system, who objected to Montgomery County Public Schools prohibiting parents from taking their children out of lessons that used storybooks with LGBTQ+ characters and themes.
Parents, who are Muslim, Roman Catholic and Ukrainian Orthodox, filed suit in 2023, saying the policy violates their First Amendment rights to freedom of religion.
The case puts the high court at the center of a contentious national debate over how to teach and treat gender and sexuality in schools, which has spurred fights over books, bathroom use and on which teams transgender athletes should be allowed to play.
Two years ago, the school district began a program that asked teachers to read at least one storybook a year from a list of books like “Intersection Allies” which features a group of kids discussing their differences. The school district said in a court filing, “The storybooks are not used in any lessons related to gender and sexuality. Nor is any student asked or expected to change his or her views about his or her own, or any other student’s, sexual orientation or gender identity. The parents are being represented by the Becket Fund, which likes to get involved in anti-LGBTQ legal issues.
What if their religious convictions said slavery was okay? Much of American Christianity used the Bible to justify slavery in the nineteenth century. Or stoning adulterers? Or cutting off the foreskin of dead soldiers to present to the leaders? Are we going to require books to include those beliefs?
— Jack the Vagabond ⚾️️ (@jackthevagabond.bsky.social) January 17, 2025 at 2:09 PM
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