Diana’s Little Corner in the Nutmeg State: Playing Games with Human Rights

Tuesday, October 23, 2012

Playing Games with Human Rights

Now we have it, now we don’t. That is the game they are playing in East Aurora Illinois with our rights. Earlier last week the East Aurora School Board passed a gender identity school policy and late last week they repealed it because of pressure from the far right.

East Aurora OKs transgender policy
Beacon News
By Stephanie Lulay
October 15, 2012

AURORA — The East Aurora school board voted to unanimously approve a policy that affects transgendered students Monday night.

The policy set forth several guidelines for school administrators to use when addressing the needs and rights of transgender and gender nonconforming students.

The policy also addresses how state laws should be implemented.

The new policy specifically states that transgendered and gender nonconforming students have the right use the restroom that corresponds to their gender-related identity that is consistently asserted at school. The student has the right to be addressed by the name they want to be called, too.

“A court-ordered name or gender change is not required, and the student needs not change his or her official records,” the policy states.

Yay!!!!!!

But not so fast…

East Aurora High School Board of Education Adopts Radical Policy on Gender Confusion
Illinois Family Institute
By Laurie Higgins
10.16.12

An outrageous and ignorant decision by the East Aurora High School Board of Education points to the increasingly compelling need for parents to pull their kids out of public schools if possible.

So what did the school board do? They caved in to a vocal minority…

East Aurora school officials debate transgender policy
Chicago Tribune
By Kate Thayer
October 20, 2012

East Aurora School District officials on Friday night rescinded a policy they put in place just days earlier that would have given transgender students certain personal rights in school.

Cries of "shame" and "coward" were shouted after the 4-0 vote at a special meeting of the District 131 school board. More than 100 people packed the district's meeting room, lined the hallway and stood outside, listening on speakers. Several carried banners, and about 20 addressed the board.

So now what? Well I think that if there is a discrimination case or gender based harassment case that the school system just opened themselves to lawsuits, especially if the harassment increases after the repeal. The U.S. Department of Education Office of Civil Rights issued a communication that warned school systems that bias against gender identity and expression is prohibited under Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972. So the East Aurora School Board is skating on thin ice.

1 comment:

Leann10/23/12, 8:40 PM
East Aurora would appear to have placed them in the same situation as California when they approved same-gender marriage and then took it back. Once you grant a right, an government needs to prove they are not discriminating in taking it back. At least that is the current ruling in the California case.
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Morality cannot be legislated, but behavior can be regulated. Judicial decrees may not change the heart, but they can restrain the heartless.

A right delayed is a right denied.Like an unchecked cancer, hate corrodes the personality and eats away its vital unity. Hate destroys a man's sense of values and his objectivity. It causes him to describe the beautiful as ugly and the ugly as beautiful, and to confuse the true with the false and the false with the true.
Martin Luther King Jr.

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― Carl Sagan, The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark

You've Got To Be Carefully Taught
You've got to be taught
To hate
And fear
You've got to be taught
From year
To year
Its got to
Be drummed in your dear little ear
You've got to
Be carefully
Taught
You've got to be taught
To be
Afraid
Of people
Who's eyes are oddly made
And people who's skin is a different shade

South Pacific
Songwriters: Oscar Hammerstein II / Richard Rogers