Pennsylvania Wants To Jump On The Florida’s Bandwagon.

We have another want-a-be. A senator in Pennsylvania introduced a bill a one-ups-manship bill like Florida’s “Don’t Say Gay” law.

Pennsylvania Republicans Introduce Extreme 'Don't Say Gay' Bill
The bill is more restrictive than the one that became law in Florida.
The Advocate
By Trudy Ring
September 21, 2022


Pennsylvania state representatives have introduced a bill regulating classroom instruction that is more restrictive than Florida’s infamous “don’t say gay” law.

“It is patterned after the Florida bill, but mine goes further,” Republican Rep. Stephanie Borowicz, the legislation’s lead sponsor, said at a rally at the state capitol Tuesday, Harrisburg’s Patriot-News reports.

Her bill, House Bill 2813, would stipulate that public and charter schools “may not offer instruction on sexual orientation or gender identity to a student in kindergarten through fifth grade.” The Florida law, which went into effect this year, bans instruction on these topics in grades K-3 and says any lessons in higher grades must be age-appropriate.

Borowicz said she ideally would like the prohibition to go through 12th grade. “It really needs to be protected up through 12th grade; we need to go all the way,” she told reporters at the rally. She endorsed a similar measure in the state Senate, SB 1278, “which would allow schools to be sued for material that is ‘not age-appropriate or developmentally appropriate”’ at any grade level,” the Patriot-News notes.

But the Democratic governor said he will veto the bill.

SB 1278 has passed the Senate, but Gov. Tom Wolf, a Democrat, has promised to veto it or any bill like it, including HB 2813, which he said “denies humanity by reinforcing homophobic ideologies,” according to news site Local Today. Wolf is not up for reelection this year due to term limits, but the Democratic nominee for governor, Attorney General Josh Shapiro, opposes this type of legislation as well. Lawmakers should stop “wasting time and tax dollars on these attempts to bully LGBTQ Pennsylvanians,” a spokesperson for Shapiro’s campaign told Local Today.

The Republicans are all lining up behind the bill including nominee for governor who is all in favor of the laws and other LGBTQ+ bills.

However, the Republican nominee for governor, Doug Mastriano, attended the rally to voice support for HB 2813, SB 1278, and restrictions on LGBTQ+ content in general, the Patriot-News reports. Mastriano is a close ally of Donald Trump.

The article pointed out something that I didn’t think of,

While the terms “sexual orientation” and “gender identity” apply to heterosexual and cisgender identities as well as LGBTQ+ ones, the bill is clearly directed at LGBTQ+ students and materials, Pick added. “That is being interpreted as you can’t discuss the minority sexual or gender identity,” she said. “What you ultimately wind up with is a climate where schools and teachers feel unable to address the needs of students.”

So if you can talk about heterosexual and cisgender identities but not about us, doesn’t that violate the Fourteenth Amendment about equal treatment under the law? So under the Florida law you can sue the school if they say anything about their straight marriage or children!

The Republicans in their haste and revulsion of us they don't think things through and all the ramifications of what they are doing.