Pronouns.

Yup, they are back in the news, this time there is another court case brewing.

He, She, They: The Pronoun Debate Will Likely Land at the Supreme Court
And the trend doesn’t look good for transgender kids.
Politico
By Kim Wehle
October 1, 2023

Once again, a pitched battle in America’s culture wars is making its steady way to the U.S. Supreme Court. In this round, the emerging question is whether public school children have a right to choose names and pronouns affirming their gender identity, or whether parents’ right to manage the upbringing of their children overrides it.

Three separate federal appeals courts have already confronted the issue, which has left school administrators across the country having to pick between the wishes and needs of students on one hand, and the demands of parents that they be alerted to their children’s gender and pronoun preferences at school on the other.

The legal issues in these cases are not easy ones, pitting children’s rights against their parents’ rights. Upset parents contend that by using a child’s preferred pronouns without their knowledge, government actors are illegally providing medical care without the parental consent that state law mandates. Weighing against the parents are their kids’ requests as well as state laws requiring that schools provide non-discriminatory environments in which students can safely express their gender identities. According to the Human Rights Campaign, 22 states and the District of Columbia have laws protecting students from harassment based on gender identity.

Place your bets and spin the wheel! You have a better chance winning on the Roulette wheel then in the courts.

The latest dispute to reach a federal appeals court arose when parents Stephen Foote and Marissa Silvestri sued a range of government entities and officials affiliated with the Ludlow, Massachusetts public schools. The lawsuit alleges that during the 2020-2021 school year, their child approached a teacher about feelings of depression, low self-esteem and possible attraction to the same gender. The teacher spoke with the child’s mother, who responded that she was getting the child professional help and asked school staff not to have private conversations with the child. The child, who was 11 at the time, then sent an email to school personnel self-identifying as genderqueer and announcing a new name and list of preferred pronouns. The school counselor responded with an email to staff stating that, consistent with a policy sanctioned by the Ludlow School Committee, they should not use the new preferred name and pronouns when communicating with the parents. Around the same time, the child’s sibling, who was then 12 years old, also began using a different name. The school did not tell the parents.

This is a biggie! And we are at the mercy of the courts which Trump packed holier than thou judges and the courts have been all over the place with rullings.

That dismissal order is now on appeal before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 1st Circuit. The 4th Circuit separately tossed out a similar case. Another remains pending in the 11th Circuit. Given the political overtones (the parents behind both the 1st and 11th Circuit cases are represented by the Child & Parental Rights Campaign, which states on its website that “children are being led to believe a powerful untruth — that they could be ‘born in the wrong body,’”) and because the law is so murky and undeveloped in this area, it is highly likely the issue will be appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court.

The organization sound like a bunch of Christian witch doctors pushing their religious beliefs on the rest of us using judges who are biased against us.

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Being Book Banning Week, here is another article about how all this book banning is being orchestrated by a handful of buttinskies.

Just 11 people were responsible for most 2021-2022 school book challenges. A Virginia woman challenged 71 out of the 73 books she read.

• Over half of all book challenges made in the 2021-2022 school year came from just 11 adults.
• One woman said she read 73 books, scanning for sexually explicit content, and challenged 71 of them.
• Book challenges, once a school library issue, are becoming a community-wide library issue.

Inside

By Katie Balevic

October 1, 2023

A Virginia woman dedicated herself to challenging at least one book per week — an effort that has caused a schism in her community as well as hours of unpaid labor for school librarians.

Jennifer Petersen, 48, spends hours scanning books for content she finds sexually explicit and filing challenges with Spotsylvania County Public Schools, where one of her children is enrolled and another is a recent graduate, The Washington Post reported.

Out of 73 books she read in one year, she challenged 71 of them, the Post reported. The remaining two were removed before she had the chance to get to them.

[...]

According to an analysis by the Post, 60% of book challenges made in the 2021-2022 school year came from the same 11 adults. Petersen was one of them. The majority of objections were on books authored by or about LGBTQ+ people or people of color.

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[Editorial]

The Republican clown car is in its full glory.

Matt Gaetz moves to oust Kevin McCarthy as speaker, setting up dramatic vote

McCarthy has said he'll survive what he suggests is Gaetz's "personal" grudge.

ABC News

By John Parkinson and Adam Carlson

October 2, 2023

Hard-line Republican Rep. Matt Gaetz on Monday night introduced a motion to remove Kevin McCarthy from the House speakership, setting up a dramatic vote over the future of the chamber's Republican majority.

The motion must be voted on within two legislative days, under House rules.

"Bring it on," McCarthy soon responded on X, formerly known as Twitter.

Gaetz, a Florida lawmaker, had said on ABC's "This Week" on Sunday that he would bring a so-called motion to vacate against McCarthy, criticizing how McCarthy has handled spending and budget fights since the GOP took control of the House in January and contending that McCarthy broke promises to other conservatives about how he would lead.

Here we go again, around and around where the clown car stops nobody knows. It took them something like 14 tries to elect a Speaker… how many this time?

McCarthy has projected confidence about facing the motion, telling on CBS on Sunday: "I'll survive." He suggested Gaetz was motivated by a "personal" grudge, which Gaetz denies.

"Let's get over with it. Let's start governing," McCarthy said. "If he's upset because he tried to push us into a shutdown and I made sure government didn't shut down, then let's have that talk."

Confidence, that is what I like in the Clown Car driver.

Moments after he spoke on the House floor earlier on Monday, teasing that he would bring the motion against McCarthy, Gaetz conceded to ABC News that he may not have the votes to kick McCarthy out of his job as he addressed reporters outside the Capitol.

So why are we going through this fire drill?

[/Editorial]