Yet another victory for trans kids. Don't think for a minute that I am sugarcoating the ugly political climate we are all facing. I am simply pointing out that even in the darkest of times, light exists, and hope and love never dies.
From The Independent:
A federal judge dismissed a lawsuit brought by America First Legal against an Ohio school district over its transgender bathroom policy. America First Legal filed the suit in November. The president of the organisation is Stephen Miller, who served as a senior White House adviser to former President Donald Trump. District Judge Michael Newman ruled on Monday that the organisation’s claims lacked standing, and the board’s new policy did not infringe on the parents’ free exercise of religion.
“The [parents] do not have a substantive due process right to dictate to the School District which bathroom a transgender student must use,” Judge Newman wrote in the filing. “The School District’s bathroom policy applies evenly to all students, making no exception for anyone based on their religion, to allow each student’s identified gender to prescribe the bathroom to use.”
According to The Buckeye Flame:
The case centered on a trans student Bethel Middle School in Tipp City – 10 miles north of Dayton – who was granted access to a restroom corresponding with her gender identity. This set off contentious school board meetings and multiple lawsuits.
. . . According to the lawsuit, student “Anne Roe,” transferred to Bethel Middle School in January of 2020. Her parents informed the school that their daughter was transgender and the school set up access for Anne to use single-occupancy restrooms scattered across school grounds. In an affidavit, Anne shared that this arrangement caused her to avoid going to the bathroom during the day, because the restrooms were “frequently occupied whenever she needed to use [them], and she felt ostracized, humiliated, and targeted by other students who taunted her for using the separate bathroom.”
Anne’s parents requested that she be able to use the girls’ communal restroom in addition to the single-occupancy spaces. The school agreed to the request. The decision set off months of school board meetings that featured anti-trans rhetoric and two lawsuits: a state one – currently ongoing – regarding whether the board’s actions violated open meeting law and a federal one alleging that the school was discriminating against their cisgender children by allowing trans students’ access to restrooms.
All of this nonsense simply to stop one trans child from using the bathroom which corresponds with her gender identity. So unnecssary.
