Florida’s House of Representatives yesterday passed its controversial and widely criticized ‘Don’t Say Gay’ Bill.
It was approved by a 69-47 vote (the Florida house has 78 Republican reps. versus 41 Democrats).
The bill, HB 1557, was introduced by Rep. Joe Harding (R-Williston). It will now advance to the Senate. Governor Ron DeSantis has already indicated his support for the legislation.
Aimed at schools, the bill seeks to ban the discussion of LGBTQ topics mainly at the primary grade level. However, it will also limit discussion when “not age-appropriate or developmentally appropriate for students”.
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Its supporters claim it will empower parents to be more engaged with their kids’ education.
One of those to vote in its favor was Republican Rep. Tom Fabricio, who argued during the debate, “Little children do not have a fully developed prefrontal cortex. They don’t have that ability to understand things at a certain level.”
Related: Rep. Joe Harding wants kids to be outed to parents, but that’s not even the worst thing about him
HB 1557’s many detractors say it will have a huge impact on LGBTQ kids, the kids of LGBTQ parents, and the education of all children.
Nadine Smith, Executive Director of Equality Florida, blasted the legislation.
“Every child has a right to speak honestly about their lives, a right to have access to a history that is honest and includes them, and a right to library books that reflect and include who they are.
“What we are seeing is the systematic erasure, or elimination of those resources for young people and a gag order imposed on educators.”
Cathryn M. Oakley, State Legislative Director and Senior Counsel at the Human Rights Campaign, said, “The ‘Don’t Say Gay or Trans’ bill is a politically motivated, shameful effort to attack and endanger LGBTQ+ students. The Florida Senate must vote this discriminatory piece of legislation down.”
Earlier this month, President Joe Biden slammed the bill as “hateful” in a tweet.
I want every member of the LGBTQI+ community — especially the kids who will be impacted by this hateful bill — to know that you are loved and accepted just as you are. I have your back, and my Administration will continue to fight for the protections and safety you deserve. https://t.co/OcAIMeVpHL
— President Biden (@POTUS) February 8, 2022
Related: Lauren Boebert’s gay rival just put out a shocking campaign ad… and wow!
On Monday, Rep. Harding introduced an amendment to the bill. This stipulated that if gay kids disclose their sexuality to a teacher, the educator has a responsibility to pass that information on to parents within six weeks. They must do so even if they think the action may result in the child facing “abuse, abandonment or neglect”. That amendment was dropped on Tuesday after much criticism.
Although laws banning the discussion of LGBTQ topics in schools are not uncommon, this one goes further and allows parents to sue school districts and seek damages if they believe the law has been broken.
If it passes through the Senate, it will likely become law in July.
Besides HB 1557, the Florida House also yesterday passed its so-called ‘Stop WOKE Act’ (HB 7). This legislation prohibits any teaching that could make students feel they bear personal responsibility or anguish for historic wrongs because of their race, color, sex or national origin.
In effect, it silences any discussion around Critical Race Theory in the classroom. It also extends to colleges and to training programs in workplaces.
HB 7 passed by a 74-41 vote.
Josh in OR
The GQP only thinks of you as ‘human’ if you are a cishet, white, male, ‘Christian’ with money. Everyone else is beneath them and they show it…daily.
Polaro
The GOP exists for one reason, to protect the wealthy. They will let anyone in that bows down. Racism, sexism, xenophobia, religion and homophobia are just tools to manipulate the vote. If Hispanics start voting for republicans, you can bet the GOP will switch to an open border position.
MarcyMayer
Josh in OR: You sound ridiculous.
Josh in OR
@MarcyMayor: And you sound like someone who’s had their head buried in the sand for the last 40+ years.
My statement comes from 40+ years of observation and study. It’s based on the things the GQP has said and done over that period, from the criminal swaths placed in positions of power by the GOP of old to entrench their money- and power-making schemes to the current lot of treasonous dictator-loving religious bigots working hard to strip women of their bodily autonomy, people of color of their ability to effectively vote, poor people of what few protections and programs still exist to help the destitute (you know, like that hippycommiequeerJew, Jesus Christ, told his followers to do? Like what modern Christian’s think is un-American and communism and socialism AND fascism, because modern GQP voters havent got the brains of a rotten rutabaga found under David Duke’s spank sock?), and queer folx of our basic humanity.
You know, the same white trash, knuckle-dragging, gap-toothed, gap-brained bigoted shitecaps who think (despite the plethora of evidence to the contrary) that they are the ‘superior’ race (thanks to their churches and politicians and ‘news’ casters telling them it’s so…) and who think that insurrection is patriotic as long as you do it in the name of the ridiculous claim that Trump is the Second Coming and Chosen by God (despite a bunch of weak liberals defeating, apparently, God and putting Biden into office through the cheatery of…*checks notes*…more votes than Trump…).
Meanwhile, your assertion comes with nothing but unearned attitude and zero reality to back it up.
Care to try again?
barryaksarben
Polaro is absoultly right. The GQP uses whatever it can to hold sway over the frightened herd of cattle that vote for them. Any issue any fringe lunatic gets their attention so they always have some new OUTRAGE to scare the fools. I mean how many trans kids are there? NOT Many and they are not dangerous. Yet you would think they were worse than the dictator Putin who gives all these small dicked men hard ons. Well he just went off the rails – that soviet VIAGRA finally didnt work anymore or rotted the rest of his tiny brain.
white-queer-african
Rep Joe Harding looks like a inbred? Then again so do most GOP members.
SamB, BarryM…… by now you should know the drill.
Josh in OR
Rep Harding looks like the sort of ‘children-loving’ guy he imagines every gay man to be.
And I’ll leave it at that.
SamB
Wow, a Queerty article that appears to be somewhat balanced. I’m shocked! Well done.
Cam
Translation: The right wing, anti-LGBTQ troll account trying to push the discussion away from the fact that Republicans hate Queer people and want to deny our existence.
Chrisk
There’s nothing balanced about it because there’s nothing good to say about these Republican douchebags.
MarcyMayer
Children should only be taught concepts that are age-appropriate, parents have a right to know what their children are being taught and have the option to not have their children exposed to things with which they disagree. That’s all this bill says.
barryaksarben
YEAH, the GOP has taken their hatred of us right out in the open so we can just report the story exactly , no need to fill in the blanks on this one. WHile we still have Sam and all his screen names to bore us. HE is such a coward. Some waste of a life little of mind or stature in his momma’s basement desperate to be important to someone since of course he is an incel. COWARD! Hey, since we are all in on it just how many screen names do you use?
Josh in OR
@MarcyMayor: I knew I was attracted to boys and men by the time I was in 4th grade. I didn’t know yet that it was called ‘gay’ and meant that some people thought that made me – a 9 year old – a disgusting, Hellbound, perverted, inhuman, dangerous, Satanic, ‘age inappropriate’ monster deserving of death and torture in Jesus’ name.
Talking about the reality that gay people exist and that there is nothing INHERENTLY inhuman or ‘evil’ about it isn’t age inappropriate. No more than asking a kindergartener if the little girl in his table group that he pulls the pigtails of is his ‘little girlfriend’.
You can – and people do – talk about the existence of queer people without going into the mechanics of anal sex with a preteen. You can discuss the existence of gay couples, lesbian couples, trans human beings, etc all without ONCE mentioning genitalia or sexual acts, despite what right wingers and hatemongers like you would have us believe.
For that matter, you know what ELSE was deemed too ‘mature’ and ‘age inappropriate’ at one time?
Miscegenation.
The very idea that people of African descent and people of European descent are both human beings and deserving of dignity, freedom and protection under the law was once deemed ‘age inappropriate’ to (white) children (and is again, by the same racist whites as back then). THAT is who you are in the side of. Not children, not ‘innocence’. You side with bigots because you don’t understand and have no interest in expanding your frame of reference beyond your myopic little view of the world.
You and parents agreeing with this are exactly WHY public schools were created in the first place. Public school is where kids are forced to learn alongside people who might not conform to their parents prejudices, people their parents might not even consider ‘people’. Literally your ENTIRE argument was once used against teaching white children that slavery existed and that Black people deserve the same rights and dignity as whites.
Your argument is bigoted as hell, and that makes YOU bigoted as hell, intentionally or not.
#BeBetter
Leash
You know who else doesn’t like kids to learn about queer people existing? Russia. 🙂
“Little children (…) don’t have that ability to understand things at a certain level.”
Oh come on, they can understand that some boys like boys and some girls like girls.
“Its supporters claim it will empower parents to be more engaged with their kids’ education”
The only thing this bill will empower is queer kids killing themselves.
And to have the audacity and sit there and LIE and pretend this bill was made to protect children.
Chrisk
“Little children do not have a fully developed prefrontal cortex. They don’t have that ability to understand things at a certain level.”
Hey dipshit. While true that it isn’t fully developed in children it basically just controls our impulse inhibition, memory, and cognitive flexibility. Learning about other people isn’t on that list though. Besides why send them to school at all if learning new things is so bad for them.
Polaro
Taking exception to that sentence, which is true and reasonable, makes me question your usually decent judgment. Nine year old children haven’t a clue about ramifications and are easily manipulated by either side of the Force. The effort to convince little gay boys that they are girls is the ultimate anti-male victory. Best to leave that till junior high school.
Fname Optional Lname
England’s Section 28 and Don’t ask Don’t tell + Russia’s gay propaganda law all wrapped up in a swampy stink hole that is Florida. They don’t care that children will be harmed. They can erase an entire group of people who make them uncomfortable.
Cam
What the right wing troll SamB is saying is that the very idea that LGBTQ people exist is dirty and shameful and something kids shouldn’t know about.
So if they talk about the Secretary of State’s spouse that is ok, but mentioning that the Secretary of Transportation also has a spouse is filthy and will harm kids if they know it.
Polaro
It’s a bad bill that is poorly written and does a lot more harm than “Don’t Say Gay”. I wish people would actually read the subject matter instead of just blindly following their mind-control biased sources (left or right). While I agree with people who do not like this bill, I abhor the fact that probably none of you have actually read it – it’s short, by the way, and provides more insight into what the other side thinks – always helpful to know. And, of course, the bad article does not include a link to the bill, which makes me wonder if the author has even read it.
inbama
The whole HRC political strategy was to make LGB folks think it was mainly about us rather than outlawing transing kids without parental approval. That’s why the Alphabet Soup dubbed it “Don’t Say Gay.”
They only use words like “gay” when they want to manipulate us or get us to contribute money. Otherwise, we’re LGBTQIA+ community.
tjack47
It’s “Don’t Ask. Don’t Tell.” for civilian children. That worked so well. Didn’t it?
stvrsnbrgr
Don’t say Florida. Or Texas. Ever.
Prax07
I say if this passes, and teachers actually do out lgb kids, the kids should in turn claim the teacher is a pedo and tried to sexually abuse them. Get every teacher that follows this fired.
cuteguy
Florida is a banana republic and the shame of the USA. Hopefully one day when the electoral college is eliminated, just like that m0ron trump has proposed in the past via tweeting before he became a GQP poster child, the world will be a better place. Faux News and Ron Deathsantis are the reasons for the downturn of civilization. Let’s hope the Dems get proper leadership one day.
flrockies30
Any of those men out there that have slept with Harding should just break their NDAs and come forward for the greater good.
Karlis
Look at that guy. Surely he is one of the fairly substantial number of supposedly straight men who get a whole lot less straight three beers in.