A bill making its way through the Tennessee General Assembly would protect teachers who do not use specific gender pronouns preferred by their students.
SB 2777 “specifies that a teacher or other employee of a public school or [Local Education Association] is not required to refer to a student using the student’s preferred pronoun if the pronoun does not align with the student’s biological sex” and “insulates a teacher or other employee of a public school or LEA from civil liability and adverse employment action for referring to a student using the pronoun aligned with the student’s biological sex instead of the student’s preferred pronoun.”
The bill is sponsored by State Sen. Mike Bell (R-District 9) and has been referred to the Senate education committee for consideration next week.
Its counterpart in the Tennessee House of Representatives is HB 2633, introduced by State Rep. Mark Cochran (R-District 23), is headed to the Finance, Ways, and Means Subcommittee for consideration next week.
Gender pronouns other than “he” and “she” have become trendy among the political left. Even some teachers now demand that their students call them something other than “Mr.,” Ms.,” or “Mrs.,” because they say they identify as something other than heterosexual.
The bill’s introduction coincides with that of HB 800, which says that schools “shall not locally adopt or use in the public schools of this state, textbooks and instructional materials or supplemental instructional materials that promote, normalize, support, or address lesbian, gay, bi-sexual, or transgender (LGBT) issues or lifestyles.”
The latter bill is similar to Florida’s recently-passed law that bars teachers from discussing sexuality with students from age five to eight years old.
The bills, which have been popping up in states across the country, are largely viewed as a reaction to the practice of teaching Critical Race Theory (CRT) to children in public schools.
CRT is a framework that teaches students to view the world through a lens of sexual or racial oppression.
Gov. Glenn Youngkin (R-VA) outrightly banned CRT from the classroom on his first day in office earlier this year.
Parents have stepped up to battle the ideology, too. Protests at school board meetings over transgender bathrooms and age-inappropriate books in their children’s schools have become commonplace and led to a rift between parents, teachers, and board members.
When a mom in Cherokee County, Georgia last week read from a sexually inappropriate book that was required reading for some students in the district, she was shut down by the board due to the graphic nature of the content.
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Pete D’Abrosca is a reporter at The Tennessee Star and The Star News Network. Email tips to [email protected].
