Remember, people, being informed about who is running for even the lowest level elected positions is very important.
Those positions often have the most day-to- day impact on your individual life, and they are typically the least voted for races.
And yet, local media has become such shit that it’s impossible to research the positions of many local candidates.
During the last elections here, the media sent out questionnaires to all of the school board candidates and half of them didn't bother to respond.
The local subreddit crowdsourced background info on all the candidates and helped identify several of the wingnut wannabe authoritarians.
.
Though one did manage to get elected and almost immediately got suspended for acting like the racist she is during the meetings, and then freaking out when called out for her behaviour.
League of women’s voters website is usually a good resource. They send each candidate a questionnaire and publish what they get back.
I've emailed local candidates and asked them how they voted on other elections (like who did you vote for president or in the primaries). They've responded. I have had some respond very vague, which I interpret as a bad sign, and others were very clear.
That happened with my local library system. We had a dipshit conservative try to ban pride displays. Turns out, even if this is a red county, the people who actually read books and care about public services don't like that, and now knew to pay attention to local library politics. The hearing about it was packed, and she lost badly the next election.
I admit I didn't consider voting in library board elections before, but now you bet I'm showing up.
Some good news sure is refreshing
the majority of the attendees voicing support did not have children in the district’s schools, and most were not residents of the area, according to the Times.
As they're fighting culture wars at other people's expenses, on the behalf of their political side, which will not care nor protect them as they think. In which word is it acceptable that a complete stranger has a say in an institution in which they won't ever take part in?
I feel like a lot of these situations could be mitigated by only allowing people with children in the school to attend, or at least only people who live in the district. It would at least keep those astroturfed groups out, like moms for fascism and the like
US policing is like this too. we could greatly improve police results by instituting local civilian boards to oversee police conduct and require police live in the areas they patrol.
How can you be a member of the school board in an area you don't live?
It said the supporters were from elsewhere, not the school board members. Or did I miss that?
Hi I live in this district and was part of the recall effort. Those board members didn't have kids in OUSD schools. They send their kids to private school. I don't know where they live, but they are politically active in other nearby communities outside the district and would encourage extreme political activists that don't live in our district to come make a circus out of board meetings. Their focus was not on kids or schools. Their interest was only in chaos.
I don't doubt that their focus was on chaos at all. I'm also not surprised that they didn't have kids in the public school system. I was just basing it on what I read in the article and I didn't remember reading anything about that in the article.
Thanks, apparently I can't read.
I honestly don't know how I feel about this. If my kid (which I do have one) was trying to pass as another gender in school, but not home, I would want to know. It's generally not good for kids to keep big secrets like this from the people looking out for them. That's how they end up getting in to trouble in life.
At the same time, I'm not the kind of parent that wouldn't support my kid through such an issue. I understand it could be dangerous for some kids to be outted to their parents, but I don't know that we should be governing based on the worst possible outcomes, when keeping the secret could also be dangerous to some.
It is telling to me that most of the supporters that showed up had no skin in the game. I don't think this specific issue is as cut-and-dry as it appears at first. My mind has certainly changed on it the more I think about it.
Many LGBT youth are hiding that fact from their parents because those parents will either throw them out of the house, send them to reeducation camp, or physicallt abuse them for coming out.
This policy is trying to hurt children.
The danger to trans kids can't be understated more in your comment. Outing a kid to parents against their transition is a good way to get them shunned and bullied to homelessness and/or death. Unsupported and bullied kids have astronomically higher rate of suicide, homelessness, and just plain chances of being murdered like that Oklahoma trans teenager recently.
Teachers can support a kid in coming out to their parents or out the kid to their parents based on their judgement rather than being required to do so. Your child has a right to privacy as well, depending on age and whether the secret harms others. Being trans at the point where they want to change their name is usually a high-school thing and being trans isn't harming anyone.
I live in this school district and was part of the group of parents that got these board members recalled. The issue is forcing educators to report it instead of trusting them to do the right thing. If they have a good relationship with the parents and know it's for the best to tell them what is happening with their student, or if they suspect there's something going on in the home where it's better for the student to keep their confidence, the decision should be up to the teacher to do what is right. These are not black and white situations. Also, regardless of anyone's opinion on the issue, the state had already made a policy, so these board members knowingly made a political decision that cost the district millions of dollars to defend in court, knowing they would lose. They didn't care, because they have no kids in the schools here. They were political activists using our kids as pawns. To the curb with that trash.
I think you and others who thought the policy was a good idea are missing the key reason why it isn't.
The rule forced schools to notify parents regardless of the circumstances. It did not say that parents must not be notified under any circumstances. That's a massive difference.
As you said, this is not a cut and dry issue. If a school deems that a trans student's health and safety are in danger and that the parents should be notified, then they can make the decision to do so. However, under most circumstances, if the parents are not already aware that their child is changing their gender identity then there is a good reason for that.
These situations are highly sensitive and must be dealt with on a case-by-case basis - the policy destroyed all that and put many students in danger unnecessarily by completely removing all nuance from the situation.
I said this further down the thread, but demanding teachers put the feelings of some parents above the wellbeing of the most vulnerable kids by not letting them use their own judgment to do what's best for each kid on a case by case basis isn't the right way to go about this.
The odds of a kid being out at school but not at home are incredibly unlikely, in my opinion. With their friends would be one thing, but to be publicly out without their parents knowing? Makes no sense, especially with the chances of bullying or somebody else just snitching (intentionally or by accident) to their parents. I could see kids confiding in a school counselor or a teacher that they trust, but the way it's worded is all about making trans kids afraid and nothing more. Under this mandate, if your kid asks a teacher to call them Bob instead of Robert, the school is required to tell you. The cruelty was and continues to be the point for these people.
Someone involved in this stuff should tip off the teenagers to the gratuitous malicious compliance that's sitting right there (preferably with a teacher who's in on it).
Just every day, whole classes should request to go by a different name. Then, the school is compelled to annoy the parents over teenage bullshit. And when the angry parents are pissed that they are getting spammed by the school, all the school can say is "we can't change the rules, the current school board forces us to do this".
Try to remember when you were a kid. Would you want your teacher ratting you out to your parents for something personal and harmless, and that you aren't ready to talk about with your parents?
How would you have felt? About the teacher, the school, your parents? Do you think this would have negatively affected your school work, social life, and home life?
Everybody should drink a couple of glasses of water and mind their own business.
Welcome to the News community!
Rules:
1. Be civil
Attack the argument, not the person. No racism/sexism/bigotry. Good faith argumentation only. This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban. Do not respond to rule-breaking content; report it and move on.
2. All posts should contain a source (url) that is as reliable and unbiased as possible and must only contain one link.
Obvious right or left wing sources will be removed at the mods discretion. We have an actively updated blocklist, which you can see here: https://lemmy.world/post/2246130 if you feel like any website is missing, contact the mods. Supporting links can be added in comments or posted seperately but not to the post body.
3. No bots, spam or self-promotion.
Only approved bots, which follow the guidelines for bots set by the instance, are allowed.
4. Post titles should be the same as the article used as source.
Posts which titles don’t match the source won’t be removed, but the autoMod will notify you, and if your title misrepresents the original article, the post will be deleted. If the site changed their headline, the bot might still contact you, just ignore it, we won’t delete your post.
5. Only recent news is allowed.
Posts must be news from the most recent 30 days.
6. All posts must be news articles.
No opinion pieces, Listicles, editorials or celebrity gossip is allowed. All posts will be judged on a case-by-case basis.
7. No duplicate posts.
If a source you used was already posted by someone else, the autoMod will leave a message. Please remove your post if the autoMod is correct. If the post that matches your post is very old, we refer you to rule 5.
8. Misinformation is prohibited.
Misinformation / propaganda is strictly prohibited. Any comment or post containing or linking to misinformation will be removed. If you feel that your post has been removed in error, credible sources must be provided.
9. No link shorteners.
The auto mod will contact you if a link shortener is detected, please delete your post if they are right.
10. Don't copy entire article in your post body
For copyright reasons, you are not allowed to copy an entire article into your post body. This is an instance wide rule, that is strictly enforced in this community.