ESCONDIDO, California (LifeSiteNews) — A California school district’s policy that teachers and staff must hide a student’s gender delusions from their parents creates a “trifecta of harm,” according to a federal judge.
Escondido Union School District cannot enforce its LGBT agenda policy while a federal lawsuit brought on behalf of two teachers proceeds, District Judge Roger Benitez ruled.
He compared the gender policy to coaches hiding an athlete’s concussion from his parents.
He explained the problems with the new policy:
The result of the new EUSD policy is that a teacher ordinarily may not disclose to a parent the fact that a student identifies as a new gender, or wants to be addressed by a new name or new pronouns during the school day – names, genders, or pronouns that are different from the birth name and birth gender of the student. Under the policy at issue, accurate communication with parents is permitted only if the child first gives its consent to the school.
Plaintiffs are Elizabeth Mirabelli and Lori Ann West, two school district teachers.
The teachers “maintain sincere religious beliefs that communications with a parent about a student should be accurate; communications should not be calculated to deceive or mislead a student’s parent,” according to Judge Benitez.
The policy is a “trifecta of harm” that “harms the child who needs parental guidance and possibly mental health intervention to determine if the incongruence is organic [sic] or whether it is the result of bullying, peer pressure, or a fleeting impulse.”
The policy also “harms the parents by depriving them of the long recognized Fourteenth Amendment right to care, guide, and make health care decisions for their children.”
“And finally, it harms plaintiffs who are compelled to violate the parent’s rights by forcing plaintiffs to conceal information they feel is critical for the welfare of their students – violating plaintiffs’ religious belief,” he ruled.
The Thomas More Society, which represented the two teachers, praised the ruling.
“This is an untenable situation to put teachers in,” Paul Jonna, Thomas More Society special counsel said. “Traditionally, educators have been viewed as highly significant players in a child’s development, partnering with parents – not supplanting them – in the incredibly important responsibility of raising children,” Jonna said in a news release.
“The State of California and the Escondido Union School District have created an unconscionable scenario where it pits these two key influencers in a child’s life against one another by putting up an intentional curtain of dishonesty between them,” she added.
The policy is part of a broader push by leftist politicians and educators in California to push gender ideology on children at any age.