South Western’s elected school board is making some strange decisions.

For the last two years, they’ve fixated on which bathrooms LGBTQ+ kids use. In 2023, officials in this Hanover-area district played musical chairs with school bathrooms in a misguided attempt to appease the loudest bigots among them — ending up with five different types of bathrooms.

After a low-turnout school board election in which several far-right members joined their ranks, they hired a Christian law firm, decided to begin banning books and reopened the bathroom issue. Board President Matthew Gelazela, who was elevated to his post after previously serving as the board’s most vocal bomb-thrower, pointed to Red Lion’s discriminatory policies as something to aspire to.

Now, upon the advice of that law firm — the Harrisburg-based Independence Law Center — the board approved spending $8,700 to cut windows so passersby can look into the so-called “gender-identity” student bathrooms.

  • forrcaho@lemmy.world
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    1 month ago

    You’ve always got to show up for those school board elections now. Every. Single. Time.

    • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.worldOP
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      1 month ago

      Or live in Houston and the governor can just strip your School Board of power, then install an unelected bureaucrat to loot the school treasury.

  • floofloof@lemmy.ca
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    1 month ago

    These are the people who continually call everyone on the left “groomers” and taking an unhealthy interest in kids? The same people cutting peepholes into school bathrooms?

    • WoodScientist@lemmy.world
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      1 month ago

      Anyone who shows up to a school board meeting to complain about bathrooms should automatically have the police sent to look at their hard drive. If you’re that concerned about the bathroom habits of young children, the cops really need to look at your internet history and the contents of your hard drive.

      • Dragon "Rider"(drag)@lemmy.nz
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        1 month ago

        Drag wants to complain about bathrooms at schools. If we segregate the bathrooms at schools, we’re teaching kids that segregation is okay. We should be preparing the next generation to have less hangups and weird behaviour than we do. The kids already all have mixed gender bathrooms at home. They won’t think anything of desegregating bathrooms, and it’ll create a less sexist society.

        • Schmoo@slrpnk.net
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          If you’re gonna talk about desegregating bathrooms I think it’s important to talk about designing bathrooms for greater privacy as well. Ideally you don’t want a bunch of urinals lined up across from the sink / common area with no dividers in a desegregated bathroom. It’s a bad idea to just remove the signs on existing public bathroom designs and say anything goes.

          Also, why do you keep referring to yourself in the 3rd person?

          • Dragon "Rider"(drag)@lemmy.nz
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            1 month ago

            Drag isn’t referring to dragself in the third person. Drag has person independent pronouns. Most people have first, second, and third person pronouns for subject, object, and possessive. That’s 9 pronouns. Drag just has one. Much simpler and easier to remember.

            • Schmoo@slrpnk.net
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              For most people what’s familiar is easier to remember than what’s simpler. Personally I find drag’s comments difficult to parse. I’ll respect drag’s wishes regarding how drag wants to be referred to, but I expect drag’s going to have a lot of friction even with very tolerant and accepting people if drag insists on that pronoun choice.

              This video might be helpful for drag. I know the title is a bit clickbaity but I promise the person in the video is also tolerant and accepting.

              Edit: I went through and replaced all instances of you/your with drag. I think this is illustrative of the problem with drag’s approach. If everyone has to expend great effort simply to interact with drag in a respectful manner then that will lead to people becoming frustrated with drag. While drag’s identity is entirely drag’s business and no one else’s, drag’s insistence on a difficult/unfamiliar pronoun is a choice, and drag could make drag’s life easier by loosening up.

              • Dragon "Rider"(drag)@lemmy.nz
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                1 month ago

                Drag is 9 minutes into the video and Jones is saying that using neopronouns is easier than people make it out to be. Drag agrees and drag told you so. Drag also already knew what a pronoun is. Drag has yet to encounter new information, apart from Zulu’s 16 grammatical genders

                • Schmoo@slrpnk.net
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                  If drag keeps watching the next point he makes is the exact inverse, namely that neopronouns are also harder than many people make them out to be. Specifically when he talks about the processing cost that is incurred by using even standard/traditional pronouns in certain ways. The parts of the video I thought would be most helpful are in his conclusion, so I do recommend watching to the end.

                  The part I believe is helpful starts at 15:10

              • Dragon "Rider"(drag)@lemmy.nz
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                1 month ago

                Drag will watch the video, but drag wonders why the title uses a right wing name for the right wing, and a right wing name for the left wing. The video could use each side’s name for themselves, or each side’s name for the other side. But only using right wing terms makes it seem like the video has a right wing bias. Drag will still watch, but drag will do so with critical thinking.

                • Schmoo@slrpnk.net
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                  I noticed that too when I first came across the video, but after becoming more familiar with this person’s content I saw that they lean progressive/inclusive and the title is like that probably just for the sake of clickbait or because they’re coming from a more centrist/liberal perspective and aren’t as familiar with leftist terminology.

                  I still think their perspective as a linguist is worth hearing.

              • Dragon "Rider"(drag)@lemmy.nz
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                Drag finished watching the video pretty much. 3 minutes left and it seemed like she was winding down. Drag was already familiar with all the main content Jones covered. Drag thinks she’s probably underestimating the knowledge of linguistics literacy on the left because she’s from a more right leaning culture, where the “left wing” people local to that area are who would be considered moderates in other places. She used a right wing name for the left wing, so drag thinks she hasn’t actually immersed herself in left wing political culture enough to understand it.

                With regard to the argument that using new pronouns is hard, drag understands and already knew her arguments. But drag thinks Jones neglected to consider the impact of neuroplasticity. Adapting to neopronouns is a skill. People with lots of practice get it faster and with less effort. Drag’s presence on Lemmy is challenging people and causing them to learn. Expanding minds. Just like the linguist with the N word pronouns. Drag picked new pronouns for this account as an experiment. Drag likes the new pronouns. Drag made revisions when an idea didn’t work, and now drag sometimes uses drag/dragself pronouns in conversation with drag’s friends and family off of Lemmy. They make drag feel dragony.

                Drag’s identity is a conversation.

                EDIT: Also, drag just remembered Jones’ point about misgendering trans people in conversation with people who know less. Well, drag has been in that situation. Drag was out to everyone and presenting full time, and even though drag’s mother struggled with drag’s pronouns, drag felt like she was finally getting it and understanding. She hadn’t misgendered drag in nearly a year. Well, then drag overheard drag’s mother in the next room he/him-ing drag to drag’s elderly grandfather. And drag felt like shit. Drag’s grandfather is in his 90s and he’s an asshole. He’s never going to accept drag. And drag had accepted that, and decided to just ignore him until he died. But when drag’s mother, who had been making all that progress, he/him-ed drag to the grandfather, drag suddenly realised that drag didn’t know if she had been misgendering drag behind drag’s back all the time. Drag realised that drag would never be able to trust that she was actually making an effort to respect drag, or if she was just appeasing drag to drag’s face. So drag moved out of home and cut contact with her. And drag is going to ignore her until she dies too. That’s not the only reason for our bad relationship, but it was a point where everything crystallised and drag decided to stop making excuses for her.

                • Schmoo@slrpnk.net
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                  I appreciate that drag took the time to watch the whole video and I think drag is probably right about Jones’ cultural background, as it is similar to mine. I only meant to help make drag’s life easier if that’s something drag was having trouble with, but I respect that drag already understood the friction that drag’s neopronoun creates and made an informed choice to use it on lemmy.

                  Also, nice Steven Universe clip. That’s a show that helped me understand people like drag and is why I have the patience to engage with drag despite the very conservative cultural context I live in.

              • Dragon "Rider"(drag)@lemmy.nz
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                1 month ago

                Drag would appreciate it if you used drag’s second person neopronouns instead of saying “you”. Drag only has one pronoun, so it’s very simple to use and easy to remember, and drag’s pronoun is in drag’s display name.

  • kescusay@lemmy.world
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    “Guys, guys… If we just hurt these kids enough, it will force them back into the closet and we’ll get to pretend LGBTQ+ kids don’t exist!” - These assholes, probably

    • betterdeadthanreddit@lemmy.world
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      That’s the plan. Ostracize to literal death and pretend it’s an unfortunate side-effect that following a god (more specifically, their god) will fix.

      • metaStatic@kbin.earth
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        I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, it’s not the substance of the issue that matters at all, it’s the taboo. Accepting these kids diminishes their kink, they’re not being naughty if it’s socially acceptable and wheres the fun in that.

  • ShaggySnacks@lemmy.myserv.one
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    Now, upon the advice of that law firm — the Harrisburg-based Independence Law Center — the board approved spending $8,700 to cut windows so passersby can look into the so-called “gender-identity” student bathrooms.

    Anyone want to take a bet that someone at the law firm or on the school board, really loves to sexual assault children?

  • Bluefalcon@discuss.tchncs.de
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    1 month ago

    From a local station.

    "Our students should not consider the space outside of our stalls as private within the multiuser restrooms. Our current policy states ‘In any facility in a District school that is for use based on Gender Identity, in which a person may be in a state of undress in the presence of others, school personnel shall provide private changing areas for use.’ Areas between our stalls and sinks in multiuser restrooms are not private changing areas under that policy.

    Just fucking WOW. I guess we should check their assholes next.

    https://www.wgal.com/article/parents-upset-over-window-installation-south-westerns-gender-inclusive-bathrooms/62492963

  • BallsandBayonets@lemmings.world
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    You only need two types of bathrooms. One for standing while peeing and the other for sitting. That’s the only way bathrooms need to be divided.

      • Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world
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        1 month ago

        Sassafras, one of the main traditional ingredients in the manufacture of root beer, is carcinogenic and has been banned in the US since 1960. There are a surprising number of rules surrounding root beer.

    • spacesatan@lazysoci.al
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      That doesn’t seem to be a code? Are you talking about the cope lintel and I guess 2104.1.1?

      *oh that’s some 2021 version change. PA is on 2018 and chapter 21 is masonry which got me to the other violation.

      You can violate 2021 IBC all you want in PA because it isn’t adopted code. 2018 only cares about privacy for urinal partitions and the enclosed stalls which weren’t touched.

  • katy ✨
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    starting to think the anti trans crusaders are just paedophiles looking to legitimise paedophilia.

    • Thebeardedsinglemalt@lemmy.world
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      They’re so concerned about what’s going on inside children’s pants that they now was to watch them in bathroom.

      Sounds pretty fucking weird to me

  • anon6789@lemmy.world
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    In case anyone else was wondering how they came up with 5 types of bathroom:

    bathrooms for males assigned as male at birth, females assigned as female at birth, males based on gender identity, females based on gender identity, and private, single-use bathrooms for all students to use.

    Source

    • metaStatic@kbin.earth
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      the fact they have the space for all of that means they have the space to eliminate communal bathrooms altogether

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        It sounded like that’s their current “problem.”. Since it’s the adults with agendas that are doing the only complaining, the kids are just using whatever bathroom is most convenient, so CIS kids are using the Identify as X bathroom because they don’t care, they just need to use a damn bathroom. I took it as that’s why they want the windows in the non CIS bathrooms.

        I feel stupider for having to try to explain this like it makes any sense. Just have single, unisex bathrooms already like everyone has at home!

    • DillyDaily@lemmy.world
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      …those don’t even remotely work to serve all genders.

      I still wouldn’t technically be able to pee anywhere if I was a student at that school (other than the single stall room…why not just have a bunch like that?)

  • ngwoo@lemmy.world
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    Conservative Christians increase their involvement and within a year the children’s bathroom has a viewport for pedophiles installed.