Banned Books and the 'Don't Say Gay' Law: LGBTQ Kids Feel They Want to 'Wipe Them Out' of Classrooms

By Matt LavietesNBC

Gay Pride posters have been repeatedly vandalized by students at Spencer Lyst's high school in Williamson County, Tennessee.

Teachers have skipped LGBTQ topics in class textbooks.

Trans children in her state have been legally prohibited from competing on school sports teams that align with their gender identity.

Parents have asked school officials to remove books on sexual orientation and gender identity from the county's elementary school curriculum.

And while leading his school's

club in a back-to-school parade in September,

.

"I'm so used to it, but it shouldn't be something I should be thinking about," Lyst, 16, said of the almost constant feeling of being targeted at school because of his identity.

He even said that it

.

"It's like, can I go to the bathroom or are they going to hate me just for existing?"

he said.

Lyst's school experience is far from an isolated case.

Spencer Lyst is a high school student in Williamson County, Tennessee.

Courtesy of Spencer Lyst.

Since the start of the school year, education officials in states across the country have banned books about gay and trans experiences, removed LGBTQ-themed posters and flags, and disbanded gay-straight alliance clubs.

classmates

, while multiple state legislators have introduced hundreds of anti-LGBTQ bills, many of which seek to redefine the place of gay, bisexual students , lesbian, transgender, and

in America's schools.

[Biden issues executive order expanding protections to LGBTQ people]

“These things can't be taken as isolated events,” Mary Emily O'Hara, rapid response manager for GLAAD, the LGBTQ advocacy group, said at a news conference Monday.

“What we are seeing here is anti-LGBTQ groups, on a national level, making schools the new battlefield across the board, in various types of school policies and various forms of legislation,” he added.

“Right now, schools are being targeted by the anti-LGBTQ movement,” he noted.

In most cases, conservative school officials, legislators and parents say LGBTQ issues don't belong in school because they are “political” and “inappropriate for the age” of students.

Rather,

youth and their families, along with LGBTQ teachers and allies, say they feel like they are being “erased” from America's education system.

"I'm not going back in the closet"

Jennifer Solomon, a 50-year-old mother from South Florida, has four children.

Her oldest daughter, Nicolette, 28, is a lesbian and teaches fourth grade in Miami-Dade County.

Her youngest son, Cooper, 11, identifies as male, but Solomon said her "expression is feminine."

Cooper "never wanted to be a girl," her mother explained, but he prefers to wear her school girls' uniform and enjoys dressing up as a fairytale princess for fun.

"An easy way to describe him is that he's the opposite of a tomboy," she told NBC News.

As hard as he works to protect his children, Solomon, who heads his local chapter of PFLAG, an advocacy group for LGBTQ families, said

Nicolette, Cooper, and Jennifer Solomon. Courtesy of Jennifer Solomon.

Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, a Republican, said Monday that he would support new state legislation, called the Parents' Rights in Education Bill, known as the "Don't Say Gay" bill, that would ban discussion of sexuality and gender identity in schools.

Speaking at a news event in Miami, DeSantis said it is "totally inappropriate" for teachers to have conversations with students about gender identity, citing alleged instances where they tell children, "Don't worry, don't choose their gender still” and in which they “hide” the parents who are giving lessons on the subject in the classrooms. 

[Utah bans conversion therapy for LGBTQ children]

“Parental rights?

The rights of which parents?

Only parental rights if you're raising a child according to DeSantis?” said Solomon, who is a nurse manager at a health care company.

“DeSantis

.

Florida is not like that;

this is not what the country looks like,” he remarked. 

Right now, schools are being targeted by the anti-LGBTQ movement."

Mary Emily O'Hara, glaad spokesperson

"DeSantis has found a soft spot, and that soft spot is children," he added, suggesting the governor is supporting the measure for political gain.

Nicolette Solomon, who is a teacher, said she is hesitant to mention her wife, and by default her sexuality, at school, but believes passage of the 'Don't Say Gay' bill would be "the last straw" and he promised to resign if it becomes law.

Nicolette Solomon and her wife. Photo courtesy of Nicolette Solomon.

“

.

It's not good for my own mental health,” she said.

“And I don't think I can stand to see students struggle and want to ask me about these things and then have to deny them that knowledge.

That is not who I am as a teacher,” she stated. 

In less than two months since the beginning of the year,

, already surpassing last year's total of 139, at least 69 of them focused on school policies, according to

(Freedom for all Americans)

The nonprofit group, which advocates for LGBTQ anti-discrimination protections across the country, said in an email that it did not track LGBTQ school policy bills last year as it was not a "radical trend." as it is now.

[40% of LGBTQ youth in the United States considered suicide in the past year, according to a survey]

Three states, including Lyst's home state of Tennessee, passed bills last year that allow parents to exclude students from any lesson or course that mentions sexual orientation or gender identity, according to GLSEN, a group of advocacy that aims to end LGBTQ discrimination in education. 

In addition to the 'Don't Say Gay' bill moving forward in Florida, there are 15 bills under consideration in eight states that would silence discourse about LGBTQ identities in classrooms, according to the nonprofit organization PEN America, which promotes freedom of expression.

transgender students

But perhaps the biggest trend in state bills targeting LGBTQ youth are those that target transgender students.

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Last year, lawmakers in at least 30 states weighed legislation that would bar trans students from competing on school sports teams that align with their gender identity, according to the LGBTQ advocacy group Human Rights Campaign.

Nine of those states have enacted bills.

So far this year, 27 states have proposed similar initiatives, with South Dakota enacting its version of the legislation this month.

While not related to school, there have also been a number of bills seeking to prevent transgender youth from accessing gender-affirming health care.

At least 20 states have proposed such measures since early 2021, with two states, Arkansas and Tennessee, enacting such bills.

However, a federal judge temporarily blocked the Arkansas law in July, after the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) sued the law in court on behalf of trans youth and their families. families.

[These are the impressions of young people and activists of the LGBTQ community after the Supreme Court ruling]

Cooper Solomon said he believes lawmakers

. "

“I guess back then, a long time ago, they didn't accept this and thought it was really bad,” the fifth grader said.

"I just wish they knew that it's okay to be like this and it's not going to hurt anyone."

"I felt my community was under attack"

Legislation aside, the final straw for 17-year-old Jack Petocz was when his high school in Flagler County, Florida, removed a young adult memoir detailing the challenges of being a black homosexual boy:

by George M. Johnson. 

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In November, a school board member filed a criminal complaint against school officials for allowing copies of the book, which has been challenged in at least 19 states, to remain in two of the county's high schools.

The complaint was dismissed, but the superintendent decided to keep the book off the shelves until new policies are written to give parents more control over the library's collection.

“I felt like my community was under attack, that they

,” said Petocz, who is gay and led a student protest in response to the book's removal.

“We are already a minority.

Why are you trying to suppress this critical information within our libraries?

These books are critical in providing a sense of identity,” he stated.

[A shelter in Mexico houses LGBTQ migrants fleeing their countries due to homophobia]

Historically, books about race, sexual orientation, and gender identity have been challenged in schools, but in recent months, school libraries have seen a groundswell of opposition.

In the fall, as book bans began to mount in counties across the country, some national groups, including No Left Turn in Education and Moms for Liberty, began circulating school library book lists that they said they were

The bans then became a talking point in Virginia's contentious gubernatorial race, where Republican candidate Glenn Youngkin, a former private equity investment executive, made education a central issue of his campaign and won. .

Virginia Governor-elect Glenn Youngkin speaking to supporters in Chantilly, Virginia, on election night on November 3, 2021. Andrew Harnik / AP

Youngkin's victory prompted other politicians to take up the issue, with the governors of Texas and South Carolina urging state school officials in November

School board members in Virginia's Spotsylvania County made national headlines after calling for LGBTQ books with "sexually explicit" material to be incinerated.

Deborah Caldwell-Stone, director of the American Library Association's Office for Intellectual Freedom, said in November that while challenges to books with LGBTQ and race-related content have historically been "consistent," the association has seen recently a “chilling” increase.

[More and more people identify as LGBTQ in the United States, with a boost from the GenZ generation]

“I have worked at ALA for two decades and have never seen this volume of challenges,” he said.

"The impact will fall on those students who desperately want and need books that reflect their lives, that answer questions about their identity, about their experiences that they always desperately need, and who often feel they can't talk to adults."

To counter LGBTQ book bans, and school bans on race-related texts, a group of more than 600 writers, including bestselling children's author Judy Blume;

publishers;

bookstore owners;

and advocacy groups signed a joint statement in December condemning the trend, arguing that it "threatens the education of America's children."

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Setting a 'different tone'

While state bills and book bans have garnered the most media attention, advocates say there are other worrying trends adding to the angst felt by many

students : removal of Pride flags and other symbols of LGBTQ affirmation of classrooms, disbanding gay and straight club alliances, and teacher resignations in protest of anti-LGBTQ policies.

In the fall, for example, rainbow stickers were ordered removed from classroom doors at MacArthur High School near Dallas.

“While we appreciate the sentiment of reaching out to students who didn't have that support before, we want to set a different tone this year,” read an email from a school official, obtained by NBC News from a MacArthur High School teacher.

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Removing the decals prompted an outcry from students, but the pushback failed to get school officials to change their stance on the policy.

School board members in Newberg, Oregon, made national headlines in the fall for taking similar steps.

In September, the school board banned educators from displaying

and

flags and other symbols it deemed "political" at school.

“We don't pay our teachers to force their political views on our students.

That's not their place," the school board member who drafted the order, Brian Shannon, said in a meeting that was recorded.

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The move sparked protests in the city that drew several members of the Proud Boys, a far-right group that has backed violence, who rallied in favor of the school board.

An attempt to remove Shannon and another school board member from office over flag removal failed last month.

Some teachers have resigned in other school districts over similar moves, such as a Missouri teacher who resigned in September after his district ordered him to remove the Pride flag and not discuss human sexuality or "sexual preference" in school.

In December, parents accused teachers at a Tennessee high school of wanting to "indoctrinate" children to be gay by helping students start a gay-straight alliance club.

[A Utah billionaire leaves the Mormon church and donates $600,000 to an LGBTQ group]

In addition to parents, school officials and lawmakers, some classmates are among those targeting LGBTQ students, according to advocacy groups and local news.

A national survey of LGBTQ students published in 2020 by GLSEN found that 69% of respondents reported experiencing verbal bullying at school due to their sexual orientation, 57% due to their gender expression or outward appearance, and 54% because of their gender identity.

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Oct. 21, 202104:14

Last year, more than a dozen local news stories, from California to Florida, reported on trans students being harassed or attacked by other students, some of them in bathrooms.

But activists say it's unclear if the attacks have increased or if the press has been more vigilant in reporting them.

Affirmation Impact

Advocates have long been warning educators about the mental health risks plaguing LGBTQ youth and how anti-LGBTQ policies can exacerbate them.

A survey last year by The Trevor Project, an organization that tries to prevent LGBTQ youth suicide, found that 42% of the nearly 35,000 LGBTQ youth surveyed, and more than half of trans and non-binary youth who responded, seriously thought about suicide in the past year.

Separately, two-thirds of LGBTQ youth said debates over anti-trans legislation have had a negative impact on their mental health, according to another survey The Trevor Project conducted in the fall.

[Virginia becomes 20th state to ban conversion therapy for LGBTQ minors]

However, researchers from The Trevor Project also found that LGBTQ youth who reported having at least one LGBTQ affirming space, such as school, home, or a workplace, were significantly less likely to attempt suicide.

With that in mind, Lizette Trujillo drives three hours a day, back and forth, to her 14-year-old transgender son's school in Tucson, Arizona.

From the time he socially transitioned in 2015, Daniel's school was open to the idea of ​​letting him use the bathroom that corresponded to his gender identity, which was not a common occurrence in Arizona, and he had experience teaching trans youth.

Daniel TrujilloPhoto courtesy of Rachel Marie Photography.

Trujillo said that while the daily commute “is not without its challenges,” sending Daniel to a school where he is “not considered 'other'” has made him happier.

“The biggest difference in my school is that I have the support of all my teachers, principal and staff;

I have access to sports and bathrooms,” said Daniel.

“It facilitates learning”.

It also left room for his mother to focus on securing gender-affirming health care for her son, applying for new identification documents, and overcoming emotional difficulties.

“What people don't realize is that you're not just worried about school when your child is socially transitioning,” Trujillo said.

“As you start this genre journey, you start hitting the walls and you're like, 'Oh, I didn't know I needed that,' or 'I didn't expect it was going to be a problem.

I didn't realize we were going to lose the family.'”

In response to the myriad of challenges facing LGBTQ students and teachers, President Joe Biden has pledged his support.

Earlier this month, the White House censured Florida's "Don't Say Gay" bill, while also connecting the legislation to disputes occurring nationwide.

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“Make no mistake, this is not an isolated action.

Across the country, we're seeing Republican leaders take action to regulate what students can and can't read, what they can and can't learn, and most troublingly, who they can and can't be," said a spokesperson for the White House in a statement to NBC News.

"This is politics at its worst, cynically using our students as pawns in political warfare."

A fight for "their basic rights"

There are a number of examples in the United States of students becoming proactive and succeeding in changing anti-LGBTQ policies.

Aaryan Rawal, 17, was one of more than 400 students in Fairfax County, Virginia, who successfully urged school authorities to reinstate two LGBTQ books in November.

Rawal, who is gay, said he was relieved when school board members heeded the students' demands, but lamented that organizing efforts forced him to skip classes and lose sleep.

[Nearly 1 in 5 Young Adults Say They're Not Straight, According to a Global Survey]

“No student in any county in this country wants to go to school to fight for their basic rights,” Rawal said.

“Instead of doing statistics homework or hanging out with friends, we were expected to go to school board meetings and lobby school board members for things that really shouldn't be up for discussion.”

Last month, a group of students in Palm Beach, Florida met with the newly hired superintendent to describe their experience as LGBTQ in their county schools.

One by one, they told stories of harassment and assault by students and bullying by teachers, according to two students who attended the meeting.

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“Los estudiantes adquieren una conciencia colectiva de que, ‘la escuela apesta y, como soy LGBT, esto es de esperarse’, y eso no es normal”, dijo Marcel Whyne, un estudiante de secundaria no binario que asistió a la reunión. “Ese no debería ser el estándar que tenemos para los niños LGBT", dijo Whyne.

En cuanto a Spencer Lyst, de Tennessee, él se propuso iniciar el club Pride de su escuela secundaria, Indy Pride, el otoño pasado, con el objetivo de difundir la conciencia sobre la comunidad LGBTQ de la escuela y proporcionar “un lugar para las personas que sientan que no tienen un espacio”. Si bien ser abucheado por adultos en el baile de bienvenida de su escuela fue una experiencia “difícil”, dijo que no se deja intimidar.

"People need to know that no matter what bill they try to pass or what book they try to ban or try to ban teachers or students from speaking in schools, it doesn't change who people are and it doesn't change who we're going to continue to be." Lyst said.

“So trying to take a legal route to 'protect your children' doesn't work.

They are who they are, and if you can't accept that, maybe you're the one with work to do,” she said.