A new report has found that more than 80 percent of the young people in the U.S.—59 million of them—live in states that have recently considered bills to censor discussions of race and LGBTQ people in schools or that would otherwise create hostile school climates, especially for LGBTQ youth.
From 2020 to 2021, these kinds of bills nearly quadrupled in number and were considered in 42 states, according to “Curriculum Censorship & Hostile School Climate Bills,” released today by the Movement Advancement Project (MAP) in partnership with the Equality Federation.
More than 59 million young people live in the 42 states that considered these bills. The report breaks it down even further:
- From 2020 to 2021, politicians in at least 30 states considered bills that would censor or restrict inclusive curricula, including about race, ethnicity, and LGBTQ people.
- Bills in at least 26 of those states were focused on banning classroom discussions of race and history, with 10 states passing them into law.
- Bills in at least 14 of those states considered “Don’t Say Gay” and other related legislation that specifically seeks to censor discussions of sexual orientation, gender identity, and LGBTQ people in schools, ban LGBTQ-inclusive books or materials, and more.
- From 2020 to 2021, at least 40 states also considered hostile school climate bills, including bills banning transgender students from playing sports according to their gender identity; these bills more than tripled from 2020 to 2021.
- The bills create a wide range of penalties, including a school losing funding and allowing a parent to sue a school if they disagree with the curriculum.
- Even when those bills did not become law, they cause harm. A 2021 survey from The Trevor Project showed that two-thirds (66 percent) of LGBTQ youth said their mental health was negatively impacted by recent state legislative debates about transgender people.
The bills haven’t stopped this year, either. As of March 2022, at least 280 hostile school climate and curriculum censorship bills have been introduced in 39 states—more than in the previous two years combined.
Here’s what’s even scarier:
These bills reflect a coordinated effort on behalf of well-financed, far-right lobbyists seeking to undermine the progress made in recent years toward addressing racism and advancing LGBTQ equality. This coordination is evident in the copy-cat language seen in bills across many states, and further in publicly released campaign strategies from the lobbyists behind these bills.
Additionally, the report says:
“This coordinated campaign is attempting to take advantage of the fears and anxieties many parents are facing right now amid the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic and the loss of control or security around their children’s health, including at school.”
This coordinated campaign is attempting to take advantage of the fears and anxieties many parents are facing right now amid the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic and the loss of control or security around their children’s health, including at school…. These bills turn schools into a political battlefield and put partisan interests ahead of the best interests of children.
Banning discussions of race, sex, or “divisive concepts,” the report says, could lead to consequences such as banning any teaching about Martin Luther King, Jr. or Rosa Parks. Teachers could also be forced to discuss denials of the Holocaust alongside historically accurate depictions. And when teachers cannot mention LGBTQ people in age-appropriate ways, children will learn an incomplete history of America, an inaccurate picture of today’s families, and incomplete and therefore harmful information about sexuality and sexual health. Also, as I’m sure most readers here know already, “LGBTQ students and those with LGBTQ parents or family members may feel ostracized or excluded from classroom discussions, resulting in disconnect from peers, lower interest in school, and even harmful mental health.”
The report concludes, and I concur: “Children require an honest education that helps them learn from the mistakes of the past and prepare to create a thriving future. To do this, schools must examine and learn from our history, not hide it away.”
I’ve written recently about many of these bills and suggested some things we can each do to help fight against them, though I make no claim to having all the answers. I do believe we can combat these attacks, but it is going to take a campaign as coordinated as the one against us, across many different communities and identity groups. It will take allyship and effort, and it will not be easy. But our children and their futures are worth it.
