Florida’s law shielding little kids from LGBTQ now shields big kids, too

As he signed H.B. 1557 last year, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) and his team ensured that the visual image fit with their rhetoric. They and the governor’s allies had championed the Parental Rights in Education Act as a necessary measure to keep kids safe and innocent. So there was DeSantis, signing the bill into law while wearing a blue suit that matched the school uniforms of the young children standing beside him.

Critics of the legislation used another term, calling it the “don’t say gay” bill. That moniker derived in part from an early iteration of the bill that barred some “classroom discussion about sexual orientation or gender identity.” The final version amended that phrasing slightly, to prohibit “classroom instruction by school personnel or third parties on sexual orientation or gender identity” — completely through the third grade and, for higher grades, when such instruction was “not age-appropriate or developmentally appropriate.”

Over and over, DeSantis and his allies insisted that little kids were being instructed about sex in schools and that it was therefore necessary for the state to set boundaries. There’s a classic trope, most broadly popularized by a religious character on “The Simpsons,” about the political utility of rising to the defense of children. DeSantis, already obviously thinking about appealing to the 2024 Republican presidential electorate, was happy to oblige. He was standing athwart the sexualizing culture in which children were immersed.

From the outset, the argument was rooted in a very old and toxic assumption: that discussion of the existence of same-sex relationships was necessarily a discussion of the mechanics of same-sex sexuality. To acknowledge that a man is married to a man does not necessarily require an acknowledgment of what the couple does in their bedrooms, any more than recognizing a marriage between a man and a woman demands an explanation of body parts.

Of course, mixed-gender relationships don’t trigger any pause anyway. A man being married to a woman is just a marriage. A woman being married to a woman is a discussion of sexuality.

“Parents have every right to be informed about services offered to their child at school,” DeSantis said in a statement accompanying the bill-signing, “and should be protected from schools using classroom instruction to sexualize their kids as young as 5 years old.”

“We’re taking a firm stand in Florida for parents when we say instruction on gender identity and sexual orientation does not belong in the classroom where 5- and 6-year-old children are learning,” Florida House Speaker Chris Sprowls added. “It should be up to the parent to decide if and when to introduce these sensitive topics.”

You’ll recall the infamous framing offered by DeSantis’s spokeswoman Christina Pushaw.

“The bill that liberals inaccurately call ‘Don’t Say Gay’ would be more accurately described as an Anti-Grooming Bill,” she wrote on Twitter, adding: “If you’re against the Anti-Grooming Bill, you are probably a groomer or at least you don’t denounce the grooming of 4-8 year old children.”

“Grooming,” in this context, means preparing young people for sexual exploitation. The leap is from “men marry men” to “talking about men marrying men is sexualization” to “that sexualization is aimed at facilitating sexual abuse.”

All framed as being about protecting little kids, the most vulnerable.

“If you are out protesting this bill, you are by definition putting yourself in favor of injecting sexual instruction to 5-, 6- and 7-year-old kids,” DeSantis said in March 2022. “I think most people think that’s wrong. I think parents especially think that’s wrong.”

And then, on Wednesday, step two.

The Florida Department of Education considered and approved a change to the application of the rules barring instruction “on sexual orientation or gender identity.” Now, the state bans intentional “classroom instruction to students in grades 4 through 12 on sexual orientation or gender identity unless such instruction is either expressly required by state academic standards … or is part of a reproductive health course or health lesson for which a student’s parent has the option to have his or her student not attend.”

The vagueness here is part of the point. What counts as “classroom instruction” that’s forbidden? Reading a novel with a gay character? Discussing the political debate over same-sex marriage? Assigning homework based on what’s occurring in the news? The safe default position for teachers is to go out of their way to avoid it entirely.

But it’s not like a 15-year-old high school student is not going to be familiar with gay relationships if neither their parents nor their schools address the subject. Johns Hopkins All Children’s Hospital (in Florida) has an interesting page detailing the stages at which children become aware of gender and sexuality. The idea that this is not already an active part of kids’ lives by the time they get to middle school is simply bizarre.

Research conducted by a team at San Diego State University found that three-quarters of children are familiar with the terms “gay” and “bisexual” by age 9 or 10. About 6 in 10 were familiar with “transgender.” If you have ever been 9 or 10 years old, you probably know how such awareness spreads: not from attentive listening to teachers but from peer-to-peer conversation. (The Johns Hopkins page warns parents of information gleaned in this way: “chances are slim that the facts will be correct and that the words learned will meet your approval.”)

What DeSantis offers parents is the illusion of parental control over this discussion and of society’s increased acceptance of same-sex relationships. He is acting as though he is stepping out of the way while simultaneously slotting same-sex relationships into the category of “under debate.” As journalist Julian Sanchez aptly put it, “disingenuously framing it as a policy of state neutrality or abstention on a controversial topic sells it better with voters who don’t want to think of themselves as hateful, but don’t understand the social reality students today inhabit.”

The tell here is the expansion to high school seniors, a group that is probably pretty familiar with human sexuality. DeSantis is offering sympathetic Florida parents the assurance that he will do everything in his power to keep the real, evolving world at bay, however unrealistic. He’s telling Republican primary voters leaning toward Donald Trump’s “make America great again” rhetoric that he, too, will work to turn back the clock.

The kids were the vehicle for the rhetoric. The opposite wasn’t the case.