In July, antigay political groups including Parents and Friends of Ex-Gays (PFOX) filed papers in Maryland state court to stop implementation of a board-approved and popular sex education curriculum in grades eight and ten in suburban Washington, D.C., schools.
This week, the Montgomery County Public Schools responded by asserting that the anti-tolerance activists were abusing certain legislative rules (which were intended to preserve status quo) to actually alter the status quo and deny Montgomery County families the up-to-date, intelligent, balanced, and age-appropriate sex-education curriculum that local parents have sought for years.
Teach The Facts, a local parents group, does its best to make sense out of the odd logic of PFOX and company — and the school district’s measured response. Among other things, the district found errors of biology and material fact in the antigay activists’ filings.
Quite simply, the district demonstrates that the sex-ed curriculum doesn’t say any of what antigay activists claim it says. The district further asserts that antigay activists’ effort to obstruct the local community’s call for improved sex education is contrary to the public interest.
Not strictly on-topic, so I expect the vengeful wrath of David Roberts to come swooping down on me at any moment, but speaking of Maryland… the recent Maryland case upholding the state’s ban on gay marriage? Well, therein the court decided that gays don’t count as a suspect group because it hasn’t been shown that sexual orientation is immutable.
Well, kinda. They actually did something of a switch: argued that the origins of sexual orientation are still being debated, and concluded that therefore there’s no consensus that it’s immutable.