{"id":347114,"date":"2022-05-13T08:45:00","date_gmt":"2022-05-13T12:45:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/knightlife.paceacademy.org\/knightlynews\/?p=347114"},"modified":"2022-05-13T08:36:13","modified_gmt":"2022-05-13T12:36:13","slug":"florida-governor-signs-dont-say-gay-bill","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/knightlife.paceacademy.org\/knightlynews\/2022\/05\/13\/florida-governor-signs-dont-say-gay-bill\/","title":{"rendered":"Florida Governor Signs “Don’t Say Gay” Bill"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Tampa Bay students protest the so-called “Don’t Say Gay” bill. Photo: ABC Action News <\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

In late March 2022, Florida\u2019s governor Ron DeSantis signed a bill that states that \u201cClassroom instruction by school personnel or third parties on sexual orientation or gender identity may not occur in kindergarten through grade 3 or in a manner that is not age-appropriate or developmentally appropriate for students in accordance with state standards.\u201d The law also states that parents are eligible to sue school districts in violation of this. The new law, which many members of the LGBTQ+ community and its allies call the \u201cDon\u2019t Say Gay\u201d law, has aroused a cultural controversy throughout the country. DeSantis believes that it is the responsibility of parents to educate their children regarding sexual orientation and gender identity. \u201cWe will make sure that parents can send their kids to school to get an education, not an indoctrination,\u201d said DeSantis just moments before turning this bill into a law.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Backlash from members of the LGBTQ+ community, its supporters, students, Democrats and the entertainment industry began nearly immediately after the bill was introduced. The law was condemned by many attendees of this year\u2019s Academy Awards, and even President of the United States Joe Biden called the law \u201chateful.\u201d Many Florida students have gathered in protest against the law, chanting, \u201cWe say gay!\u201d The Walt Disney Company, which holds a lot of political power and influence in Florida, brought its political donations in the state to a pause, and the company\u2019s CEO Bob Chapek received criticism for being slow in responding to the law. After the law was signed, Disney released a statement, which says, \u201cOur goal as a company is for this law to be repealed by the legislature or struck down in the courts, and we remain committed to supporting the national and state organizations working to achieve that.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe bill\u2019s intentionally vague language leaves teachers afraid to talk to their students and opens up school districts to costly and frivolous litigation from those seeking to exclude LGBTQ people from any grade level,\u201d said Florida Representative Carlos G. Smith, who is a member of the LGBTQ+ community himself. He then said that #DontSayGay sends a hateful and negative message to the youth of today in need of support. The President of the Florida Education Association Andrew Spar says that the law is built on falsehood, and \u201cthat falsehood is that somehow we\u2019re teaching kids inappropriate topics at an early age, and clearly we\u2019re not.\u201d Many have assumed that the law permits school staff members to \u201cout\u201d students to their families, but Republican Florida Rep. Joe Harding denied those claims. \u201cNothing in the amendment was about outing a student,\u201d he said. \u201cRather than battle misinformation related to the amendment, I decided to focus on the primary bill that empowers parents to be engaged in their children\u2019s lives.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This new law being enforced in Georgia has only been lightly discussed, but still is a possibility. On March 8, 2022, Georgia officials proposed a bill that would forbid private schools funded by the state from discussing gender identity and sexual orientation. While many celebrities and other influential figures shared their very strong opinions about Florida\u2019s law, very few, if any, have publicly discussed Georgia\u2019s. No Georgia-based companies in the entertainment industry, including Tyler Perry Studios, Trilith Studios and multiple others, were willing to comment on the situation. This silence may imply that this law coming to Georgia is only a possibility, and likely will not happen. This does not mean that it will not happen, it\u2019s just unlikely at the moment.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In late March 2022, Florida\u2019s governor Ron DeSantis signed a bill that states that \u201cClassroom instruction by school personnel or third parties on sexual orientation or gender identity may not occur in kindergarten through grade 3 or in a manner that is not age-appropriate or developmentally appropriate for students inContinue Reading<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":479,"featured_media":347169,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[175],"tags":[],"class_list":["entry","author-","post-347114","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-politics-news"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/knightlife.paceacademy.org\/knightlynews\/files\/2022\/04\/tampa-protests.jpeg?fit=1280%2C720&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p1TYqQ-1siC","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/knightlife.paceacademy.org\/knightlynews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/347114","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/knightlife.paceacademy.org\/knightlynews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/knightlife.paceacademy.org\/knightlynews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/knightlife.paceacademy.org\/knightlynews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/479"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/knightlife.paceacademy.org\/knightlynews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=347114"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/knightlife.paceacademy.org\/knightlynews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/347114\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":347508,"href":"https:\/\/knightlife.paceacademy.org\/knightlynews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/347114\/revisions\/347508"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/knightlife.paceacademy.org\/knightlynews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/347169"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/knightlife.paceacademy.org\/knightlynews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=347114"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/knightlife.paceacademy.org\/knightlynews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=347114"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/knightlife.paceacademy.org\/knightlynews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=347114"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}