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Pushback: Teacher sues for being suspended for defying pronoun demands

Owned by government
This is apparently what Kansas school administrators think

Don’t comply: Pamela Ricard, a teacher at Fort Riley Middle School in Kansas, has sued the local school board there for suspending her for three days for refusing to call a female student by the male pronouns demanded.

Ricard was suspended for three days and issued a formal reprimand in April 2021 for addressing a biologically female student by the suffix “Ms.” and the student’s legal last name, according to the Herzog Foundation. Ricard alleges that she received an email from the school’s counselor informing her that she must use the pronouns “he/him” to describe the biological female, though the student had never made a direct request.

At the time of Ricard’s three-day suspension, the complaint alleges that neither the district nor the middle school had a formal policy regarding student preferred name and pronoun usage and that Ricard was suspended under the “Bullying by Staff” policy. [emphasis mine]

The highlighted words strongly suggest that this demand was not coming from the student, but from the counselor and school administration, and that there was a very good chance that this counselor and the administration were grooming the child sexually.

When the school then released a policy requiring teachers to to use the pronouns demanded, Ricard then requested a religious exemption, which apparently the school refused to give. From another report:

Ricard requested a religious accommodation three times during an appeal of her discipline. In a closed meeting last August with the Board of Education, Ricard explained that her addressing the student as “Miss (last name)” was intended to be respectful while also protecting Ricard’s religious beliefs.

When the board later denied her appeal without a public vote, the Kansas Attorney General’s office warned the district that it had violated the Kansas Open Meetings Act. The board then denied Ricard’s appeal in a public vote at its September meeting.

At this point Ricard filed her lawsuit.

Though Ricard certainly should have the right to be exempt from this policy because of her religious beliefs, so should everyone else, and not because of religion. Liberty of conscious, the fundamental idea behind the First Amendment, means that each person has the right to do decide, for themselves, what they believe in, whether they be a Christian, Jew, Muslim, or atheist. No one else has the right to impose different beliefs upon them.

Thus, making anyone say anything, from pronouns to the communist manifesto, if they disagree with it, is morally wrong.

Note too that this is a middle school, which means the students in it are younger than fourteen. They are minors. Worse, they are children, and for the school administration to be advocating this nonsense on them is actually child abuse. Are the parents aware of this? I suspect not.

Furthermore, the board’s willingness to act in secret, in violation Kansas law, illustrates its lawless nature. While Ricard’s lawsuit is proper, it isn’t enough. The Kansas legislature as well as the parents of the kids in this school district should move quickly to get the administrators of the school, its school board, and the teachers and counselors in it all fired immediately.

Genesis cover

On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.

 

The print edition can be purchased at Amazon. from any other book seller, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.


The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
 

"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News

13 comments

  • Nabi

    Legal communty loves this stuff–first it creates gay ‘marriage’ and mandates an equivalence with traditional marriage makes big bucks off all the ruckus this nonsense causes and then gives its blessing to transgenderism–thumbs up to a mental disorder–and plays both ends of the ruckus that creates too. In fact if you look closely you can see the legal community’s the catalyst behind almost all of our present woke messes.

  • Bobby Hill

    Robert wrote: “The highlighted words strongly suggest that this demand was not coming from the student, but from the counselor and school administration, and that there was a very good chance that this counselor and the administration were grooming the child sexually.”

    This is a profoundly moronic take, even by Robert’s standards. Later in his write up, Robert acknowledges that this is a middle school, and we’re talking about children. How hard is it to imagine a kid not feeling comfortable asserting themselves to an adult, a teacher, especially with s topic of a sensitive nature? Maybe the parents had a conversation with the school admins on their child’s behalf.

    Agree with the topic or not, Robert’s guessing to make the story more salacious and befitting a gossip rag don’t help.

  • Doubting Thomas

    Bobby Hill – I am breaking my own rules. I had sworn that I would only comment on space-based postings to give myself a break from the ongoing collapse of Western Civilization, but you tipped me over the edge.

    I suggest that you read Abigal Shrier’s 2020 book entitled Irreversible Damage: The Transgender Craze Seducing Our Daughters. As one reviewer wrote: “Abigail Shrier has written a deeply compassionate and utterly sobering account of an unprecedented and reckless social experiment whose test subjects are the bodies and psyches of the most emotionally vulnerable among us.”

    Regardless of the fact that the school or the girls’ parents themselves were promoting this on a young girl who was likely less than 14, it is an abomination. Let our children be children for a while.

    I’m going to try to get back to my promise to myself but as I have granddaughters 8 and 10 I worry greatly about what some “socially committed” adult will do to them.

  • Bobby Hill

    Doubting Thomas, please read the last sentence of my post.

  • Bobby Hill: I have been puzzled why your comments always required my moderation, and decided today to see if I had banned you previously under a different nickname or email address.

    Lo and behold, you had posted previously at your IP address under the names Jimmy Page and Eddie Munster.

    I could ban you again, but as long as you maintain the same fake nickname you are using now so the conversation can be coherent, I will tolerate your presence. Your dishonesty however in identifying yourself of course only illustrates the overall intellectual dishonesty of all your comments.

  • I should add that your comments will continue to go into moderation requiring my approval each time. You are on probation. See if you can debate civilly without descending into insults. Your first comment here skirted the line quite dangerously.

  • Doubting Thomas

    Bobby Hill – I did read your last sentence.

    Robert said: “Note too that this is a middle school, which means the students in it are younger than fourteen…for the school administration to be advocating this nonsense on them is actually child abuse. Are the parents aware of this? I suspect not.”

    Robert was supposing that the parents were not aware of it.

    My post said “Regardless of the fact that the school or the girls’ parents themselves were promoting this on a young girl who was likely less than 14, it is an abomination. ” I was being less forgiving than Robert.

    Again, in my opinion, even of the parents were aware of the schools actions **and endorsed them.** this was an child abuse and an abomination.

    Now I am back to trying to concentrate on space matters.

  • t-dub

    I’m going to say this . . . and I mean it. These “people” who want to inflict this sexual and gender stuff on kids starting in kindergarten are just “grooming” them sexually for what ever perverted purpose they have in store for them. Thats what this is all about, plain and simple. Nothing more, nothing less.

  • Chris

    This is the result of one of those “new and exciting fields” created by universities that end in
    “ – Studies”

    The Joe Rogan interview of Abigail Shrier is fascinating:

    https://open.spotify.com/episode/4SIh4Pt39AtGQYzMJMNkv1

  • wayne

    Chris-
    I didn’t know one could link to Spotify Stuff, how did you do that?
    IIRC, that Abigail Shrier episode w/ Rogan, is still up at youtube, but I can’t confirm that right now.
    –Jordan Peterson also interviewed her–>

    Jordan B. Peterson Podcast S4 E11
    March 2021
    https://youtu.be/fSKQfATa-1I
    1:32:04

    t-dub;
    Spent 30 years working in mental health and you are more correct than not.
    I wouldn’t necessarily say they are all pedo’s, but people who overly focus on this Topic and especially as it relates to children, have all sorts of baggage in their background, and they appear to really enjoy dragging everyone else into their chaotic lives.

  • Rick Yarnell

    “Liberty of conscious, the fundamental idea behind the First Amendment, means that each person has the right to decide, for oneself, what one believes, whether one be a Christian, Jew, Muslim, or atheist. No one has the right to impose different beliefs upon others.”
    FIFY

  • Lawrence

    This not only violates freedom of speech, but like all political correctness, it requires one to lie a violation of the ninth commandment so it violates freedom of religion as well.

  • sippin_bourbon

    The injection of sexuality at this age beyond basic reproductive education amounts to grooming.

    Through bullying tactics the groomers are making the other educators an active accomplice in their grooming.

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