Talk about cancel culture: Grain Valley schools tells LGBTQ kids they aren’t safe here
In a move that hurts not just LGBTQ kids but all students, Grain Valley officials have told high school teachers to remove stickers signaling that their classrooms are safe spaces.
Yes, the stickers meant students could feel safe to be themselves in terms of sexual orientation and gender identity. But it meant more than that, too.
We often hear conservatives say that they or their children don’t feel safe to be themselves in class because they fear being “canceled” if they dare to express conservative views. That is a valid point; they should not have to fear expressing ideological differences.
But if that’s true, and it is, then why would they want anyone else to feel that way?
District officials recently wrote a letter to school families explaining that they ordered the “Safe Space” stickers removed because “our goal is for every classroom to be a safe place for all students, not just in classrooms where teachers choose to display a particular sign.”
Good goal, but ordering all stickers removed sends exactly the opposite message.
The decision, prompted by a parent’s complaint, unfortunately is in step with legislation proposed by Republican lawmakers across the country, and in Missouri and Kansas.
Such bills are designed to ban transgender girls from participating in girls sports, and remove school library books about race and gender.
It’s no surprise that students see these actions as attacks on their existence. That’s the kind of erasure that guarantees more bullying and more anguish.
Children’s mental health emergency visits to hospitals were up 40% in 2021 over 2020, according to the Children’s Hospital Association. Considerable research links bullying to suicidal behavior among teens, and LGTBQ teens are far more likely than their peers to attempt suicide, the third leading cause of death among children.
So yes, public schools should be accepting of and sensitive to all, and classrooms should be a space where students feel safe to express varying ideas or identities.
The district says it’s now planning a listening session to hear from parents and the community about its sticker removal decision. Let’s hope that what they hear will result in a reversal.