Report: Bay Area High School Let ‘Queer Straight Alliance’ Bully Students

AP Photo/Elise Amendola
AP Photo/Elise Amendola

Acalanes Union High School in Lafayette, California, is facing infuriated parents after freshman students were reportedly singled out–with the tacit support of teachers–and humiliated if they didn’t subscribe to politically correct views on gay and lesbian issues.

On January 29, students reported that members of the Queer Straight Alliance (QSA) were allowed to take over all freshmen English classes at Acalanes Union High School to grill students about their personal beliefs and their parents’ personal beliefs on lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) issues.

The QSA asked students step forward to demonstrate whether they believed that being gay was a choice. Students were also required to state whether their parents would be accepting if they came out as gay. Those students who did not step forward were ridiculed and humiliated by QSA members.

The QSA also gave students a handout of LGBT terminology that included “pan-sexual,” “demi-sexual,” “gray gender,” and about a dozen other LGBT-approved terms. QSA then asked student to line up in order to demonstrate where the students fell in the “gender spectrum.”

Shocked parents retained Pacific Justice Institute (PJI) public law attorneys to send a letter to Acalanes High School’s attorneys on February 4. PJI stated that the school exercise was a violation of federal and state laws requiring parental notice and permission before students are questioned about personal or family beliefs regarding sexuality or morality.

PJI emphasized that the school’s action of allowing QSA questioning and harassment violated the students’ constitutional right to privacy.

The letter demanded that the school immediately cease the interrogations and suspend all QSA activities. PJI also demanded production of all public records associated with the events of January 29th, including e-mails, notes, and documents from the school officials who approved the QSA activities.

“Singling out students for ridicule based on their moral or political beliefs is a Marxist tactic that should have no place in the United States of America,” said Brad Dacus, the President of PJI. “We’re not going to put up with this intimidation and interrogation of students, and it’s also time for other community members to join PJI and the parents we represent in speaking out against the outrages happening in their school district.”

Acalanes Union High School is no stranger to sexual controversy. According to Fox News, some parents of students became “irate” when they learned that their children’s sexual education classes were being taught by employees of Planned Parenthood, without their prior knowledge and consent. The parents were reported to be “fuming” over the methods and materials being used as instruction materials, including: a worksheet that describes how to give and obtain sexual consent and a diagram that uses a “genderbread” person for lessons in gender identity.

Documents previously publicized by PJI showed that Planned Parenthood instructors encouraged freshmen high schoolers to ask each other questions like, “Can I take your shirt off?” and “Is it okay if I take my pants off?”

PJI also stated that Planned Parenthood instructors distributed a sex checklist to freshmen students that appeared to suggest students were “ready” for sex when they “would not feel guilty about it and knew how to use lubricants.”

PJI stated that parents identified the public Twitter feed of another sexual education instructor at Acalanes High School and Planned Parenthood education manager for Northern California, where she calls herself a “pleasure activist.”

Said pleasure activist tweeted enthusiastically on attending the CatalystCon pornography conference for her continuing education along with other Planned Parenthood representatives, just prior to teaching at AHS this past fall.

“Acalanes High School and the District have defied common sense, ignored the law and broken parents’ trust,” said PJI Attorney Matthew McReynolds, who sent the letter on Wednesday. “These administrators are acting like schoolyard bullies. If they think intimidation is going to work on us or these parents, they are greatly mistaken.”

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