Parents in a Washington school district are furious after children as young as 10 were asked about sexual orientation and gender identity on a COVID-19 survey.
“I do my best to protect my daughter’s innocence at this age,” said one father, who has a 12-year-old daughter in the Bethel School District. “I don’t allow her to watch rated-R movies that have sexual content in them. We don’t allow certain magazines and monitor her internet usage. It’s infuriating when the school pushes back against my value system.”
While the survey administered by the school district did ask questions related to COVID-19, such as whether students are maintaining physical fitness and what their emotional health is like, it also asked what sex or gender they are were at birth, “even if you are not that gender today.”
It also asked how they identify, whether it’s “male, female, transgender, questioning/not sure of my gender identity, or something else that fits better.” It then gets into sexual orientation, asking students if they are heterosexual, gay, or lesbian, or “something else that fits better.”
The father, who would only speak to the press anonymously, said he doesn’t believe the questions asked were appropriate for children as young as his.
“My daughter will make her choices about life when she matures. I want her to use our values as a guide, not to be manipulated by our overreacting government,” the father said.
The school has not responded to questions about whether the survey was appropriate, but a spokesperson did acknowledge that “a few parents have contacted their schools about some of the questions on the survey.”
But the father said he was led to believe the survey was “more of a wellness/COVID questionnaire” and that he only became aware of the content when his upset daughter took screenshots and told him about the survey.
“I do not trust the public school system any longer. Once she is exposed to it, you can’t unring that bell,” he said. “I got a very special email about how to opt my kids out of the HIV classes but no specific/special email about wanting to ask my 12-year-old if she is a lesbian, a different gender than at birth, or how she identifies her sexuality.”
Now the father is warning parents to keep a closer eye on the materials that schools are giving to students.
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“Most of it I don’t have a problem with, and I understand the need for wellness monitoring,” he said. “But is the state’s intent to inject transgender and hypersexuality into everything they do?”
