Across America, various states and school districts are trying to implement rules that will forbid certain subjects from being addressed in schools. For instance, in Florida, the “Don’t Say Gay” bill, a piece of legislation that will prohibit teachers from discussing sexual orientation and gender issues with their students in classrooms, has just advanced to the Florida House. Furthermore, numerous school boards in places like Texas, Pennsylvania, and Tennesse, have begun removing individual books from their curriculum for containing information about sensitive topics such as the Holocaust, racism, or gender discrimination. Lastly, here in Indiana, House Bill 1134, or the Education Matters Bill,was considered to target critical race theory, an academic concept that emphasizes that race is a social construct and that racism is institutional. The bill also aimed to prevent conversations about sex, ethnicity, and religion in classrooms.
The attempts to restrict such topics in schools have certainly created a lot of backlash from legislators, parents, students, and teachers alike. Many of them argue that these types of regulations will do more harm than good, and that is undeniably true.
First of all, these laws are damaging because they will foster the hatred of people from certain minority groups. Many educators have stated that it is important to create a learning environment where students feel safe and accepted, and with these types of laws, many educators will not be able to do this. Furthermore, if children do not feel accepted or adequately represented, this could not only lead to problems with their schooling, but also with their self-esteem. And as many are already aware, self-esteem issues could snowball into even bigger problems such as depression, guilt, anxiety, and even suicide in some cases.
Moreover, these laws are harmful because they will dilute or eliminate factual history. And as frequently stated, if history is not properly taught it will likely be repeated. To elaborate, studying history provides people with a proper understanding of other groups and cultures, therefore preventing prejudice. But by limiting specific information, this certainly cannot happen.
Lastly, these new pieces of legislation are problematic because they will likely cause many teachers to leave their professions. After the proposal of these laws, many teachers have expressed that they felt uncomfortable, and if these laws do pass, many believe they will not be able to properly do their jobs. This is because by having to stop teaching certain topics, censor some information, or water down certain aspects of history, many teachers feel like they will not be fulfilling their responsibilities as an educator and will be putting their students at a disadvantage. And with the potential of many teachers resigning from their careers, many students will struggle to get a quality education.
Overall, these laws represent the unreasonable fear many people have of certain groups of people. Also, they signify how much work still has to be done to properly educate people about diversity, as well as how much improvement still needs to be made towards more inclusion. Through protests and contacting their legislators, people can continue to speak out against these proposals.