WASHINGTON, D.C. (LifeSiteNews) — The U.S. Department of Education (DOE) under President Joe Biden has submitted to the U.S. Office of Management & Budget (OMB) its finalized Title IX rule forcing widespread recognition of LGBT “identities” on the American education system in potentially its biggest gift yet to radical gender-fluidity activists.
The proposed rule, “Nondiscrimination on the Basis of Sex in Education Programs or Activities Receiving Federal Financial Assistance,” is meant to advance the administration’s priorities on “Preventing and Combating Discrimination on the Basis of Gender Identity or Sexual Orientation” and “Guaranteeing an Educational Environment Free from Discrimination on the Basis of Sex, Including Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity,” according to its abstract, but the final text has not yet been released.
Politico reports that it is “expected to unravel” Trump-era rules that “narrowed the definition of sexual harassment and directed schools to conduct live hearings with cross-examination for sexual misconduct investigations.” A previous draft proposed by U.S. Secretary of Education Miguel Cardona would ban “all forms of sex discrimination, including discrimination based on sex stereotypes, sex characteristics, pregnancy or related conditions, sexual orientation and gender identity.”
“The Biden-Harris Administration is committed to ensuring all students are guaranteed an educational environment free from discrimination on the basis of sex,” a DOE spokesperson said. “The Department of Education has taken the next step to advance a rule, first proposed in 2022, that strengthens protections for students from sexual harassment and for LGBTQI+ students.”
Writing at The Federalist, Mountain States Legal Foundation attorney William Trachman warns about the ramifications of “suggest[ing that] schools must accept, validate, and accommodate every student’s self-proclaimed gender identity and sexual orientation, or else be adjudicated to have violated federal civil rights laws.”
“Consider some potential effects,” he explains. “Students who insist they are neither male nor female might demand that a university build a separate dormitory for each unique gender identity, in addition to the male and female dormitories that are already established, to ensure ‘equal’ access for all. Some students who identify as gender-fluid might insist on moving back and forth between facilities.”
“Yet it could get even more onerous for schools trying to comply with federal law. Unless the new Title IX rule clearly defines the outer boundaries of what a ‘gender identity’ is, schools will be confounded with strange requests from students who insist they are animals, autigender (that’s a neurodevelopmental gender), or even cake,” Trachman adds. “In an extreme situation, a pedophile could assert his sexual orientation is that of a ‘minor-attracted person.’”
Florida Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis, one of the nation’s leading opponents of “woke” education policy, accused Biden of “waging an ideological war on behalf of gender ideology” and announced that if the rule is enacted, “we will not abide by it” in the Sunshine State.
Biden is waging an ideological war on behalf of gender ideology and he is willing to destroy protections for women and girls in the process. https://t.co/4pJFHkO5Cs
— Ron DeSantis (@RonDeSantis) February 14, 2024
A significant body of evidence shows that “affirming” gender confusion carries serious harms, especially when done with impressionable children who lack the mental development, emotional maturity, and life experience to consider the long-term ramifications of the decisions being pushed on them, or full knowledge about the long-term effects of life-altering, physically-transformative, and often-irreversible surgical and chemical procedures.
Studies find that more than 80 percent of children experiencing gender dysphoria outgrow it on their own by late adolescence, and that even full “reassignment” surgery often fails to resolve gender-confused individuals’ heightened tendency to engage in self-harm and suicide – and may even exacerbate it, including by reinforcing their confusion and neglecting the actual root causes of their mental strife.
Last summer, Biden’s own U.S. Department of Health & Human Services (HHS) Substance Abuse & Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) released a since-deleted report that acknowledged “lesbian, gay, and bisexual adults are more likely than straight adults to use substances, experience mental health conditions including major depressive episodes, and experience serious thoughts of suicide.”
Regardless, the White House has given uncompromising support for all major aspects of the LGBT movement, including reopening the military to recruits afflicted with gender dysphoria, promoting gender ideology within the military (including “diversity” and drag events on military bases), holding White House events to “affirm transgender kids,” condemning state laws against underage “transitions” as “close to sinful,” promoting underage “transitions” (potentially at taxpayer expense) as a “best practice,” and trying to force federally funded schools to let males into female athletic competitions and restrooms.