Too late to opt-out: Supreme Court ultimately can't save the religious right's futile book bans

Too late to opt-out: Supreme Court ultimately can't save the religious right's futile book bans
Even if SCOTUS allows LGBTQ books to get pushed out of classrooms, the right is still losing the larger culture war

By Amanda Marcotte
Senior Writer
Published April 23, 2025 5:59AM (EDT)


(Salon) Can you treat someone with "love, kindness, and respect" while simultaneously insisting their identity is so poisonous that it cannot be acknowledged?

The Supreme Court heard oral arguments on Tuesday for Mahmoud v. Taylor, which has become known as the "don't say gay" case, because it's over conservative objections to children's books, taught in Maryland classrooms, that position queerness as a normal fact of life. The arguments involved a lot of legalese about "burden" versus "coercion," or what constitutes a "sincerely held" religious belief. But at the heart of the battle was a more philosophical question, one with an answer that should be self-evident: Is it possible to "respect" someone while trying to erase their existence?

The case regards a Montgomery County school board's decision to include books featuring same-sex marriage, trans characters and a Pride parade as part of their curriculum. The Becket Fund, a religious right organization, is suing on behalf of parents who want to opt their kids out of lessons involving these books, claiming that mere exposure to the books violates their religious beliefs. The school district's lawyer told the court these books are no different than books portraying women working or soldiers fighting in wars, both behaviors proscribed by some religions. "These lessons are students should treat their peers with respect," he said. Exposing kids to different beliefs is not a mandate that they follow them, he argued, just an education in what the world looks like.

....(snip)....

During arguments, Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson made this point most clearly, asking the plaintiffs' lawyers how far this parental right to "opt out" should go. She asked if a gay teacher would be allowed to have a wedding photo on her desk? Or if a student group put up "love is love" posters in the hallway? Or if a trans teacher insisted that the students use their preferred name and pronouns? On this last point, the conservative lawyer insisted the teacher has no right to tell students how to address them.

This answer gave the game away. It's standard practice for teachers to dictate how students address them: First name or last name? Miss or Mrs? Only trans people, in this lawyer's determination, don't deserve this basic respect from students. It's just about insulting them, not "protecting" kids from the knowledge of trans identities. But Jackson's larger point is crucial. Blocking a few books from classrooms won't hide the existence of queerness from kids. And efforts to go down that futile path only lead to ever more draconian censorship, such as telling queer teachers to hide their spouses, while allowing straight teachers freedom to talk about theirs. At which point, the fiction that "respect" and "equality" are being maintained is a joke. .................(more)

https://www.salon.com/2025/04/23/too-late-to-opt-out-ultimately-cant-save-the-religious-rights-futile-book-bans/