Many still find it shocking, but there is a real battle underway in America over whether or not schools must let biological males who claim to be female use women’s restrooms and locker rooms at school.
Members of the Obama administration are pushing very hard to force schools to change their restroom and locker room policies, but as John Stonestreet at the Chuck Colson Center for Christian Worldview and as attorneys from the Alliance Defending Freedom both note, schools can–and have–successfully defeat this kind of bullying from the federal government.
Many parents wonder if they can do anything to stem this tide. After all, can you stop the federal government?
The Alliance Defending Freedom’s answer is a resounding “yes!”
Speaking recently on Moody Radio, the ADF’s Matt Sharp said that “If you look at what the [legal] precedent says, and what the most recent courts looking at this issue have found,” it becomes clear that “schools can have these separate facilities” for boys and girls.
Last year Alliance Defending Freedom drafted a model policy schools can adopt to protect the privacy of their students. The policy reads in part,
Notwithstanding any other Board Policy, student restrooms, locker rooms, and showers that are designated for one sex shall only be used by members of that sex.
ADF notes that when the question comes before the courts, schools are actually winning, saying,
According to Title IX, “[n]o person in the United States shall, on the basis of sex, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any education program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance.” 20 U.S.C. § 1681. No court has ever interpreted Title IX as requiring schools to give students access to opposite-sex restrooms and changing areas.
ADF goes on to cite cases in which transgender individuals have unsuccessfully challenged school policies that barred them from using the restroom or locker room of the opposite sex.
You can listen to John Stonestreet’s full commentary on the issue below.
[audio:http://www.breakpoint.org/images/content/breakpoint/audio/2015/112015_BP.mp3|titles=Boys in Girls Locker Rooms]