Parental Rights Trump Kids’ Rights to Privacy

by Kerry Dougherty

In their relentless quest to slam Governor Glenn Youngkin, Virginia’s rabid lefties are now apoplectic because he believes parents ought to be notified if their troubled son is dressing as a girl at school and changing his name and pronouns.

How dare Youngkin say parents are entitled to know such things about their kids!

Boys have a right to visit their transition locker when they get to school to pick out a cute frock and matching pumps for the day. They can then use the girls’ room, demand to be called Susie, insist on she/her pronouns, and re-emerge as a boy before heading home.

What business is this nutty behavior to the people who are legally responsible for him and love him, the left asks.

Oh, so what if trans kids tend to suffer from depression and sometimes kill themselves? If these confused children wanted their parents to know about their struggles, they’d tell them.

According to news reports, both Fairfax and Loudoun Counties have firm school policies that forbid school officials from notifying parents if their child is switching genders at school.

School boards in those jurisdictions have decided that a student’s “right to privacy” trumps the parents’ right to be involved in their kids’ lives. Or to get them mental help if needed.

Now that Youngkin has a majority on the Virginia Board of Education, 7News asked the governor if he thinks the board will pass new guidance for school districts.

“With regards to informing parents with most important decisions about their children, I think everybody knows where I stand, parents matter,” Youngkin told WJLA ABC 7. “Parents should be at the forefront of all of these discussions. And I firmly believe that teachers and schools have an obligation to make sure that parents are well informed about what’s happening in their kids’ lives. And one of the things we learned last year during the campaign is that parents were tired of being pushed to the background in their child’s education.”

Youngkin’s so old-fashioned, isn’t he? Imagine, believing that parents have a right to know what their kids are doing and that schools shouldn’t be keeping secrets from them.

No one expects teachers to be snooping around trying to figure out who’s gay or trans or a furry. But if behavior in school is glaringly obvious, the parents have a right to know.

For example, there have been logistical problems with students on overnight field trips. Think about it: students are always assigned a roommate of the same sex to prevent any hanky-panky while on band, athletics, theater or academic competition trips.

The assumption is that most parents don’t want their kids having sex on school journeys.

When gay kids room together, though, the chaperones are faced with a dilemma.

And teachers are left to try to break up couples. It happens. Parents need to know.

The radical left, who believe government is wise and parents are pests, have forgotten why Youngkin was elected: Virginia parents were tired of being excluded from school decisions about everything from masks to curriculum.

That all changed with Youngkin’s inauguration in January. In the new Old Dominion, parents are back in charge.

This column has been republished with permission from Kerry: Unemployed & Unedited.


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Comments

30 responses to “Parental Rights Trump Kids’ Rights to Privacy”

  1. Stephen Haner Avatar
    Stephen Haner

    It was the same BS excuses forty years ago when the debate was over parental notification on abortion. The pro-death team argued school counselors or medical personnel should protect the privacy of the 13 year old and arrange the abortion without parental notification, let alone consent, because some parents might react badly, punish the child, etc.

  2. DJRippert Avatar
    DJRippert

    If teachers and school administrators want to act as amateur hour child psychologists they should be liable for any adverse consequences of their amateur psychological activities. No qualified immunity if a transgender child hurts or, heaven forbid, kills themselves without the parents knowing that their child was “under the care” of an unqualified person offering mental health care. School employees should be held responsible for the actions of their mental health advice just like real psychologists are liable for malpractice. No “qualified immunity” for any school employees (other than a licensed child psychologist) for malpractice where the parents have not been involved. If a confused child hurts herself or if he hurts others – take the teacher’s job, their salary, their pension and throw them out in the street.

  3. Dick Hall-Sizemore Avatar
    Dick Hall-Sizemore

    Ah, so now we know the reason that schools should tell parents about their kids’ gender issues–so high school kids won’t have sex on school trips.

    1. That is some truly outstanding snark, sir. I am impressed.

  4. vicnicholls Avatar
    vicnicholls

    I’m not so sure.

  5. Nancy Naive Avatar
    Nancy Naive

    You guys were more fun when you discuss Mar-a-Lago searches… crickets this morning.

    Oh yeah, almost forgot. Happy Charlottesville Day!

    1. I pay pretty much zero attention to Trump-world. Is there something new regarding the searches?

      1. Nancy Naive Avatar
        Nancy Naive

        Nah. Trumpy people screaming it’s illegal or something, Trump doing what he does, i.e., raise money off it, and Garland saying Trump could release his copies of the warrant at any time. Fox doing what Fox does.

        1. Warmac9999 Avatar
          Warmac9999

          I wonder if you have ever studied the Stalin purges and maybe read a day in the life of Ivan denisovich.

          1. Nancy Naive Avatar
            Nancy Naive

            Why? Is that what Trump has in mind for 2025? He purged the IGs. His attempt at a coup had more “acting” agency and department heads since 1781.

          2. Warmac9999 Avatar
            Warmac9999

            Obama purged the Bush DOJ. You might want to check why.

          3. Nancy Naive Avatar
            Nancy Naive

            And Bush fired every USA as did Trump. What’s you point?

          4. Warmac9999 Avatar
            Warmac9999

            You implied that trump did something unusual.

          5. Nancy Naive Avatar
            Nancy Naive

            In the last months, definitely.

          6. Warmac9999 Avatar
            Warmac9999

            Exactly, what? He was working with the FBI and had locked up boxes at their request.

          7. Nancy Naive Avatar
            Nancy Naive

            Only because he refuse to hand them over.

          8. Warmac9999 Avatar
            Warmac9999

            There is no indication that was the case. If the FBI wanted they could have seized them at that point. Instead Trump put a second lock on the storage are at the request of the FBI. This was agestapho type raid and you should be as horrified as I am by such tactics. This is the stuff of a police state not a free democratic republic.

          9. Nancy Naive Avatar
            Nancy Naive

            Hahaha… oh poor Trumpy.

          10. Warmac9999 Avatar
            Warmac9999

            Adtually, this has nothing to do with Trump. It is about what can happen to you and me. Police State tactics have a long history in association with dictatorships. Intimidation and elimination of opposition is at the core of such tactics. And note, this raid has followed a number of similar armed raids against Trump administration officials and friends.

          11. Nancy Naive Avatar
            Nancy Naive

            If it can happen to me then it should be possible to happen to Trump. As to the raids on his friends and other officials, there was a distinct predictable pattern. Invesitgation opened, possible search and seizure warrants served, possible indictment, plea or trial with verdict, and sentences. The only difference in the Trump admin was the pardons.

            Your paranois is no excuse to believe BS.

          12. Warmac9999 Avatar
            Warmac9999

            Did you ever bother to look at the Clinton or Obama pardons. You somehow think that Trump is the only individual ever to use the pardon powers to protect friend and supporters. Hell, Lincoln basically pardoned the confederacy.

          13. Warmac9999 Avatar
            Warmac9999

            The FBI walked away with half the boxes in June. Doesn’t sound like a refusal but a lack of manpower so they double locked the storage.

          14. Warmac9999 Avatar
            Warmac9999

            Let’s be specific. If you make such an allegation back it up with facts.

      2. James McCarthy Avatar
        James McCarthy

        P45: Russia, if you’re listening, I demanded DOJ publish the classified documents. I could not understand their contents but may be you can.

  6. Warmac9999 Avatar
    Warmac9999

    When I was growing up, we had Tom boys and uncoordinated effeminate boys. The girls got involved in sports and the boys in things like chess or computer games today. The lgbtq would have us believe that these two groups should be transitioned to the opposite sex.

    1. Virginia Gentleman Avatar
      Virginia Gentleman

      Finally a response I can support — to fix this problem, we just need to mandate all the Tom boys play more sports and require the uncoordinated effeminate boys to play more chess and computer games. That will take the gay and trans right out of them.

      1. Warmac9999 Avatar
        Warmac9999

        I don’t believe in mandates. However, I do believe that if one child can be spared from the physical disfigurement and medical horrors of mistaken transition followed by detransition then any ideas ought to be tried. This, of course, is hated by the LGBTQ who want more transitions not less (See Disney Video).

    2. Virginia Gentleman Avatar
      Virginia Gentleman

      Finally a response I can support — to fix this problem, we just need to mandate all the Tom boys play more sports and require the uncoordinated effeminate boys to play more chess and computer games. That will take the gay and trans right out of them.

  7. Philip Shucet Avatar
    Philip Shucet

    Perhaps this particular topic warrants more thought and fewer pejoratives. Open lines of communication between schools and parents makes sense. Yet, perhaps it’s also important for school administrators to consider more than rhetoric when students are faced with complex and legitimate social situations. Students, administrators and parents face a barrage of situations of varying degrees of seriousness.

    In the matter at hand, the behavior of any child dealing with gender identity deserves respect. And certainly the parents of those children deserve respect. But we also know that being a parent does not in itself bestow the moral principles required to raise children.

    The intended result of the recent election was not to put parents in charge of any branch of government. Rather it was to put responsible people in charge of governing. And to be sure, there are differing opinions on how that is best accomplished.

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