This 17-year-old gave their class a queer history lesson just days after Florida passed its "Don't Say Day" bill prohibiting LGBTQ-related discussions in schools. Here's what happened next ...
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00:00People were fed up with the abuse and Stonewall was the tipping point.
00:15One of my administrators literally came up to me and was like,
00:18this teacher is on the warpath against you, which is absurd.
00:21We have seen curriculum embedded for very, very young children,
00:35classroom materials about sexuality and woke gender ideology.
00:40It prohibits classroom instruction on sexuality or gender identity.
00:45If a parent, for example, heard that there was classroom instruction on, say, Stonewall,
00:52then they're able to suit the school, the school district and the teacher teaching it.
01:07I was like, are we going to learn about the Stonewall uprising, knowing very well that
01:13we were not going to learn about the Stonewall uprising. But she replied,
01:17what is the Stonewall uprising?
01:35People started throwing objects. It started with pennies and whatever you could find,
01:42but then it became bricks from Stonewall's end. It was probably the single most important event
01:48for LGBTQ liberation in the United States. And so many people don't even know that it happened.
02:05I went up to my teacher between classes and I was like, oh my God, look, we were in the
02:09Washington Post because I thought she would be excited as an educator, but she was very upset.
02:15She was like, this misrepresents the school and our class. And we do learn queer history.
02:19And I was like, lol, no, we don't. It's not part of the Sunshine State standards.
02:24We've mentioned queer people, but we haven't learned queer history. And there's a, there's a
02:28massive difference there. I was put under investigation for a little bit about it.
02:33And then they just switched my class.
02:34This is a peaceful demonstration to show the Florida legislature that what they are doing does not represent us.
02:59I've heard different members of the legislature say something along the lines of parents know
03:04what's best for their kids. When it comes to the queer community, that is not true. If parents know
03:08what's best for their kids, why did my best friend get kicked out of his house and have to live with me?
03:23I struggled a lot as a kid. I thought I was the only one, a freak of nature, a mistake.
03:29Something was wrong with me. I'm broken. And that's why they don't say gay bills. So terrifying
03:34because it's banning a discussion that first of all, isn't even happening, but should be happening
03:39in those formative years. If someone had told me, Hey, you don't need to fall into this gender binary.
03:44And there are so many people that don't. My life has been drastically different.
03:49What people don't really realize is that this, this is the reason queer teens are four times
03:55more likely to commit suicide. Even I've been there. Every single queer kid that I know that
03:59I've ever met, every single person in the queer student union has gone through extreme issues with
04:04mental health, self-harm, drug abuse, and it's horrifying. And, and these are the direct effects
04:10of DeSantis's rhetoric and the Republicans anti-LGBTQ bills.