You tell me. Did this individual just confess to a crime?

Hernando County, FL, School Board Meeting 6-27-23: This is what the local newspaper, the 'Hernando Sun', calls getting "back to normal" at our local school board. They wholeheartedly approve. The complete transcript of this speech is reprinted below.

Forget all the woke pronouns. Forget the sobbing. Did this licensed psychologist, who also claims to have a teacher's certificate, just confess to a crime? It certainly used to be. When did it change?

If this is no longer a crime in FL (and it obviously must not be since she has two professional licenses), then we need to ask President Wannabee Rondee to come in off the campaign trail to fix our criminal codes, so that we can fix our own damn school district.

Transcript
(pronouns used are those of the speaker)

I would like to start by addressing a school board member’s comment. Last meeting, they made the statement, “Some teachers have crossed the line into becoming therapists.”

As probably the only person in this room who holds both a teaching certificate and a therapist’s license, I would like to state that this is inaccurate. Accepting students for who they are and listening when they speak is not therapy. It is being a decent person. However, I can see why certain people are confused about that.

I want to share why it’s so important for teachers to simply be a decent person. Through Big Brothers-Big Sisters, I’ve been matched with my little sibling, who I will call Alex, for almost five years. Alex is beautiful, smart and curious. They are creative artists and participate in both track and volleyball. They love monkeys, fruit snacks and anime’. I’ve had the privilege of spending time with this beautiful kid and watching them grow. But there are some in this room, who would ignore all that, because Alex came out to me a little over a year ago.

They have been bullied so often that there have been days when they have refused to get out of bed and go to school. Why? Because they are constantly hearing, “Gay people are evil. Gay people are immoral. Gay people are groomers. They’re perverts. They’re going to hell.”

Kids have 24/7 access to a tiny computer in their pockets. Do we really think that they don’t know what we say about them? Alex has no interest in supposedly grooming your kids. They don’t want to teach your kids to be gay. They just want to survive school so they can get home and watch anime’. (Sobbing)…

I don’t understand the (vexation?) that certain people have on queer people, so I did some googling. Imagine my horror when I learned that book removals are simply a distraction. Your goal is to segregate queer students away from their peers. You can google it yourself.

Their goal is to prevent their own children from interacting with queer children because they believe they are damaged. They are terrified of their own kids somehow turning queer. And deeper than that is the fear that they will not be able to love their own children.

I can have some empathy for that. Everyone wonders if they’re a good enough parent sometimes. It must be a terrible fear that your child may grow to be someone you cannot love. But it is never okay to project these fears onto children.

I sincerely hope everyone’s kids grow into kind, loving, accepting people and choose to break the chains that their own parents may have put on them, but just because you’ve chosen to shackle your own children does not give you the right to shackle everyone else’s.

No child deserves to live like that—not today, not ever. I will be here, every meeting, as long as my schedule allows, until I am convinced Alex and others like them feel safe. You chose to use my God as a weapon. I choose to be the shield.