A federal judge has upheld part of Iowa’s “Don’t Say Gay” law prohibiting discussion of gender identity and sexual orientation from kindergarten through 6th grade. However, the judge has blocked other parts of the law that sought to block students from voluntarily being exposed to school “promotions” and “programs” that acknowledge the existence of LGBTQ+ people.
Iowa’s 2023 law S.F. 496 prohibits “any program, curriculum, test, survey, questionnaire, promotion, or instruction relating to gender identity or sexual orientation” in grades K-6.
In his split-decision issued late last week, U.S. District Judge Stephen Locher (an appointee of former President Joe Biden) ruled that the law can restrict any LGBTQ+-related information in mandatory curriculum, tests, surveys, questionnaires or instruction can be interpreted in the way the state argues or required school functions.
“It does not matter whether the lessons or instruction revolve around cisgender or transgender identities or straight or gay sexual orientations. All are forbidden,” he wrote, according to ABC News.
However, he said that the law’s prohibitions on “programs” or “promotion” are so broad that they violate students’ First Amendment rights.
In his ruling, Locher said the law has compelled some school districts to remove visual representations of LGBTQ+ support, including Pride flags, safe space stickers, and materials supporting LGBTQ+-friendly groups, The Hill reported. It has also compelled some school administrators to tell teachers in same-sex relationships not to mention their partners around students.
“Students in grades six and below must be allowed to join Gender Sexuality Alliances (‘GSAs’) and other student groups relating to gender identity and/or sexual orientation,” Locher wrote in his decision, adding that teachers and students “must be permitted to advertise” those groups as well.
Locher said that teachers may mention same-sex partners or make “neutral references” to books with LGBTQ+ characters, so long as those “are not the focus of the book or lesson.”
He also blocked part of the law forbidding schools from accommodating trans and nonbinary students, noting that the law didn’t clearly define “accommodation.” However, Locher allowed the state to continue the law’s forced outing provision that requires teachers and school administrators to notify parents of a change in students’ gender status or pronouns, essentially outing them to their potentially unsupportive parents.
The ACLU of Iowa and Lambda Legal sued the state in November 2023 on behalf of LGBTQ+ advocacy organization Iowa Safe Schools and seven students and their families, alleging that the law “singles out Iowa students and discriminates against them based on their sexual orientation and gender identity” in violation of their First Amendment, Equal Protection Clause, and Equal Access Act rights.
Last March, Locher blocked a portion of the law that allowed for the removal of books with LGBTQ+ themes and references to sex acts. In that ruling, he noted that 3,400 books removed from schools weren’t explicitly obscene, despite claims from the state’s Gov. Kim Reynolds (R). Locher also noted that the law made a contradictory exception for the King James Holy Bible, even though it contains references to sex and brutality.
On Thursday, Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk—a far-right federal judge in the Northern District of Texas with a record of aligning with the GOP’s most extreme legal positions—issued a ruling declaring that Title VII no longer protects LGBTQ+ people from workplace discrimination. The decision directly contradicts the Supreme Court’s landmark 2020 ruling inBostock v. Clayton County, which held that discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender identity is, by definition, sex discrimination. Kacsmaryk’s ruling marks one of the most alarming judicial rollbacks of LGBTQ+ rights in recent memory—and sets up a direct legal challenge to one of the foundational civil rights protections for queer and trans people in the United States.
The case was brought against the EEOC by the state of Texas alongside the Heritage Foundation, a central force behind Project 2025—an aggressive right-wing policy blueprint that explicitly calls for rolling back LGBTQ+ protections in federal law. In siding with the plaintiffs, Judge Kacsmaryk pointed to the Texas Department of Agriculture’s current employee policy, which requires “employees to comply with this dress code in a manner consistent with their biological gender,” specifying that “men may wear pants” and “women may wear dresses, skirts, or pants.” The ruling also upheld the department’s policy banning transgender employees from using restrooms that align with their gender identity.
The judge reached a verdict that Title VII only protects “firing someone simply for being homosexual or transgender,” but that it does not protect transgender or gay people from “harassment.”
“In sum, Title VII does not bar workplace employment policies that protect the inherent differences between men and women,” Kacsmaryk writes in his ruling.
Judge Kacsmaryk further argued that disparate treatment of transgender employees does not constitute unequal treatment, reasoning that “a male employee must use male facilities like other males”—a statement that erases transgender identity altogether. He extended that logic to dress codes and pronouns, claiming that requiring employees to adhere to clothing standards and pronoun use based on their assigned sex at birth is not discriminatory because it applies “equally” to everyone. The argument mirrors the discredited legal reasoning once used to uphold bans on same-sex marriage—that such laws didn’t discriminate against gay people because they, like straight people, were allowed to marry someone of the opposite sex. It’s a circular logic designed to mask exclusion as neutrality. It also flies in the face of the fact that Texas allows people assigned female at birth to wear gender “pants, skirts, and dresses” but denies that same right to people assigned male at birth.
Ultimately, Judge Kacsmaryk ordered the complete removal of all references to sexual orientation and gender identity as protected classes under Title VII from EEOC guidance. His ruling declares that “all language defining ‘sex’ in Title VII to include ‘sexual orientation’ and ‘gender identity’” must be stripped from federal employment policy. Specifically, it targets and nullifies Section II(A)(5)(c) of the 2024 EEOC guidance, which states: “Sex-based discrimination under Title VII includes employment discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender identity.”
The ruling flies in the face of Bostock v. Clayton County, which held that Title VII protects LGBTQ+ workers from discrimination. The landmark case centered on Gerald Bostock, who was fired from a county job after joining a gay softball league, and Aimee Stephens, a transgender woman dismissed from a funeral home after informing her employer she would begin presenting as a woman. In a 6–3 decision, the Supreme Court ruled that firing someone for being gay or transgender is inherently sex-based discrimination, and thus violates federal civil rights law. While Bostock focused on wrongful termination, it strains credulity to suggest that the same protections wouldn’t also apply to workplace harassment or other forms of discriminatory treatment under the very same statute.
This isn’t Judge Kacsmaryk’s first foray into far-right legal activism—it’s his trademark. He’s become the go-to jurist for plaintiffs looking to turn extremist ideology into binding precedent. He’s the one who tried to revoke FDA approval of mifepristone, a safe and widely used abortion medication. He’s ruled against LGBTQ+ protections in the Affordable Care Act. He even tried to force Planned Parenthood to pay $2 billion to Texas and Louisiana—a ruling so outrageous that even the deeply conservative Fifth Circuit tossed it. Now, he’s taking aim at Title VII itself, effectively inviting employers to harass and discriminate against LGBTQ+ workers by pretending Bostock never happened.
A lesbian and retired Rhode Island firefighter was awarded nearly $2 million in damages in a lawsuit involving her accidental disability pension, which could balloon to $5 million after interest, local NBC affiliate WJAR reported last month.
Lori Franchina previously won over $800,000 in a separate lawsuit detailing the anti-LGBTQ+ abuse she suffered while working with her fellow firefighters.
Franchina joined the Providence Fire Department in 2002. She retired on disability in 2013 after she was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder due to the habitual anti-LGBTQ+ abuse she endured on the job. She filed for accidental disability in 2011, but was denied by the retirement board. She sued and was awarded over $800,000 and declared eligible for disability by a jury in 2016.
While Franchina was given disability, it was general disability versus accidental disability, which pays at twice the rate and is not subject to income tax. She sued again and won. Lawyers estimate with interest, she will be eligible for a payday of up to $5 million.
Franchina’s lawyer, John Martin, said the retirement board has no one to blame but themselves for the loss.
“Two weeks before trial, we offered to go to mediation with them where the only thing we were seeking was for them to reopen the application and provide her with a fair hearing, and they refused to even discuss it,” Martin told WJAR. “They could’ve avoided millions of dollars that they’re going to pay on this judgment by simply giving her a fair hearing, and they refused to do it two weeks before the verdict came down.”
During the original trial, representatives from PFD tried to downplay the abuse Franchina received, but jurors heard a litany of horrific and even life-threatening examples in court. A three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit described the abuse she received in the decision written by Judge Ojetta Rogeriee Thompson.
“‘C**t,’ ‘b***h,’ ‘lesbo’ all are but a smattering of the vile verbal assaults the plaintiff in this gender discrimination case, Lori Franchina, a former lieutenant firefighter, was regularly subjected to by members of the Providence Fire Department (‘the Department’),” Thompson wrote in the ruling. “She was also spit on, shoved, and – in one particularly horrifying incident – had the blood and brain matter of a suicide-attempt victim flung at her by a member of her own team.”
“That was the incident that broke me,” Franchina said.
She said she welcomes the ruling because it provides her with financial security and the message of hope it gives to others in similar circumstances.
“It gives me my gainful income, it gives me the ability to not decide what bill I’m paying, it definitely provides me with comfort,” Franchina reflected. “I hope it helps somebody realize you can win.”
A Christian school in Georgia has forced a student to withdraw for bringing a transgender date to prom, just weeks before the senior was scheduled to graduate.
North Cobb Christian School in the Atlanta area recently held their prom off campus. But 10 days later, the principal called senior Emily Wright into their office.
“I was asked, ‘Is there anything we should know about the guest you brought to prom?’ Emily told Fox 5 News. “And I knew exactly what they were talking about, so I said, ‘Yes, he’s transgender.”
Her mother Tricia continued: “I got a call from the principal who said, ‘Ms. Wright, I’ve been informed that Emily brought a transgender guest to prom. Were you aware of that?’ I said yes. She said, ‘Well, I’m sorry, Ms. Wright.”
With that, Emily was forced to withdraw from the school.
The Wrights are still in shock. North Cobb Christian School won’t comment on the decision.
“It was off property. I did sign a form allowing her to bring a guest,” said Emily’s mom. The only limitation on the form was related to the guest’s age, she said.
Nothing in the school’s prom guidelines or the student code of conduct explicitly states LGBTQ+ individuals are not allowed to attend events, she told Atlanta News First.
“I feared this might happen,” said Tricia, but she thought the worst that could happen would be Emily’s removal from the dance.
“I cried very hard. I was just thinking that my entire future was in jeopardy,” Emily said. “‘Where am I going to go to school? Where am I going to graduate?’”
With just weeks left in the school year, Emily was forced to reenroll in a nearby public school so she could earn her diploma.
The decision to force Emily out was contrary to the school’s stated mission, her mother said, and not “kind”.
Among the school’s core values are “love for God, neighbor and self,” and “respect for people, property and ideas.”
“That’s not, in my opinion, a good example — to not be kind, not be loving, not be accepting, to be exclusive instead of inclusive,” she said.
The school’s principal and headmaster is Todd Clingman, a graduate of Liberty University, founded by anti-LGBTQ+ Christian conservative Jerry Falwell.
Clingman previously served as head of school at McKinney Christian Academy in McKinney, Texas, and as high school principal and acting administrator of Prestonwood Christian Academy in Plano, Texas.
North Cobb Christian School was founded in 1983 as a conservative evangelical Christian alternative to Atlanta’s public school system. Students from eight underperforming public schools in Cobb County are eligible to receive state funding of up to $6,500 per year to attend private schools in the area, including North Cobb Christian School, Baptist News Global reports.
In a letter to Clingman addressing Emily’s forced withdrawal, her parents said the “decision is not reflective of the Christian values you claim to uphold,” adding they believe the school made a “discriminatory decision.”
“The school chose to kick out a senior student just four weeks before graduation simply because Emily was being inclusive and kind,” the letter said.
A memorial to the long-ignored gay victims of the Nazi regime and to all LGBTQ people persecuted throughout history has been unveiled in Paris on Saturday.
The monument, a massive steel star designed by French artist Jean-Luc Verna, is located at the heart of Paris, in public gardens close to the Bastille Plaza. It aims to fulfill a duty to remember and to fight discrimination, Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo said.
“Historical recognition means saying ‘this happened’ and ‘we don’t want it to happen again,’” Hidalgo said.
Describing the sculpture that looks like a big star wand lying on the ground, Verna, a visual artist who also is a LGBTQ rights activist, said: “There’s a black side in front of us, forcing us to remember. … At certain times of the day, it casts a long shadow on the ground, evoking the dangers looming over, sadly.”
The other side of the star, silvery, reflects the sky. It represents “the color of time passing, with the Paris sky moving as quickly as public opinion, which can change at any moment,” Verna said.
Historians estimate between 5,000 and 15,000 people were deported throughout Europe by the Nazi regime during World War II because they were gay.
Jacques Chirac in 2005 was the first president in France to recognize these crimes, acknowledging LGBTQ people have been “hunted down, arrested and deported.”
Verna speaking next to Paris’ mayor Anne Hidalgo on Saturday.Kiran Ridley / AFP – Getty Images
Jean-Luc Roméro, deputy mayor of Paris and a longtime LGBTQ rights activist, said “we didn’t know, unfortunately, that this monument would be inaugurated at one of the worst moments we’re going through right now.”
In Europe, Hungary’s parliament passed this year an amendment to the constitution that allows the government to ban public events by LGBTQ+ communities, a decision that legal scholars and critics have called another step toward authoritarianism by the populist government.
A festival featuring the works of playwrights from countries where LGBTQ+ rights are suppressed is turning to fundraising after President Donald Trump’s National Endowment for the Arts cut its grant to the group. The National Queer Theater said they have created a GoFundMe page where the community can support the Criminal Queerness Festival taking place during NYC Pride 2025, NBC Newsreports.
The Criminal Queerness Festival takes place at the HERE Art Center in NYC on June 11-28. According to its website, the festival “showcases the works of international LGBTQ+ playwrights from countries where queer identities are criminalized or censored.” This year’s festival features plays reflecting queer life in Cuba, Indonesia, and Uganda.
The festival, which was created during WorldPride 2019, is the creation of Brooklyn’s National Queer Theater. The group depended upon a $20,000 grant from the NEA to fund the festival, which represented 20 percent of the festival’s budget for 2025.
The group was notified via email on Friday that their grants no longer aligned with Trump’s priorities, and the request for this year’s grant was denied.
“It’s devastating and upsetting, because we’re a very small organization,” Jess Ducey, co-chair of the company’s board, told NBC News. “That grant is absolutely integral to the funding.”
While the news was devastating, Ducey and the National Queer Theater do not view it as fatal. The group has created a GoFundMe page (@national-queer-theater) to help cover the lost grant. So far, the page has raised over $8,000 of its $20,000 goal.
The three plays to be performed this year reflect a mix of queer identities set in places hostile to the LGBTQ+ communities, both in foreign countries and the U.S.
Tomorrow Never Came by Jedidiah Mugarura is set in Uganda and tells the story of a gay man in a heterosexual marriage and also a same-sex love affair. What Are You to Me by Dena Igusti is about a lesbian romance in Indonesia cut short by the Jakarta riots and crackdown in 1998. The story is discovered years later by an “emerging zine writer in Queens” looking to share their story. frikiNATIONby Krystal Ortiz explores the lives of young punks in Cuba of the early 1990s who injected themselves with tainted blood to acquire HIV, knowing they would live better lives isolated in state-run sanitariums than trying to survive under Fidel Castro’s oppressive, homophobic regime.
The National Theatre Group is party to the suit, Rhode Island Latino Arts v. National Endowment for the Arts, filed by the ACLU in a Rhode Island federal district court. The suit has unsuccessfully sought to reinstate funding cut from the NEA by Trump.
The Pentagon issued a memo directing all military leaders and commands to pull and review books that address anti-racism, diversity, or gender issues from libraries operated by branches of the military. He initially focused on removing any so-called pro-DEI reading material from libraries within DOD-run schools.
The memo is perhaps the Department of Defense’s (DOD) broadest and most detailed directive so far in Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s campaign to rid the military of diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) programs and materials.
The Associated Press (AP)obtained a copy of a memo which, signed Friday by Performing the Duties of Deputy Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness Timothy Dill.
The memo on the latest library purge states educational materials at base operated libraries “promoting divisive concepts and gender ideology are incompatible with the Department’s core mission.” The memo directs department leaders to “promptly identify” books that are incompatible with these guidelines and sequester them by May 21.
The memo doesn’t mention what will happen to these books or whether they will be stored or destroyed, only stating that additional guidance will be provided on how to cull the initial list and determine what should be removed.
The memo indicates that the DOD will set up a temporary library committee to provide information on the reviews of and decisions upon reading material. The committee will set up a list of search terms to identify which works should be pulled for review.
These search terms include: affirmative action, anti-racism, critical race theory, discrimination, diversity, gender dysphoria, gender identity and transition, transgender, transsexual, and white privilege.
Books being purged include Maya Angelou’s autobiography, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, which explores Angelou’s experience as a black youth living in the southern United States during Jim Crow-era segregation.
Other books in this purge detailing the experiences of African American women in the 19th and 20th century include Half American, about African Americans in World War II; A Respectable Woman, about the public roles of African American women in 19th century New York.
Additionally books about the Holocaust written by survivors trying to make sense of their trauma or those memoralizing the victims of the horrific event where purged including Memorializing the Holocaust.
Last month, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) — representing 12 plaintiffs from U.S. military schools —brought up a lawsuit against Pete Hegseth in his official capacity as Defense Secretary for ordering the removal of over 400 books from DOD school libraries. The plaintiffs argue that removing these books violates students’ First Amendment rights and denies these students the same educational opportunities as students in public schools.
On the same day that Dill issued his memo, Hegseth released a memo ordering military academies to admit students solely based on merit with “no consideration of race, ethnicity, or sex”, underlining the word “no.”
For over a decade, the organization I founded, Gays With Kids, has proudly stood as a beacon of support, education, and visibility for gay men on the path to fatherhood. From the beginning, our mission has been rooted in a singular belief: Every person, regardless of sexual orientation or gender identity, deserves the opportunity to create and raise a family. That belief hasn’t changed. But the world around us has.
Over the past year, we’ve watched with growing alarm as the movement against DEI (Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion) has moved from fringe rhetoric to mainstream policy. Politicians and influencers alike have declared open season on the very principles that helped us inch closer to equality, principles that affirmed our right not just to live openly, but to love, marry, and parent with dignity.
These attacks have consequences.
When laws are passed to defund DEI initiatives, or when universities are forced to shutter offices that serve LGBTQ+ students, or when healthcare providers are threatened for offering gender-affirming care, the ripple effect is felt across every aspect of LGBTQ+ life, including family building.
Surrogacy, adoption, foster care, and fertility access are already complex and costly journeys. For LGBTQ+ people, they’re even more so, compounded by legal roadblocks, discriminatory policies, and social stigma.
DEI frameworks were never about “special rights”; they were about leveling the playing field, ensuring that our families had the same opportunities, protections, and support systems as any other. Without these systems in place, the path to parenthood becomes steeper, narrower, and more uncertain.
That’s why I’m thrilled that the GWK Academy is officially expanding its services beyond gay men to support all LGBTQ+ people with their family-building needs. In doing so, we are transitioning into a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization—a move that allows us to provide free, vital educational resources, advocacy, and community to anyone in our community hoping to become a parent.
This expansion comes at a critical moment. As anti-LGBTQ+ rhetoric becomes more emboldened, as rights and resources are rolled back in state after state, and as disinformation spreads regarding what it means to be an LGBTQ+ parent, we are doubling down on our commitment to serve the entire community: gay dads, lesbian moms, queer parents, transgender and nonbinary people, bisexual parents, and anyone who needs a trusted, affirming guide to help navigate the journey to parenthood.
We are doing this not just because it is right, but because it is necessary.
Let’s be clear: The current wave of efforts against DEI is not just a political maneuver. It is a targeted attempt to silence, erase, and disempower marginalized communities, including LGBTQ+ families. These policies don’t just remove language from mission statements; they remove critical support from the real people who need it. For LGBTQ+ prospective parents, that can mean losing access to affirming healthcare providers, adoption agencies, legal protections, and financial resources.
By becoming a nonprofit, GWK Academy is taking a bold step to insulate our work from these attacks. We are building partnerships with LGBTQ+ affirming clinics, agencies, and legal experts to ensure our community can access accurate, inclusive, and life-changing information. We are creating new educational programs tailored to all family-building paths, from IVF to foster care, from co-parenting to adoption. And we are advocating — loudly and proudly — for a world where LGBTQ+ parents and their children are not just accepted but celebrated.
This is a deeply personal mission. Like so many LGBTQ+ people, I grew up believing that being gay meant I would never be a dad. And yet, here I am — a proud father, raising children in a loving and supportive home. I know the joy that comes from becoming a parent. I also know the fear, the confusion, and the heartbreak that can come with navigating a system that wasn’t built for us.
GWK Academy exists to change that.
To every LGBTQ+ person out there wondering if parenthood is possible for you: Yes, it is. And we are here to walk that journey with you, every step of the way. Whether you’re just beginning to explore your options, deep into the legal paperwork, or already a parent looking to connect with community, we’ve got your back.
When you think about Bible study, images might pop into your head of kids learning principles like forgiveness or loving thy neighbor, and that’s just what LifeWise Academy advertises on its website: “A supportive and inclusive atmosphere where everyone feels valued.”
But for many parents and LGBTQ kids in at least 591 American public schools with LifeWise programs, that’s far from the truth.
One parent says their daughter was “mercilessly bullied by LifeWise kids for ‘looking like a Lesbian who is going to burn in hell.’” Another had to remove their transgender son from school after he was bullied following the presidential election, with the school fearing LifeWise staff and students would make things worse.
And a third parent—a queer mom—says, “As a member of the LGBTQ+ community, my children’s safety in the public school setting is compromised when students are permitted to be removed from the school… to be taught discriminatory and harmful things about my family.”
For an hour a week, students from kindergarten through 12th grade learn about religious concepts rooted—in part—in homophobia and transphobia. For example, students are taught that anything other than a nuclear family, with one mom and one dad who are married, is wrong and that there is no such thing as being transgender.
LifeWise even requiresitsemployees to agree to their worldview statement, which says, “God’s design for the gift of sex is for it to be exercised and enjoyed exclusively within the covenant relationship of marriage between one man and one woman. Additionally, a person’s sex has been given as a gift from God and should not be altered.”
“This is not just learning about a religion,” says Sloan Okrey Anderson, an assistant professor of social work at St. Catherine University who researches LGBTQ populations and Christianity. “The content is from a very specific, hyper-conservative, white American evangelical perspective, a very specific white nationalist-adjacent version of Christianity.”
Since its inception seven years ago, LifeWise has grown massively with 50,000 students projected to attend LifeWise classes across 29 states. The organization was founded in Ohio, which has at least 197 programs, and it has a disproportionate presence in the Midwest.
LifeWise’s growth in the U.S. reflects a trend of politicians and lawmakers attempting to incorporate Christianity in public schools and minimize LGBTQ representation. Last year, Oklahoma’s superintendent of public education announced all schools in the state would be required to teach students about the Bible—a decision which came shortly after Louisiana attempted to mandate that the Ten Commandments be displayed in every classroom. This is all occurring as the Supreme Court seems poised to side with Maryland parents who want to remove their kids from classes that are teaching LGBTQ-themed books.
How LifeWise Is Allowed to Operate
Since American public schools aren’t allowed to promote any one religion, LifeWise uses what’s known as Released Time Religious Instruction (RTRI), a precedent set in a 1952 Supreme Court case that allows public school students with parental consent to receive religious education off school property during the school day, although it was only meant to be used by individual families, not a nationwide organization.
RTRI prohibits public funds from being used to facilitate the program and schools from promoting it, but LifeWise gets around this by having children recruit their peers and bribing them with sweet treats. For example, LifeWise in Wauseon, Ohio, has provided children with “student business cards” to hand out to friends and has said, “If you [can] get 90 kids to come, [we’ll] give you an ice cream party.”
LifeWise Academy Wauseon, OH. Student business cards | Screenshot: Wauseon Character Academy on YouTube
Curriculum
LifeWise teaches elementary and middle school students a variety of Christian principles. But embedded in the core curriculum are more insidious, anti-LGBTQ teachings. In a sixth grade lesson plan obtained by Uncloseted Media, LifeWise teaches 11– to 12-year-olds that “God created people as ‘male and female’” and “God designed two separate, distinct genders to complement one another in relationship.”
But high school is where the curriculum really sinks its teeth into issues related to LGBTQ identities. LifeWise’s high school curriculum uses the “Foundations” series that starts with “Understanding the Times,” based on a book by the same name.
The original book was written in 2006 by Jeff Myers and David Noebel, two conservative evangelicals, and contains a plethora of harmful and untrue homophobic, transphobic and even Islamophobic teachings.
On page 324, they write, “Being raised by parents who have been involved in same-sex relationships is correlated with several negative social outcomes, including crime, substance abuse, and forced sexual encounters.”
And on page 409, they critique people who disavow heteronormative power structures: “This way of thinking continues to creep into judicial decisions, most recently … through the decision of Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy to overthrow the Defense of Marriage Act because he viewed it as oppressive to people experiencing same-sex attraction.”
Okrey Anderson says that reducing LGBTQ identities down to worldviews is a distinct form of othering. “You’re granting permission to and empowering these kids to go out and see people’s identities and lived experiences as a worldview to be debated and you’re othering them. … Every scrap of misinformation that you spread about trans people translates directly into violence against trans people.”
Beyond the curriculum, LifeWise has a rulebook that gives instructors—who are not required to have teaching certifications from the Department of Education—guidance on how to answer “difficult questions from students.”
Excerpt from Lifewise’s Difficult Questions from Students document. | screenshot
The document explains that anyone who is experiencing gender dysphoria or is attracted to someone of the same sex should deny those feelings. If a child asks, “What would God think if I changed my gender?” LifeWise teachers are instructed to deny that trans, gender diverse and intersex people exist, and to explain that “God made us male or female. No matter how we feel, or how confused we are, we should trust and respect God’s perfect design and how He created us.”
If a kid asks about same-sex relationships, LifeWise instructs teachers to explain that “God designed the first man and woman to have a loving relationship with one another in marriage” and “anything different from this kind of romantic relationship between a husband and a wife is sin.”
“It’s grotesque,” says Olivia Murray, a professor at Portland State University whose research focuses on education. “From a child, youth and adolescent perspective, how does this build critical thinkers?”
Murray says social and emotional learning should teach children to “call out and question what we know and think deeper into the how and the why of knowledge.” She says a better approach might be to ask a question in return like, “What do you think of your friend who was presumed male at birth that uses female pronouns?” or “What’s your interpretation of the Bible and how might that impact your religion and relationships in the world?”
Policies and Staff
LifeWise operates with little diversity. According to its website, all of its senior leadership boast nuclear families, and three-quarters are men.
Staff are expected to remain abstinent, with the only exception being for those in heterosexual marriages.
Excerpt from LifeWise’s team member conduct policy. | screenshot
Christopher Elder was a volunteer at LifeWise’s chapter in Paulding Village, Ohio, until he was terminated shortly after he started dating his boyfriend.
“My identity in Christ, to me, looks like loving and supporting my boyfriend and everyone in the LGBTQ community,” Elder, 25, told Uncloseted Media. But when he told his director he had a boyfriend and asked if he could continue to volunteer, he was surprised by the answer. His director said, “Since the LifeWise Worldview Statement is that God’s design is for marriage to be between one man and one woman and your current choice doesn’t align with that stance, I think it’s best that you not volunteer at this time.”
Christopher Elder {right} and his boyfriend [left} | Photo courtesy of Elder
The director at LifeWise’s Paulding Village, Ohio chapter did not respond to Uncloseted Media’s request for comment.
“I thought that as long as Jason and I are abstinent, then I [could] still volunteer,” says Elder. “I’m not killing anybody, I’m not blatantly opposing the Bible, it’s just this one thing. … It’s unfair and unjust because my biggest passion is serving Christ.”
Murray says this discrimination creates an awful learning environment for teachers and students alike. “From an educator perspective, we need to teach with integrity and oftentimes that means adhering to our identity,” she says. “To teach in ways that are closeted or against our lived experiences or desires can be disingenuous and students can feel that.”
LifeWise’s repressive policies extend as far as using the bathroom. Their policy manual states that “team members and students attending LifeWise will use the bathroom that corresponds to the gender identified on their birth certificates.” If staff don’t abide, they will face disciplinary action. If students don’t follow, they’ll be outed to their parents.
“It’s always gonna be based on passing,” says Okrey Anderson. “Even cis kids who are maybe ambiguous-looking—they’re going to be targeted specifically by leadership for a conversation where they’re told ‘Hey, you need to dress more femininely’ or whatever it may be.”
LifeWise did not respond to Uncloseted Media’s request for comment.
Concerned Parents
As the program infiltrates public schools across the country, some school districts are deciding not to allow LifeWise to operate. Last year, at a Board of Education meeting in Westerville, Ohio, one mom explained to the Board why she and her wife decided not to opt their daughter into LifeWise.
“LifeWise has a clearly stated anti-LGBTQIA policy,” she said. “My daughter has explained on numerous occasions [that] she has been confronted by peers in LifeWise. She’s been asked to explain why she does not attend and pressed about if she believes in Christ, in God, in religion. … All of this seems incredibly counterproductive for a school district that otherwise is so clearly committed to diversity, equity, inclusion and student safety and wellbeing.”
But parents are pushing back beyond School Board meetings. Revere City Schools—also in Ohio—have been under pressure from Revere Citizens Against LifeWise Academy, a group fighting to keep the program out of their community.
“Public education is literally the cornerstone of our democracy and it is just one more thing that is being threatened along with book bans and teachers,” Gaines told Uncloseted Media, adding that they have upward of 14,000 group members on Facebook. “We wanted to bring awareness to that, and the more we looked into it, the more nefarious it became.”
Since 2023, Parrish and Gaines’ group has amassed a massive collection of documents and knowledge on LifeWise and its operations, most of which would likely still be kept behind closed doors if it wasn’t for their work. Their website contains resources to help parents make an informed decision about whether to opt their children in, as well as testimony from concerned parents.
Among their findings are 140 internal policy documents, information about LifeWise’s funding—which includes over $3.4 million in grants, including some from the notoriously anti-LGBTQ National Christian Foundation—and details about how LifeWise conducts background checks and trains its educators.
In one shocking discovery, they found that an Ohio teacher, who was previously fired from a public school for sexting with a student, was subsequently hired to be a local program director at LifeWise.
Their methods for obtaining this information landed Parrish a lawsuit from LifeWise last year that ended in a settlement agreement.
Despite pushback efforts, LifeWise has forged a clear path for growth. In at least 11 states, school districts are required to have a policy that greenlights programs like LifeWise, leaving communities with no mechanism to keep the Academy out.
LifeWise’s ultimate goal is for conservative Christian teachings to be embedded in public schools across America.
And in select schools, this is already happening. Starting later this year, the LifeWise chapter in Liberty Center, Ohio, will begin offering a for-credit class for high school students. If LifeWise has their way, this could spread across the country thanks to model legislation provided by the Released Time Resource Institute, a LifeWise-founded think tank that provides resources for legislators and educators.
“A lot of people from conservative backgrounds often fear the recruitment of queer and trans folks recruiting other people in, and I feel like it’s really flipped on its head here,” says Murray. “This grooming that’s occurring here … is incredibly damaging.”
Okrey Anderson agrees. “By exposing kids to this type of theology—whether that’s queer kids or not—you are potentially robbing those kids of a future spiritual life. … You could be poisoning them forever to have a meaningful relationship to deity in a way that feels safe and comfortable for them.”
This story was originally published in Uncloseted Media. For all their LGBTQ-focused journalism, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber at UnclosetedMedia.com.
The mayor of Salisbury, Maryland has announced that three Pride flag crosswalks located in his city’s downtown area will be painted over in order to “maintain neutrality in public spaces.” The city is now soliciting artists to propose designs that “[embody] the character, history, or artistic vibrancy of the city,” WMDT reported.
One LGBTQ Nation reader has accused the mayor of “erasing” the local LGBTQ+ community amid Republican efforts to remove LGBTQ+ visibility and inclusion in public life.
“Our city is home to a diverse and vibrant community, and we want our public spaces to be welcoming to all. However, we also have a responsibility to ensure that government property remains neutral and does not promote any particular movement or cause,” Salisbury Mayor Randy Taylor said. “By moving forward with a neutral design, we are ensuring that city property remains a place where every individual, regardless of background or belief, feels they belong.”
The city has launched the Crosswalk Canvas offering artists a $3,000 stipend for a design that “aligns with the city’s commitment to keeping public spaces free of political or ideological influence while ensuring they remain welcoming and inclusive for all residents.”
The city will choose the winning design by July 14; the decision will be made by panel of city officials and community representatives from the Public Art Committee. The winning artist will begin repainting the crosswalks on July 15, and finish by mid-September. The new designs will remain for up to two years.
The city’s first rainbow crosswalk was painted in 2018 by over 60 Salisbury PFLAG volunteers who donated paint and materials. It was the state’s first rainbow crosswalk, and volunteers traveled from as far as three hours away to help paint it, according to the Salisbury chapter of PFLAG.
The second and third crosswalks — bearing images of the transgender and Progress Pride flags — were painted in 2021 and annually touched up with paint each October starting in 2022 in observation of LGBTQ+ History Month.
“This is grassroots visibility being erased by government policy—and it’s happening in a place where the LGBTQ+ community already faces hostility,” one reader wrote LGBTQ Nation. “The crosswalk was approved by a prior [mayoral] administration … The new administration’s push for ‘neutrality’ is really about erasure.”
Republican- and conservative-led political bodies have tried to outlaw the display of Pride flags as well as various public acknowledgements of LGBTQ+ identities under policies opposing diversity, equity, and inclusion efforts.
