trans in Texas schools

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It seems petty, but without any context about why the teacher refuses to use the new name, we are left to speculate. Even in the most extreme scenario, that the teacher is doing to register disapproval of the trans identified kid, it's not clear that the teacher is doing anything wrong by using the legal name on the roster.

More likely... the teacher just doesn't give a crap about a teenager feeling like the other gender, or being some alternate status of non-gender. Most likely, the teacher has over 100 students per day, and the school year just started, and he doesn't remember that Larlo wants to be called Casey. He's probably just reading off a roster. And the other nicknames are probably easy to remember because they somehow relate to the actual name. I'm not a huge apologist for teachers. But this seems like a case of your friends picking a fight with someone who is working their ass off and doesn't have time to validate the choices of Little Lord Fontleroy, who is apparently picking apart every interaction and making a capital case.

The administration brought it up with him, and he would not budge.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It seems petty, but without any context about why the teacher refuses to use the new name, we are left to speculate. Even in the most extreme scenario, that the teacher is doing to register disapproval of the trans identified kid, it's not clear that the teacher is doing anything wrong by using the legal name on the roster.

More likely... the teacher just doesn't give a crap about a teenager feeling like the other gender, or being some alternate status of non-gender. Most likely, the teacher has over 100 students per day, and the school year just started, and he doesn't remember that Larlo wants to be called Casey. He's probably just reading off a roster. And the other nicknames are probably easy to remember because they somehow relate to the actual name. I'm not a huge apologist for teachers. But this seems like a case of your friends picking a fight with someone who is working their ass off and doesn't have time to validate the choices of Little Lord Fontleroy, who is apparently picking apart every interaction and making a capital case.

This is really reaching to sympathize with a petty tyrant of a teacher. As an immigrant kid who went by an English name with absolutely no relation to my legal foreign name and knew many others who did the same (think Xing -> Jenny type), not a single teacher over the course of a decade had a problem with it, either in principle or in practice. Most of them, I didn’t even have to correct once, because there was a “preferred name” slot on public school intake forms even back in the 90s. This teacher is 100% doing it to flex their power over the student.

[Anonymous]

If all the other teachers are fine with this and the administrators seem supportive, it’s worth reporting this guy to his supervisors.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If all the other teachers are fine with this and the administrators seem supportive, it’s worth reporting this guy to his supervisors.

+1 Agree.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If all the other teachers are fine with this and the administrators seem supportive, it’s worth reporting this guy to his supervisors.

+1 Agree.

Pretty sure OP said they already talked to the administration and the teacher still deadnames him. What do they do next? Demand they reprimand the teacher? What if the teacher is fired? If the teacher went public with being forced to be respectful to a trans kid, that could put the kid and his family at risk. These are the things trans kids have to deal with on a regular basis.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If I was a teen in that class, I’d organize everyone to (1) not respond to roll call and (2) call the teacher by his first name. No more “Mr. Wilson”….he will be addressed as “Dan.”

I was soooooo that kid in HS. A little bit of innocent mischief to prove a point. One has to earn respect.

It really depends on what part of Texas this is at. No way student athletes are doing that if there is a chance they can be suspended from the football team.

Obviously kids should be called the name they order but sometimes in life you need to pick and choose your battles. I have a very ethnic official first name that I never use. All my teachers in high school used my preferred nickname but one insisted on butchering my legal first name. I cringed every time I was called on and respectfully asked the teacher not to say it to no avail. It wasn’t worth the fight. So getting marked truant because you won’t say present is just a losing battle in some Texas classrooms. The study could say -“present but I prefer you address me as ———“ every single time.

Can’t the parents submit a nickname to get around the issue?

Also, plenty of family with Eastern European names and friends with Asian names go by some bland English-friendly name. With my friends half I didn’t know were actually born with a different name.

Samples from my current family:

Przemysław - Shem

Wladyslawa - Lottie

Gah! This is so frustrating! I mean, do they expect women named Leslie, Stacey, Carol and the like to change their names because they are actually men’s names???

[Anonymous]

This post is really just one example of a common thing that happens to transgender people. People act like they accept you but their actions are a lot louder than their words.

When I first came out as trans, most people said they didn't care. They said that they were happy if I was happy.

One person said it was fine with her but refused to ever use my name or pronouns. It's funny that the transphobic people will claim that they/them cannot be used singularly (in relation to nonbinary people) but then use it instead of she/her for me. The amount of linguistic gymnastics required to avoid using my chosen name and pronouns is really ridiculous and pretty obvious. That chosen name is my legal name now. It's been updated everywhere. My driver's license, social security, you name it. This "friend" still hasn't used it or my pronouns ever. Meanwhile she's been remarried 3 times and I've always respected her legal last name changes as well as her use of her middle name as her first name (which she despises).

So hearing that a teacher in school is refusing to use a chosen name, even if it's just considered a nickname isn't at all surprising. If this kid was cis, the teacher would have no problem respecting their nickname, even if it was something like Scooter. It's pretty much the definition of bigotry to respect everyone except for one student who you single out because they're different - in this case because that kid is trans.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It seems petty, but without any context about why the teacher refuses to use the new name, we are left to speculate. Even in the most extreme scenario, that the teacher is doing to register disapproval of the trans identified kid, it's not clear that the teacher is doing anything wrong by using the legal name on the roster.

More likely... the teacher just doesn't give a crap about a teenager feeling like the other gender, or being some alternate status of non-gender. Most likely, the teacher has over 100 students per day, and the school year just started, and he doesn't remember that Larlo wants to be called Casey. He's probably just reading off a roster. And the other nicknames are probably easy to remember because they somehow relate to the actual name. I'm not a huge apologist for teachers. But this seems like a case of your friends picking a fight with someone who is working their ass off and doesn't have time to validate the choices of Little Lord Fontleroy, who is apparently picking apart every interaction and making a capital case.

The administration brought it up with him, and he would not budge.

School has been in session 1-2 weeks in Texas. This is so much drama that I strain to believe it. Even if it's true though, you don't know why he "didn't budge" and the idea that the teacher is getting his bearings with the names of over 100 kids is pretty reasonable. It's also a bit reactionary to reach out to the administration and get action taken in the very first week of school.

[Anonymous]

As someone who has a child struggling with this now (out of the blue I might add), I would like ONE teacher in my kids’ school who challenged my kid like this teacher is. Why grown adults think it’s ok to convince kids to stop their sexual growth and mutilate their bodies is just gross. Kids and teens romance transgenderism and don’t understand that they are signing themselves up for a lifetime of physical pain.

My kids’ therapist believes that existing OCD is seriously contributing to the transgender thought process in a lot of kids and by reinforcing in the schools, the instant acceptance is dangerous to a child’s mental health.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:As someone who has a child struggling with this now (out of the blue I might add), I would like ONE teacher in my kids’ school who challenged my kid like this teacher is. Why grown adults think it’s ok to convince kids to stop their sexual growth and mutilate their bodies is just gross. Kids and teens romance transgenderism and don’t understand that they are signing themselves up for a lifetime of physical pain.

My kids’ therapist believes that existing OCD is seriously contributing to the transgender thought process in a lot of kids and by reinforcing in the schools, the instant acceptance is dangerous to a child’s mental health.

Ask your therapist if daily, public humiliation in front of their high school peers is a suggested treatment.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It seems petty, but without any context about why the teacher refuses to use the new name, we are left to speculate. Even in the most extreme scenario, that the teacher is doing to register disapproval of the trans identified kid, it's not clear that the teacher is doing anything wrong by using the legal name on the roster.

More likely... the teacher just doesn't give a crap about a teenager feeling like the other gender, or being some alternate status of non-gender. Most likely, the teacher has over 100 students per day, and the school year just started, and he doesn't remember that Larlo wants to be called Casey. He's probably just reading off a roster. And the other nicknames are probably easy to remember because they somehow relate to the actual name. I'm not a huge apologist for teachers. But this seems like a case of your friends picking a fight with someone who is working their ass off and doesn't have time to validate the choices of Little Lord Fontleroy, who is apparently picking apart every interaction and making a capital case.

This is really reaching to sympathize with a petty tyrant of a teacher. As an immigrant kid who went by an English name with absolutely no relation to my legal foreign name and knew many others who did the same (think Xing -> Jenny type), not a single teacher over the course of a decade had a problem with it, either in principle or in practice. Most of them, I didn’t even have to correct once, because there was a “preferred name” slot on public school intake forms even back in the 90s. This teacher is 100% doing it to flex their power over the student.

I doubt all your teachers remembered every kids name in the first week. At an absolute maximum, it has been 2 weeks and the issue has already been escalated to senior management. It could be that he's hiding his KKK hood in his closet. Or it could be that he's not good with names, he has brain fog, he's getting older, he is preoccupied with issues in his own life, etc. Be honest about which is the most like likely scenario- that this teacher is struggling to keep up, or that he's a total jerk.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It seems petty, but without any context about why the teacher refuses to use the new name, we are left to speculate. Even in the most extreme scenario, that the teacher is doing to register disapproval of the trans identified kid, it's not clear that the teacher is doing anything wrong by using the legal name on the roster.

More likely... the teacher just doesn't give a crap about a teenager feeling like the other gender, or being some alternate status of non-gender. Most likely, the teacher has over 100 students per day, and the school year just started, and he doesn't remember that Larlo wants to be called Casey. He's probably just reading off a roster. And the other nicknames are probably easy to remember because they somehow relate to the actual name. I'm not a huge apologist for teachers. But this seems like a case of your friends picking a fight with someone who is working their ass off and doesn't have time to validate the choices of Little Lord Fontleroy, who is apparently picking apart every interaction and making a capital case.

This is really reaching to sympathize with a petty tyrant of a teacher. As an immigrant kid who went by an English name with absolutely no relation to my legal foreign name and knew many others who did the same (think Xing -> Jenny type), not a single teacher over the course of a decade had a problem with it, either in principle or in practice. Most of them, I didn’t even have to correct once, because there was a “preferred name” slot on public school intake forms even back in the 90s. This teacher is 100% doing it to flex their power over the student.

I doubt all your teachers remembered every kids name in the first week. At an absolute maximum, it has been 2 weeks and the issue has already been escalated to senior management. It could be that he's hiding his KKK hood in his closet. Or it could be that he's not good with names, he has brain fog, he's getting older, he is preoccupied with issues in his own life, etc. Be honest about which is the most like likely scenario- that this teacher is struggling to keep up, or that he's a total jerk.

Dp- the op has stated the teacher is able to remember and keep up with other kid’s nicknames. If teacher wants to adhere strictly to the written list, that’s fine. But that isn’t what is happening here.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It seems petty, but without any context about why the teacher refuses to use the new name, we are left to speculate. Even in the most extreme scenario, that the teacher is doing to register disapproval of the trans identified kid, it's not clear that the teacher is doing anything wrong by using the legal name on the roster.

More likely... the teacher just doesn't give a crap about a teenager feeling like the other gender, or being some alternate status of non-gender. Most likely, the teacher has over 100 students per day, and the school year just started, and he doesn't remember that Larlo wants to be called Casey. He's probably just reading off a roster. And the other nicknames are probably easy to remember because they somehow relate to the actual name. I'm not a huge apologist for teachers. But this seems like a case of your friends picking a fight with someone who is working their ass off and doesn't have time to validate the choices of Little Lord Fontleroy, who is apparently picking apart every interaction and making a capital case.

This is really reaching to sympathize with a petty tyrant of a teacher. As an immigrant kid who went by an English name with absolutely no relation to my legal foreign name and knew many others who did the same (think Xing -> Jenny type), not a single teacher over the course of a decade had a problem with it, either in principle or in practice. Most of them, I didn’t even have to correct once, because there was a “preferred name” slot on public school intake forms even back in the 90s. This teacher is 100% doing it to flex their power over the student.

I doubt all your teachers remembered every kids name in the first week. At an absolute maximum, it has been 2 weeks and the issue has already been escalated to senior management. It could be that he's hiding his KKK hood in his closet. Or it could be that he's not good with names, he has brain fog, he's getting older, he is preoccupied with issues in his own life, etc. Be honest about which is the most like likely scenario- that this teacher is struggling to keep up, or that he's a total jerk.

Dp- the op has stated the teacher is able to remember and keep up with other kid’s nicknames. If teacher wants to adhere strictly to the written list, that’s fine. But that isn’t what is happening here.

On its face, this isn't something OP would know. She is learning this third hand, from a kid that is only in one of the teacher's many classes. It isn't reasonable for OP to claim to know something that is impossible to know.

We are literally talking about the first or second week of school. They are spoiling for a fight and targeting this teacher.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:As someone who has a child struggling with this now (out of the blue I might add), I would like ONE teacher in my kids’ school who challenged my kid like this teacher is. Why grown adults think it’s ok to convince kids to stop their sexual growth and mutilate their bodies is just gross. Kids and teens romance transgenderism and don’t understand that they are signing themselves up for a lifetime of physical pain.

My kids’ therapist believes that existing OCD is seriously contributing to the transgender thought process in a lot of kids and by reinforcing in the schools, the instant acceptance is dangerous to a child’s mental health.

Wow. I just can’t even formulate a response to this. While what you say about your child might be true, to think it is ok for anyone outside your family and therapists to be that disrespectful of your child’s wishes just to be called by a different name is just disturbing

[Anonymous]

If the administration is supportive, is moving out of this teacher’s class to another an option?

I have done that with one of my kid in one class because the teacher was a bully.