Chasten Buttigieg Slams Florida Over Proposed ‘Don’t Say Gay’ Bill for Schools: You’re ‘Pushing Kids Back Into the Closet’
Chasten Buttigieg, writer and husband of Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, is denouncing a proposed bill in Florida for the impact he claims it will have on the mental health of young people dealing with LGBT issues.
The Parental Rights in Education bill is an advancing piece of Florida legislation that would set rules prohibiting schools from discussing sexual orientation or gender identity in the classroom. While proponents argue the bill will allow parents to sue school districts if teachers or staff discuss these topics in a manner deemed age inappropriate, critics have called it the “Don’t Say Gay” bill, alleging that LGBTQ students could be outed without their permission, and the bill would make it harder for them to talk about issues of sexuality.
Chasten Buttigieg has strongly condemned the bill, claiming “this will kill kids” as he cited a Trevor Project survey showing how 42 percent of LGBTQ youth have considered suicide in the past year.
This will kill kids, @RonDeSantisFL. You are purposefully making your state a harder place for LGBTQ kids to survive in. In a national survey (@TrevorProject), 42% of LGBTQ youth seriously considered attempting suicide last year. Now they can’t talk to their teachers? https://t.co/VtfFLPlsn3
— Chasten Buttigieg (@Chasten) January 20, 2022
Buttigieg expanded on his thoughts as he spoke to CNN’s John Berman on Tuesday and broke down the survey.
We should be approaching that number with urgency and with compassion and care. Wondering what we’re doing what kind of country we’re building, or in Florida, what kind of state are you building where you’re essentially pushing kids back into the closet. You’re saying we can’t talk about you, we can’t talk about your families. And you know, as a kid who grew up for 18 years being told you don’t belong, something about you is wrong. Sometimes, you take that trauma to heart. Unfortunately there are a lot of kids in this country who do the worst because we tell them something about you is twisted and you don’t belong here.
After delving into his personal experiences and various criticisms of the bill, Buttigieg arrived at the conclusion that bill isn’t about defending parental rights. Instead, he judged that its purpose was about “using the LGBT community as a scapegoat, which we’ve been used as multiple times throughout history, and I just don’t agree with it.”
Watch above, via CNN.
