Say what?

The headline reads, "Brownsburg teacher says transgender name policy goes against his religious beliefs."

John Kluge was an orchestra teacher at Brownsburg High School in Indiana.  The school instituted a policy that transgender students who have met school requirements are to be called by their chosen name; one that matches their self-identified gender.  He claimed doing so was a violation of his rights.  A compromise was worked out for the school year that just ended that he would address all students by their last names.

But that compromise was not going to work for the next school year.  Mr. Kluge claims that being forced to use their "new" name is an implied agreement with the student's decision to declare themselves transgender.

That seems akin to someone who sells a gun to another person implicitly agreeing with their decision to commit murder.  Calling a person by their preferred name is a sign of respect.  Our parents choose our names when we are born, but we are not stuck with that choice for the rest of our lives.  Would calling the late John Wayne by his given name of Marion Mitchell Morrison be proper?  Would refusing to call him John Wayne be an indication of disagreement of his choice to pursue acting?  No.  You call a person by the name they want to be called.

But the thing that really bugged me was a parent's claim that she removed her 9th grade daughter from the school after the girl saw another kid who was born female but choose to identify as male; using the boys bathroom.  She went to the school administration with her fears that boys could use the school policy to use the women's restroom but she says they, "...didn't take her concerns seriously."

Aside from the fact there appears to be an utter absence of reported incidents where a man falsely claimed to be transgendered just to gain access to female restrooms and/or locker rooms, the school's policy on the subject is quite clear.

Let's look at how this would work in the twisted pretzel logic of this mother's mind where her daughter might wind up having to deal with a boy falsely claiming to be transgendered in order to gain access to the restroom/locker room used by her daughter.

The start of that process is for the boy to get letters signed by his parent(s) and by a healthcare professional.  Those letters are presented to the school administration.  At that point, the student's status as transgendered, and their new name (if requested) would be entered into the school district's computerized records system.

What boy would go through all of that to get into the girls' bathroom or locker room?

I wonder if Mr. Kluge would refuse to call the man born Lew Alcindor and raised a Catholic by his chosen name of Kareem Abdul-Jabbar.  Wouldn't that be implied agreement with Abdul-Jabbar's choice to convert from Catholicism to Islam?