The demise renewed scrutiny of anti-transgender legal guidelines handed within the state and rhetoric by Oklahoma officers, together with the state superintendent for training, Ryan Walters, whose company has been forceful in making an attempt to bar what it calls “radical gender theory” in faculties.
“It’s dangerous,” Mr. Walters mentioned in a video made by the company final yr. “It puts our girls in jeopardy.”
The video highlighted a battle in a toilet the earlier yr by which, based on a lawsuit, a feminine scholar was “severely” injured in a battle with a transgender scholar.
Advocates for nonbinary and transgender college students mentioned that the state’s coverage on gender and loos had led to extra experiences of confrontations in faculties.
“That policy and the messaging around it has led to a lot more policing of bathrooms by students,” mentioned Nicole McAfee, the chief director of Freedom Oklahoma, which advocates for transgender and homosexual rights. College students who don’t current themselves as clearly male or feminine discover themselves questioned by different college students, they mentioned. “There is a sense of, ‘do you belong in here?'”
The reason for Nex’s demise stays unclear. The New York Put up experiences that Sue Benedict, Nex’s mom, mentioned Nex fell and hit their head throughout the toilet battle. The Put up additionally quotes the mom of the opposite sufferer, who reported seeing the assailants “beating her head across the floor.” However based on a press release that the Owasso Police Division posted on Fb yesterday, preliminary post-mortem findings point out that Nex “did not die as a result of trauma.” The assertion provides that “toxicology results and other ancillary testing results” are nonetheless pending and “the official autopsy report will be available at a later date.”
Nex was examined at Bailey Medical Heart the day of the battle and launched that night time. After coming residence, Sue Benedict instructed the Instances, Nex “complained of a sore head.” The following day, “Nex collapsed at home and was rushed to the hospital.” In an interview with KWGS, the NPR station in Tulsa, on Tuesday, Benedict complained that “school staff didn’t call an ambulance” and that “medical professionals performed a cursory exam before discharging Nex.” However Benedict additionally mentioned “she is not certain yet how much [the] altercation contributed to Nex’s death.”
No matter the reason for demise, the case raises troubling questions concerning the response to the battle. “Students were in the restroom for less than two minutes and the physical altercation was broken up by other students who were present in the restroom at the time, along with a staff member who was supervising outside of the restroom,” the Owasso Public Colleges (OPS) mentioned in a press release issued on Tuesday. “Once the altercation was broken up, all students involved in the altercation walked under their own power to the assistant principal’s office and nurse’s office.”
What occurred subsequent? “Physical altercations between students are unacceptable,” OPS mentioned. “Any student/s engaging in such action, jeopardizing the safety of others, will receive disciplinary consequences. These consequences can include out-of-school suspension for a first offense. Due to federal privacy laws, we are unable to disclose the exact nature of disciplinary action taken against any student.” Sue Benedict instructed The Impartial that faculty officers “informed her Nex was being suspended for two weeks.”
Below “district protocols,” OPS mentioned, “the parents/guardians of students involved in a physical altercation are notified and informed of the option to file a police report should they choose. Should they choose to file a police report, school resource officers are made available to the parents/guardians either at that time or they can schedule an appointment, if they choose, at a later date. These practices were followed during this incident.”
The afternoon of the battle, police say, “an Owasso School Resource Officer was assigned to respond to Bailey Medical Center where Nex Benedict was being examined. The School Resource Officer interviewed Nex and their parent concerning the altercation at the Owasso High School. The following morning, the School Resource Officer followed up with the parent.” That very same day, “Owasso Fire Department medics were dispatched to a medical emergency involving Nex Benedict, who was transported to the St. Francis Pediatric Emergency Room where they later died.”
Police mentioned they have been “conducting a very active and thorough investigation of the time and events that led up to the death of the student.” As of Tuesday, the Put up says, “it remained unclear” whether or not Nex’s assailants “would face charges.”
Extra typically, the incident raises questions on Owasso Excessive College’s response to bullying. An OPS spokesman instructed the Instances that “students who identified as transgender or nonbinary would be treated ‘with dignity and respect, just like all students.'” However Sue Benedict mentioned Nex had been repeatedly harassed by different college students in school. “The Benedicts know all too well the devastating effects of bullying and school violence,” the household mentioned in a press release, “and pray for meaningful change wherein bullying is taken seriously and no family has to deal with another preventable tragedy.”
Did Oklahoma’s insurance policies encourage such violence? Goodman and Sandoval clearly suppose so. “In addition to the bathroom law,” they notice, “Oklahoma passed a ban on gender-transition care for minors last year. And in 2022, the state was among the first in the nation to explicitly prohibit residents from using gender neutral markers on their birth certificates.” Additionally they suppose it’s related to notice that “the state education agency” not too long ago appointed “Chaya Raichik, who runs Libs of TikTok, an account on X that has posted anti-gay and anti-transgender content, to serve on the agency’s Library Media Advisory Committee, which reviews the appropriateness of school library content.”
The implication is that state insurance policies are reinforcing the intolerance from which Nex suffered. Perhaps. However anybody who has attended highschool can testify that youngsters don’t want official encouragement to choose on children they see as totally different. And on this case, the lavatory regulation that the Instances repeatedly highlights looks like a purple herring.