Despite voting against banning rainbows in classrooms last year, a Cincinnati-area suburban school district voted 4-1 Wednesday night to ban a “Hate Has No Home Here” poster because it had a Pride rainbow and trans colors.
The Little Miami Board of Education took action at the recommendation of their new law director who was hired in January, Board President David Wallace said during the meeting. The poster was brought to the board because of HB 8, the “Parents’ Bill of Rights,” which prohibits images in classrooms that promote “sexuality content or gender ideology.”
While discussing the poster before the vote, recently elected Board Member Dan Smith said he interpreted the poster as accusing people of hating LGBTQ+ people “because we disagree with that lifestyle,” he said.
“I’ll tell you what [Jesus] didn’t like. He didn’t like sin, and he let it be known,” Smith said. “So when you label all those different rainbow things there and the trans things, you’re identifying with that and you expect us to love that and even like that. But we don’t.”
The issue
The display was a small poster in the corner of a history teacher’s classroom. It said, “Hate Has No Home Here” with hands holding up multiple hearts. Two of the hearts referenced LGBTQ+ people through rainbow and trans colors. Others showed a peace sign and an American flag.
The agenda said the motion to remove the poster was to determine whether it “constitutes ‘sexuality content’” as defined in Little Miami Schools Board Policy 5780.01, adopted after the Ohio legislature passed HB 8.
The policy defines “sexuality content” as “any oral or written instruction, presentation, image, or description of sexual concepts or gender ideology provided in a classroom setting.” Exceptions are included for discussions in sexual health education, sexual violence prevention and “incidental references to sexual concepts or gender ideology occurring outside of formal instruction or presentations on such topics.” If such content is in a classroom, parents are to be notified and given an opt-out.
While Wallace did not say how the Board was notified of the poster, he said he received a review from the superintendent, though he did not say what her recommendation was.
During discussion, Superintendent Regina Morgan said the teacher put up the poster four years ago but it was not used during instruction in his history class. She gave an example that if students were learning about the Second World War, the teacher would point to the poster to emphasize that hate does not belong in the classroom while they were learning about hate-motivated historical events.
“It was used as a peacekeeper in the classroom,” she said. “He’s saying, ‘In my classroom, hate does not belong here regardless of [how] you identify in the lessons that have hate.”
Wallace and Smith both cut off Morgan multiple times as she tried to clarify the teacher’s reasoning.
Smith asked whether the poster (while misstating it was a flag) was up all year or just during certain parts of the curriculum.
“So the flag is always up? That doesn’t make sense,” he said.
Public comment
A petition was circulated online encouraging those who live in Little Miami School District to attend and request for the poster to stay up. The majority of people who spoke were in favor of the poster staying.
One of the commenters, Laura Fischer, said children “shouldn’t feel like they’re going to be bullied for exactly who they are,” and that banning displays brought back last year’s debate over what flags and displays should be in schools. She gave a personal example that she wrapped her twin babies in a rainbow blanket, not because she was “baptizing them gay,” but because she was celebrating a successful birth after “multiple losses.”
“What rainbow is acceptable? Is ‘The Reading Rainbow’ acceptable?” Fischer said. “I do not see [a rainbow] and think ‘sex,’ but some people see it and they think, ‘safe.’ Every child deserves to know that they are safe.”
A following parent, Emily Kronenberger, said she had a hard time seeing what was wrong with the poster.
“It is baffling to me, a Southerner who is also a pastor’s daughter, that we’ve come to a point where the idea that promoting love is a sexual concept,” she said. “I would much rather we be flawed for providing too abundant a welcome than not providing one at all.”
Another parent, Jackie Mason, was not in support of the poster. The poster is “spin and gaslighting” and is part of a trend “ to support sexual sins and the sexual confusion of our children.”
“Those posters are in favor of sexual degradation,” she said. “It’s not the sexually confused children who have been bullied. It is quite the opposite. All of my children were bullied in this district for standing up and stating what is right and what is true.”
Discussion period
Recently elected board member Mandy Bullock and incumbent Diane Horvath said the phrase isn’t an issue, but the symbols are.
“Once you add the symbols, it shouldn’t be in a classroom setting,” Bullock said. “Nothing sexuality orientated or gender identity should be included on a classroom wall.”
To Horvath, it was “unfortunate” how the symbols made the poster “kind of muddled together.” Because the community is made up of people with different values, she said the poster wasn’t fair to those who do not “agree with” LGBTQ+ people.”
All students have to “veil certain parts of themselves” in order to have a “shared focus” and “achieve academically,” she said.
“ If you could just have the message without bringing in certain aspects and certain values that not everyone else has, that would be more acceptable,” Horvath said. ”If you’re asking people to embrace something that is not part of their value system, then that’s not the kind of poster that you should be putting up on a wall.”
She voted in favor of removing the poster. Last year, Horvath voted against the controversial flag and displays policy that would have banned Pride flags.
Wayne Siebert was the lone board member who voted against the resolution. Removing the poster was “ridiculous” because it went against the advice of their last law director and put them at risk of expensive Title IX lawsuits, he said.
“I’ve had hundreds of people tell me [removal] ‘was ridiculous, we don’t need this,’ and I’ve had very few say that they want it,” Siebert said. “This board is going to ignore that legal advice, and they will suffer the consequences.”
Passing the resolution was disappointing to the district’s union, said Little Miami Teachers Association President Wayne Lyke in a statement to The Buckeye Flame.
“The poster is intended to convey a general message of inclusion and respect for all students, not to create division or inspire hate,” Lyke said. “The association’s responsibility is to protect our members’ contractual rights and to support a teaching and learning environment that promotes academic excellence while encouraging kindness, safety, and belonging.”
Wallace defended the board’s decision before voting. The resolution wasn’t their fault, they are “just following the law,” he said.
“I don’t think we made the law. I think your state representatives did,” he said. “If someone has an argument about HB 8, they’re probably at the wrong meeting.”
In a statement provided to FOX19, Wallace said “based on the record before it, the Board determined this poster was reasonably understood to engage students on [sexual concepts or gender ideology], which requires parental notice and the opportunity to review and opt out.”
After the resolution passed, a man shouted, “You’re standing on the wrong side of history.”
Wallace yelled for the police officer to remove him while the audience loudly protested.
“This isn’t Facebook, okay?” Wallace yelled. “This is a Little Miami School Board meeting!”
Editor’s Note: This article was updated with the correct names of speakers during public comment after the school district received the list of speakers.
IGNITE ACTION
- To access contact information for members of the Little Miami Board of Education, click here.
- If you are a young LGBTQ+ person in crisis, please contact the Trevor Project: 866-4-U-Trevor.
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