Washington Blade - March 16, 2007
Joshua Lynsen

Maryland's schools superintendent Nancy Grasmick, in an order last week, granted curriculum opponents a hearing before the state school board. Education officials must render a decision by July.

Grasmick said the hearing is necessary because curriculum opponents pose arguments that "are equally matched by the local board's response."

John Garza, an attorney representing three groups challenging the lessons for eighth and 10th grade students, said he's looking forward to presenting his case.

"The state board clearly said that the evidence is so equally matched that the state board finds it to be in equipoise - or that it's equally matched," he said. "So it's a tossup right now who's going to win before the state board."

But curriculum supporters noted Grasmick did not stop Montgomery County schools from testing its new curriculum in classrooms, a process that began March 6.

Jim Kennedy, co-founder of Teach the Facts, a coalition of curriculum supporters, said opponents of the plan thus failed to stop the lessons they find objectionable.

"They're talking as though this were a victory," he said. "They're talking as though this was close. It wasn't. They lost."

Citizens for a Responsible Curriculum, Parents & Friends of Gays & Ex-Gays and Family Leader Network had sought to stop Montgomery County schools from testing the new lessons. In their Feb. 7 appeal to Grasmick, they argued the lessons are improper, unnecessary and scientifically unsupported.

The district responded by telling Grasmick that the three groups "base their objection primarily on religious grounds and on a fundamentally flawed view of applicable law."

Complex hearing foreseen

During a March 8 meeting of curriculum opponents, Garza said state officials will resolve the dispute this summer in a procedure similar to a court trial.

"This trial could last six weeks or more," he said. "There's going to be 50 witnesses or more that need to be called to the stand."

Among the people that could testify, he said, are health experts, local school board members and former members of the citizens advisory committee that was tasked with reviewing the lessons.

The curriculum, titled "Respect for Difference in Human Sexuality," explains concepts like sexual identity and orientation using nonjudgmental language.

Students in eighth grade are taught to recognize health relationships and how to define sexuality, gender identity and other terms. Students in 10th grade receive a more thorough curriculum, including an examination of topics such as coming out and transgender discrimination.

Garza asked curriculum opponents - about 80 of whom gathered for the March 8 meeting - to help fund what is expected to prove a costly challenge.

"To take the deposition of each of the citizen advisory committees is going to cost $15,000," he said. "To take the depositions of the board of education is going to cost $6,000. To bring in experts à is going to cost us $20,000 to $30,000."

Garza said the case, while expensive, could be won.

"If we get those resources, we can win this battle at that level," he said, "and there won't be any need for any more appeals."

But curriculum supporters said the new lessons would withstand the challenge.

David Fishback, a board member of Metro D.C. PFLAG who has two gay sons, said in an interview that the curriculum is sound and need not be rewritten to placate opponents.

"Lord knows what they think they're going to get in the long run," he said, "but it's clear they've set out to harass the school system as much as possible on this."

Inflammatory material?

Nevertheless, curriculum opponents said the lessons must be changed because they contain inflammatory material.

Peter Sprigg, vice president for policy at Family Research Council, said particularly troublesome is the curriculum's assertion that homosexuality is innate.

"What's the consequence of this?" he said. "If you say that sexual orientation is innate, then you are essentially saying it cannot change. And you are denying the existence of people who can testify to the fact that they have changed - that they once experienced sexual attractions and no longer do."

Sprigg also said at the meeting that students shouldn't be asked to define homophobia as though it were a medically acknowledged illness.

"The word homophobia, because it includes 'phobia,' it sounds like a description of a clinically diagnosed mental illness," he said. "That's what a phobia is. But that's not what homophobia is."

Sprigg said the term was "coined by homosexual activists" to stigmatize their political opponents.

The lessons use Webster's Dictionary to define homophobia as "an extreme or irrational aversion to homosexuality and homosexual people."

Dr. Ruth Jacobs, an infectious disease specialist who works with Citizens for a Responsible Curriculum, said the lessons also are problematic because of what they omit.

She said lesson developers left out statistics that could demonstrate the health risks associated with anal sex.

"We are saying that heterosexual kids can easily think that anal sex is a non-pregnancy producing alternative," Jacobs said, "and they have to be warned of the risks."

She said students should be told the highest rate of HIV/AIDS transmission in the U.S. occurs via anal sex, and most of those transmissions occur among men who have sex with men.

"Why would we keep this information from our kids?" Jacobs said. "It's unacceptable to not warn of these risks."

Challenging the challengers

Jacobs and Sprigg fielded several questions at the meeting's end including one from a curriculum supporter.

Matthew Murguia, who is gay and works at the National Institutes of Health, asked Jacobs to explain several points, including why she touts "that HIV and gays are together" when 65 percent of all AIDS patients in Maryland are straight.

Jacobs replied by outing Murguia, who had not revealed in his comments that he is gay. She also noted her data was taken from the Centers for Disease Control & Prevention.

"Whatever is necessary for him to say to match his gay agenda, he will say," she said. "And I have been very careful to stick to the CDC à because I've known that there would be concerns."

After the meeting, Jacobs said she outed Murguia partly because "he's very annoying to me."

"I believe that as part of his gay identity, he is defending his gay agenda," she said. "And so I felt at that point, when he's attacking me with everything he's got, to do it without saying he's gay à I think is disingenuous and wrong."

Jacobs, who said she treats gay patients, insisted her objections to the curriculum do not make her homophobic.

"I'm not expressing hate speech, I'm expressing a concern," she said. "That lifestyle has risk. And my stance is skydivers, you know, jump out of airplanes and you tell skydivers that it's risky. It's risky! But that doesn't mean you hate skydivers. And teens drunk drive. And you tell them that you shouldn't drink, but that doesn't mean that you hate teens. And so I cannot see why you would not put the risks of anal intercourse into a condom-use lesson unless you were afraid it would reflect poorly on the homosexual lifestyle."

Jacobs said the lessons should have no political agenda but should rely on proven medical information.

"I think we try to make the point that we care about people," she said. "We want you to be able to live your own lifestyle. I don't care. I don't care how you live. I just want you to know your risks. I want you to know that anal sex is very risky.

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