9th circuit does it again,you cant teach your kids

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http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/S/SEX_SURVEY?SITE=AZMES&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT

Court Upholds Calif. School's Sex Survey

By DAVID KRAVETS
Associated Press Writer

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) -- A federal appeals court Wednesday dismissed a lawsuit by parents who were outraged that a school district had surveyed their elementary school-age children about sex.

The three-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals rejected the parents' claim that they have the exclusive right to tell their children about sex.

In upholding a lower court ruling against the parents, Circuit Judge Stephen Reinhardt said "no such specific right can be found in the deep roots of the nation's history and tradition or implied in the concept of ordered liberty."

The appeals court noted that other courts have upheld mandatory health classes, a school system's condom distribution program and compulsory sex ed.

The parents had sought unspecified damages.

An attorney for the parents, Erik Gunderson, said he was considering an appeal. Dennis Walsh, attorney for the Palmdale school district north of Los Angeles, said the survey was part of a legitimate effort aimed at helping students.

The district dropped the survey in 2002 amid complaints from parents. It was given to children in the first, third and fifth grades as part of a program to gauge early trauma and help youngsters overcome barriers to learning.

Among other things, the students were asked how often they thought about sex.

Parents whose students took the survey signed consent forms. But the forms never mentioned sex would be a topic.

What I wanna know is since I cant teach my kids about sex,can I teach yours?

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Seems on readig the above you can teach your children anthing you want. No rights are taken away only added to, as far as education goes.

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Seems on reading the above you can teach your children anthing you want. No rights are taken away only added to, as far as education goes.

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Shouldn't the thread title be "you can't keep your kids as ignorant as you want?"

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The case is Fields v. Palmdale School District, and the district court cite is Fields v. Palmdale Sch. Dist., 271 F. Supp. 2d 1217 (2003) (I can't find the Appellate decision; it's too new). It sounds like the plaintiffs ripped an argument out the pages of Pierce v. Society of Sisters, 268 U.S. 510 (1925), or Meyer v. Nebraska, 262 U.S. 390 (1923). Fine if you like substantive due process, but you'd be taking a distinctly activist position in supporting the plaintiff, Mysteryman. Perhaps you don't care much for textualism or originalism, but would you be so eager to find extra-textual constitutional rights elsewhere? (I don't pretend to know you that well, so I won't answer for you.) Nothing in the constitution says anything about the rights of parents to prevent the use of sex surveys in school.

As for everyone else who has responded thus far, I would think that some of you would agree with the idea of extra-textual constitutional rights, but principled legal stances are so rare... Or perhaps I'm mistaken about your preferences...

edit: I'd wager that this post will piss everyone off (on both sides), but I'd might as well start some fires.

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I take it mysteryman wants an activist judge, but only in this instance because he agrees witht the plaintiff.

Interesting.

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Somehow I missed the ruling that ordered parents to send their children to public schools.

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Here are some of the questions that were asked of these kids.
Remember,the parents were NOT told these questions were going to be asked.

Here is the link with the questions...
http://www.laborlawyers.com/CM/Education%20Labor%20Letters/eEdLL%20-%20January%202004.pdf

Look halfway down the second column,starting with the words..."The survey was administered".

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mysteryman wrote:

Here are some of the questions that were asked of these kids.
Remember,the parents were NOT told these questions were going to be asked.

Here is the link with the questions...
http://www.laborlawyers.com/CM/Education%20Labor%20Letters/eEdLL%20-%20January%202004.pdf

Look halfway down the second column,starting with the words..."The survey was administered".

The parents pressured the school administration to drop the survey. Why is this in court? Why are we even talking about this now?

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I read the questions. I thought they were intrusive for young kids. The parents objected, the survey was withdrawn. End of story.

If the repressed among us want to argue against sex education, feel free to make that case.

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The objection lies in the not keeping parents involved in what the students would be learning and when. They should have sent anotice home prior to the lesson asking for parental objections regarding sexual education.

Please do not try to warp this into something it is not Harper.

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McGentrix wrote:

Please do not try to warp this into something, it is not Harper.

No it is not Harper, whatever that is supposed to mean.

Again, this is a non-story. What is at issue here? Is anyone going to argue that schools should not provide sex education?

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twin_peaks_nikki wrote:

McGentrix wrote:

Please do not try to warp this into something, it is not Harper.

No it is not Harper, whatever that is supposed to mean.

Again, this is a non-story. What is at issue here? Is anyone going to argue that schools should not provide sex education?

Anyone, anyone? Bueller?

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twin_peaks_nikki wrote:

McGentrix wrote:

Please do not try to warp this into something, it is not Harper.

No it is not Harper, whatever that is supposed to mean.

Again, this is a non-story. What is at issue here? Is anyone going to argue that schools should not provide sex education?

Actually, yeah, I would argue that schools have no business teaching sex education. I think our schools should stick to teaching things like math, english, history, etc and leave sex education and such to the parents.
Maybe then you would find that more adults would be able to speak and write properly. Maybe then people would know the difference between "there" and "their", "it's" and "its" and so on. But I realize that is too much to hope.

There, I did it. I gave you the argument for which you asked.

Oh, and about the topic. I think the questions had no business being asked of elementary students. If the school sent home a consent form, they should have spelled out exactly what the survey would contain. If they did that, then the parents had no reason to sue. Even less of a reason once the school discontinued the survey.

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twinpeaks, if you are so hell bent on making this a "non story" tell us, why is this not a story? You very obviously do not have kids. Whether or not schools should teach sex ed is not the issue. It's asking kids who probably don't even understand sex to answer questions about masturbation and "feeling dirty" about sex.

And as for your statement about having to send kids to a public school, I'd like to see you pay tuition for a private school. Some people simply cannot afford it. Especially if you live outside of the district and have to pay extra to have you kid go to the school not in your district.

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Dys got it, the title of this thread is nonsense. Ruling says nothing about what you as parent can or can not teach your kid, nothing at all. Question is about what schools are allowed to teach kids. So strictly speaking, DrewDad's got the correct phrasing.

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DrewDad is always right. We should elect him president. Very Happy

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Does that mean you refuse to run and will not serve if elected??? Darn.

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The title of this thread was written that way intentionally,to get your attention.
My objection is to the questions that were asked and the fact that the parents were not told about them.

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9th circuit does it again,you cant teach your kids

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