New Boston Post, a conservative aggregate news source for all things New England, recently reported Needham High School in Needham, Massachusetts, is teaching students in its biology class that humans who “change” their gender are no different than animals or plants who naturally alter their bodily composition for the survival of their species. According to the report, the Massachusetts high school biology class also requests students limit gendered language during the section on genetics in order to create an inclusive classroom. But some critics are saying the lesson plan is “indoctrination.”
New Boston Post reported last week that Needham High is teaching in biology class that “humans are socially conditioned to view sex and gender as binary.” That class also requires students to refrain from “language that removes gendered terms to talk about bodies” to make sure “people with diverse (a)sexualities, (a)genders, bodies, and (a)romantic orientations are included and respected.”
According to the report’s author, Tom Joyce, Needham High educators broke down the difference between “anatomical sex” and “gender identity” even further:
Here is how it defines anatomical sex:
“Sex (sometimes called biological sex, anatomical sex, or physical sex) is comprised of things like genitals, chromosomes, hormones, body hair, and more. But one thing it’s not: gender.”
And here is how it defines gender identity:
“Your psychological sense of self. Who you, in your head, know yourself to be based on how much you align (or don’t align) with what you understand to be the options for gender.”
The lesson plan also includes “non-human examples” of gender variation, as reported by Joyce.
These include clownfish, the common reed frog, and amborella (a plant) all of which have the natural ability to change their reproductive system, something New Boston Post noted is distinctly different from humans who believe they can change their gender. “The clownfish differs from a biologically male human identifying as a woman because a male human cannot give birth under any circumstances,” New Boston Post claimed.
According to Parents Defending Education, the section on genetics also included a focus on topics like “gender expression” and “attraction.”
In reaction to the story, Massachusetts Family Institute communications director, Mary Ellen Siegler, slammed the lesson plan, saying in an email to New Boston Post that in schools across the Bay State “harmful transgender ideology has moved beyond being promoted in select student sponsored clubs to now being actively taught across the curriculum.”
Massachusetts schools “have been overtaken by special interest groups intent on promulgating radical social theories, and the Needham school district is no exception,” Siegler alleged.
“These facts are troublesome enough, but to think that transgenderism is now being taught as ‘science’ takes the concern to a whole new level. Biological sex is immutable. To teach students otherwise is a lie and not science. This is not education. It is indoctrination,” she claimed.
For its part, Needham Public Schools superintendent Daniel Gutekanst defended the curriculum, in part saying to New Boston Post, “We are proud of the programs we offer all students and continue to work hard to ensure all science curriculum materials and resources are accurate and appropriately reflect the needs of a diverse student body and the standards, values, and high academic expectations of the Needham community.”
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