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High Stakes in Florida
City Journal ^ | 11 Sep, 2023 | Christopher F. Rufo

Posted on 09/12/2023 4:55:36 AM PDT by MtnClimber

The Biden administration comes after New College and its conservative reforms, alleging specious civil rights violations.

Last week, the Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights opened an investigation into New College of Florida, where I serve as a trustee, regarding alleged “disability discrimination.”

The investigation was prompted by a complaint by ACLU attorney Jennifer Granick, alleging that the college’s trustees and administrators violated civil rights law by removing “gender neutral” signage from bathrooms, defunding the DEI and gender studies programs, and “misgendering” the former DEI director and a former student, who use “ze/zir” and “they/them” pseudo-pronouns, respectively. According to the complaint, these actions constitute discrimination “based on perceived disability and gender prejudice.”

As a tactical matter, the complaint is a clear attempt to disrupt the conservative reforms at New College, which represent a threat to the Left’s hegemony over higher education. Since January, when the new board of trustees was announced, New College has secured record funding from the state legislature, begun a campus-wide renovation, launched a new core curriculum, and recruited the largest incoming class in the college’s history. For left-wing activists, who had previously considered New College as an outpost for social-justice activism, this state of affairs—conservative leaders implementing conservative reforms—was intolerable. They might chant for “democracy” in theory, but, in practice, they are more than willing to use anti-democratic tools to restrict any democratic action that might undermine their cultural power.

As a strategic matter, a more dangerous element is in play: the manipulation of civil rights law. The Civil Rights Act, many have come to believe, was a noble response to Jim Crow segregation and other serious abuses that, over the years, has been distorted by left-wing activists, who have used it to force public and private institutions to conform to unrelated ideological demands. In the case of New College, the implication is clear: despite the fact that the trustees, state legislators, state education officials, and governor support the ongoing reforms, left-wing activists, in cooperation with the Biden administration, would use civil rights law to compel the college to surrender to left-wing “diversity and inclusion” orthodoxy and to mandate the use of falsified ideological terms, such as “ze/zir” and “they/them.” Dissenters, the activists hope, will be denounced, investigated, and punished by the full force of the federal government.

The stakes are immense. The complainants would like nothing more than to set the precedent that DEI bureaucracies, gender studies programs, and specified political speech are required by civil rights law. If they are able to make the link between “perceived disability and gender prejudice” and win such a judgment, it would be the ultimate vindication of Christopher Caldwell’s thesis that the Civil Rights Act, in its present configuration and usage, represents a mortal threat to the constitutional principles of free speech, democratic representation, and equal treatment under the law. If the Department of Education forces New College to reinstate terminated left-wing programs and requires trustees to address women as “ze/zir” and “they/them,” it would mean, in a real sense, the replacement of the system of self-governance with a system of ideological rule....


TOPICS: Education; Society
KEYWORDS: antiwoke; byebyemarxists; desantis; fl; florida; newcollege; sarasota; wokeism

1 posted on 09/12/2023 4:55:36 AM PDT by MtnClimber
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To: MtnClimber

Brandon will send in the Federal Bureau of Wokeness to straighten out all of these slow adopters.


2 posted on 09/12/2023 4:55:50 AM PDT by MtnClimber (For photos of Colorado scenery and wildlife, click on my screen name for my FR home page.)
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To: MtnClimber

This should be a case that goes all the way to Supreme Court.

The Biden Administration will attempt to impose its radical agenda on this University for a couple of reasons, they can’t let it go and the college is in the state, and should DeSantis win the nomination, a civil rights claim against the university will be used against him in the campaign.


3 posted on 09/12/2023 5:18:52 AM PDT by srmanuel
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To: srmanuel

>This should be a case that goes all the way to Supreme Court.

It probably will, and result in a judgement saying that civil rights lawsuits must actually be about inequalities and not privileged rights.


4 posted on 09/12/2023 5:22:28 AM PDT by struggle
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To: struggle

It would be unthinkable if this isn’t the ultimate outcome of this case, it would be a complete elimination of the 1st Amendment.

If you could be sued by someone for misgendering them, it would setup a massive number of lawsuits getting filed, then ultimately criminal charges for not using the preferred pronouns.

It’s already happening in Canada; Jordan Peterson has been ordered to take a reeducation course on social media posting because of the language he was using otherwise his license to practice gets suspended.


5 posted on 09/12/2023 5:48:23 AM PDT by srmanuel
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To: MtnClimber

I don’t have a dog in this fight, but I’m confused about them wanting to be labeled as disabled. Are brown eyes a disability?


6 posted on 09/12/2023 6:12:58 AM PDT by Babba Gi
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To: MtnClimber; JulieRNR21; Travis McGee; AAABEST; kinganamort; katherineisgreat; floriduh voter; ...
Not surprising that the Deep State and its Gramscian adherents would mount this sort of attack. Lawfare, plain and simple. A favored and much-used tactic.

It will fail.

Florida Freeper

I'm compiling a list of FReepers interested in Florida-related topics.
If you want to be added, please FReepMail me.

7 posted on 09/12/2023 6:15:46 AM PDT by Joe Brower ("Might we not live in a nobler dream than this?" -- John Ruskin)
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To: MtnClimber

Unbelievable BS!


8 posted on 09/12/2023 6:19:49 AM PDT by the OlLine Rebel (Common sense is an uncommon virtue./Federal-run medical care is as good as state-run DMVs.)
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To: MtnClimber

BTW, my pronouns are “her highness”.


9 posted on 09/12/2023 6:21:39 AM PDT by the OlLine Rebel (Common sense is an uncommon virtue./Federal-run medical care is as good as state-run DMVs.)
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To: MtnClimber

my pronouns were assigned by

God


10 posted on 09/12/2023 6:43:24 AM PDT by joshua c (to disrupt the system, we must disrupt our lives, cut the cable tv)
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To: MtnClimber

“pseudo-pronouns”

Oh! I like that. I may use it from now on.


11 posted on 09/12/2023 6:56:11 AM PDT by John Milner (Marching for Peace is like breathing for food.)
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To: MtnClimber

Pray for New College……
…if they’re striving to be, at some level, the Hillsdale College of Florida, more power to them and Praise God

May the new Board stand on their principles!


12 posted on 09/12/2023 6:58:37 AM PDT by Guenevere (“If the foundations are destroyed, what can the righteous do?”)
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To: MtnClimber

When you have the corrupt federal judiciary behind you, you can sue anyone and everything with impunity. Whatever happened to throwing out frivolous and nonsense lawsuits?


13 posted on 09/12/2023 7:47:33 AM PDT by jeffc (Resident of the free State of Florida)
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To: MtnClimber

counter sue.

i am sick of the demon rats.


14 posted on 09/12/2023 12:55:20 PM PDT by Recovering_Democrat
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