Free Republic

In the summer of 2018, a transgender student at West Point High School in West Point, Va., had transitioned, asking his French teacher to refer to him with masculine pronouns: he, him, his. But the instructor, Peter Vlaming, did not comply, he said in a lawsuit. Citing his religious beliefs, he promised to use only the student’s name and avoid pronouns entirely. Administrators eventually gave the teacher an ultimatum: Use the student’s correct pronouns, or face disciplinary action, he said. Then, on Oct. 31, 2018, his second-year French students wore virtual-reality goggles and walked around the classroom. The transgender student...

A Virginia high school teacher was fired Thursday for refusing to use a transgender student’s new pronouns, a case believed to be the first of its kind in the state. After a four-hour hearing, the West Point School Board voted 5-0 to terminate Peter Vlaming, a French teacher at West Point High School who resisted administrators’ orders to use male pronouns to refer to a ninth-grade student who had undergone a gender transition. The board met in closed session for nearly an hour before the vote. Like a similar transgender rights case in nearby Gloucester County that eventually reached the...