Kids have rights, too, and Texas banning school LGBTQ clubs violates them | Opinion

Children are people. They are smaller, developing people, of course, still learning about themselves, their values, their desires and dreams. Then again, so are grown-ups.

As Americans, children are protected by the First Amendment. Kids can make friends with whom they want, and those friends can start groups so long as those groups do not discriminate against others.

Texas Republican lawmakers would do well to familiarize themselves with the First Amendment, now that they’ve passed a bill that fundamentally undoes its purpose for the people who need it most. It bans school-sponsored LGBTQ pride clubs, further targeting a small group of kids for the non-crime of formally associating with the people they want and expressing the ideas they have.

This new restriction of LGBT clubs was included in “Parent Bill of Rights” legislation barring diversity, equity and inclusion programming in public schools. That’s no surprise. Restricting what children can learn about themselves and people who are different from them is a broad ideological project.

However, the anti-club clause goes a step further because it goes beyond what’s printed in a textbook or even purchased for a library by codifying what children, by their own volition, pursue in their schools. Gov. Greg Abbott is likely to sign the bill into law, triggering expensive legal battles that the state is likely to lose.

Republicans defended their pride-club ban as an inherent sexualization of children. Rep. Jeff Leach of Plano erroneously referred to them as “sex clubs” before claiming he “misspoke.” Even if Leach and his allies were right, the retort also imagines that teen boys and girls who like the opposite sex don’t succumb to hormones when sharing close spaces. The premise is laughable on its own merits. Football players, you may have heard, date cheerleaders. Why? Because straight kids are also people.

Subversions of the First Amendment are often undone by their hypocrisy. Texas Democrats like Fort Worth Rep. Nicole Collier pointed out the other kinds of student groups — namely, religious clubs — who won’t be subject to the same scrutiny, a “double standard that flies in the face of the principles you say you support.”

And that’s why the provision on student clubs is surely doomed. Because no matter how ashamed lawmakers are of their youngest constituents, no amount of rank discrimination will completely stop our children from showing pride in themselves.

This story was originally published June 4, 2025 at 10:26 AM.