The Thing About That Alabama Law

 For about a week, I've been surveying my home state of Alabama and this new law....prohibiting gender surgical procedures for folks under 18, and prohibiting puberty blockers/hormones for folks under 18.  Naturally, it's to be challenged.

Also contained is wording for teachers to refrain from gender identities chatter or sexual orientation in schools.

So I've sat and pondered over the matter.  Having spent the late 1960s and most of the 1970s in the Alabama school system....I can assess some things.

First, by the time I reached the 10th grade....I'd come to realize that about fifty percent of the teachers of the time (some just out of college in the past five years) were incompetent and not capable of meeting the basic requirements.  

I'm not calling them stupid...just that they were unprepared to be instructors, and in some cases.....were themselves (after four years of college) not prepared for the profession or the landscape.  

If you asked me if anything had changed since the late 1970s?   I doubt it.  Half of them are probably still incompetent, and these are the idiots who'd want to 'gift' you their vast knowledge on gender identities or orientation.

Second, if all of this 'rights' business makes sense....why can't the 13-year old kid get the right to marriage?  Seriously.....if you were bending over so much to give so much 'entitlement' to these poor kids.....if they wanted to marry up with some 25-year old guy, or some forty-five year old gal....wouldn't that right fall into play as well?

Third, I just get this impression.....any minute now....these mature kids (age 13 or 14) would be asking for a driver's license or just state the obvious that they are smart enough to wrap up the 9th grade and go out seeking a job.  

Fourth, all this begs the question....are there really that many confused kids out there?  I mean....in the whole state....are we talking about 6,000 kids fitting this profile?  Or are we talking about sixty kids who seem confused?  

Fifth, is it possible that we might drag this into a 200,000 man-hour mess state-wide....where confusion starts up over gender identity, and each week....some kids wake up....confused about being X, but waking up the next week and being confused about being Y....then repeating this every other week.  Would we be spending more time (in the end) talking about this....than actual class material?

Sixth and final.....isn't this all leading to some bully-versus-bully school fight, with adults in the middle?