A Texas A&M professor was fired after teaching about gender identity in a children's literature course, where they showed the "gender unicorn" infographic. When a student filmed herself objecting that this went "against President Trump's law," it led to removals of administrators and the professor's termination. After Governor Abbott posted "Good. Now fire the professor who acted contrary to Texas law," Harrison shot back, "Not 'good' enough. The President must also be fired."
From Inside Higher Ed:
"I'm not entirely sure this is legal to be teaching, because according to our president, there's only two genders and he said that he would be freezing agencies' funding programs that promote gender ideology," the student told the professor in the video. "And this also very much goes against, not only myself, but a lot of people's religious beliefs, and so I am not going to participate in this because it's not legal, and I don't want to promote something that is against our president's laws as well as against my religious beliefs."
Jonathan Friedman, managing director of free expression programs at PEN America, wrote: "We are witnessing the death of academic freedom in Texas, the remaking of universities as tools of authoritarianism that suppress free thought."
Previously:
• Texas lawmakers considering a ban on 850 books. Here's the full list.
• 'Vulgar' Texas Rangers ball cap pulled from sale
• Texas Sheriff not eager to explain why 70 people have died in his jail
