Kindness Shouldn’t Be Controversial

I wrote most of this a couple of years ago after reading an article that left me gutted, enraged, and scared. It was about a teacher who lost her job for reading My Shadow is Purple—a book her students chose. I never shared it, but this type of thing is almost constant. 

Recently in a neighboring district,  a committed, well-qualified, widely respected educator was publicly called out by a religious leader simply for being gay while doing her job exceptionally well. The district continues to support her, but the absurdity of that situation astonishes me–that someone can spend decades consistently showing up, doing the work, and proving their value to educating the students of a community only to be called out publicly for something completely unrelated to that job. It’s invasive, and it’s cruel.

It is scarier to be a gay educator in Texas today than it was when I first wrote this. But it’s also more important than ever that someone says it out loud. So here it is: unfiltered, messy, emotional.

xoarl 

I am gay. I am a teacher. I teach social studies, which, in my opinion, has become especially challenging in Texas in 2025. I'm a fairly liberal thinker and progressive human. But I have never—and would never—“spread my agenda” to my students.

Conservative colleagues know I’m gay, and they also know I’m a good teacher. They know I don’t discuss my personal life with students. Not because I’m ashamed, but because I've witnessed firsthand how easily an educator's professional reputation can be jeopardized by someone else’s opinion or knowledge about who they are. It’s terrifying.

This book? It’s cute. But to me, it’s much more than that. It's a book that could have spared me decades of feeling fundamentally damaged.

If someone had read it to me, I might have realized sooner that it was okay to play with GI Joes and Big Wheels and still be a girl. I might have understood earlier why frilly dresses felt so uncomfortable, and why I wasn’t “boy crazy” like my female cousins—not because I was confused about my gender or identity, but because I was gay and simply didn’t fit the mold of what others expected me to be. I've always known I'm female; I've felt it biologically and emotionally my whole life. Yet, I spent so much of my childhood hating myself because I didn't match the stereotypical image of what everyone said a girl should be.

Eventually, I realized on my own that I liked girls “the way boys liked girls,” and that realization broke me. I thought something was deeply wrong with me. I wanted to die. I fought and struggled with myself and my identity, and twice I came terrifyingly close to ending my life. I've never told anyone that. Never. And there is almost nothing I won't tell everyone.

This book, if I had been allowed to read it, might’ve saved my life.

If a teacher (or any adult) had read it to me—no explanation, no commentary, just reading—it might have shown me I wasn't broken, wrong, or unworthy. It wouldn’t have made me “switch genders” or “turn gay.” It would’ve just made me feel comfortable in my own skin, and it might’ve saved me from decades of pain.

This book does not say:
“There are no genders! Pick one!”
“It’s okay to be gay! Join the LGBTQIA+ club! Welcome!”
“Abandon your God and family and become a gender-confused Satanist!”

It’s simply a sweet children's book—one that might help a kid feel even a tiny bit better about not fitting in exactly like their peers. I think about my childhood self, a voracious reader, and wonder if a book like this could have helped me accept myself sooner, spared me some shame, and taught me to love myself earlier. After years of pain, I finally do love myself. But getting here has been the hardest thing I've ever done, and it’s something I still consciously work at every single day.

Yet now, we’re banning books like that. Books that help kids know it’s okay to simply be who they are. We tell children they can be anything they want—astronauts, soccer players, presidents—but we won’t let them read a book that makes them feel seen. We encourage kids to dream big and be happy in any career path, but when it comes to gender or identity, we panic. We erase. We ban. Even if reading that book, quietly on their own, could literally save their life.

People are leaving education in droves. LGBTQ+ rights—something I rarely speak up about publicly, and that silence fills me with guilt—are increasingly threatened. I'm a gay educator who wants to be here. I keep so much to myself so I won’t "influence" your kids. I don’t push ideology. I was brainwashed by church (and private schools) as a kid, and I’d never do that to someone else—not even with my most progressive beliefs.

What I will always do, as an educator who sees teaching as a calling, is help your kids read thoughtfully, think critically, listen actively, show empathy, be kind to others, and find meaning in every situation they encounter. I have no hidden agenda. I'm not secretly trying to perform transgender surgeries on your children or any of the other baseless claims used to attack educators.

Yet everything about me—my entire life—is under scrutiny, threatened simply because I'm a gay teacher in Texas who dares to love kids and help them feel seen.

Nail polish won’t turn a boy gay. Pants didn’t turn women into lesbians, even though wearing them was once considered scandalous. Today, straight kids wear nail polish, and nobody panics. Nobody’s turning anyone gay,  despite whatever Moms for Liberty (straight women in pants) and others would have you believe. 

As a gay public school teacher in Texas, I often feel like no one’s rooting for me—not the state, not federal lawmakers, not some community members, and definitely not religious groups and leaders. It feels like I’m constantly being watched, judged, and picked apart—like I’m somehow dangerous just for existing. Meanwhile I show up every day and give everything I’ve got to help kids become thoughtful, kind, capable humans. I’m not trying to confuse or influence them—I’m trying to equip them to make the world a better place.

I teach, support, and love my students in a way many others can't-or don't. show up for them with a kind of empathy and intention that comes from my own lived experience. And every day, I try to be the adult for them that wish had.It’s my gift. It’s my calling. I am a teacher, an educator, a mentor—and I also happen to be gay.

Throughout my career and various relationships (lol…i’m doing my best), I’ve never said the word wife or girlfriend at school. When students ask about my “husband” or “boyfriend” (and they do, because they’re observant, curious teenagers who notice whether or not you wear a ring), I say, “I’m here to teach you history and how to be a good human, not talk about my personal relationships.”

I don’t confirm anything. I don’t correct them. I just redirect.

And while it’s true that my job is to teach—not to share personal details—my straight colleagues don’t have to do this dance. They don’t have to filter every answer before they speak. They don’t have to craft their beginning-of-year “get to know me” stories to avoid any details that could out them. They don’t have to wonder if a casual mention of a vacation or a weekend plan might accidentally put their job at risk.

They don’t have to contort their stories to protect themselves. I do. Every day. And that’s not fair.

But I do it. And I’ll keep doing it.
Because my job matters.
Because these kids matter.
Because being safe and seen in school should never be political…for them or me. 

I’m not here to spread an agenda. I'm here to teach kindness. Somebody has to do it, but these days, even teaching kindness feels risky–especially when it comes to who we can offer it to and how much.

And we ban the very books that might have saved someone like me.

That’s not just political. It’s cruel.