Teachers, parents say kids should learn about racism. Sexuality much more divisive.

Activists have engaged in fierce debates in recent years over what kids should learn about race, sexual orientation and gender identity.

A new report from the Pew Research Center shows that while the majority of teachers, students and parents believe it's important to discuss racism in school, their opinions on other "culture war" subjects are mixed. Namely, there's a great divide over whether LGBTQ-related discussions have a place in the classroom.

Half of teachers, for example, say students should not learn about gender identity in school, including nearly 2 in 3 elementary educators. Teens are also split about whether such discussions should take place in the classroom: About a third say the topic makes them uncomfortable.

While "culture war" topics are "lumped together" in national conversations, teachers, students and other Americans tend to see these issues as separate, said Juliana Horowitz, associate director of research at Pew.

Most teachers and members of the general public said parents should not be able to opt their kids out of race-related lessons even if that instruction conflicts with a family's viewpoint, Horowitz noted. But on lessons about sexual orientation or gender identity, roughly half of teachers and most Americans as a whole said parents should have opt-out rights.

As policymakers from both parties push for and pass legislation that dictates whether or how schools can teach about controversial topics, these findings indicate that public opinion on certain threads of that instruction remains very mixed. It also highlights that broad laws that restrict an array of topics can undermine learning.

One relatively common belief among participants, including those who are right- and left-leaning, was that the government has too much influence over curriculum and that the "culture wars" are harming teachers’ ability to do their jobs. Most teachers say that regardless of what the pundits may say, LGBTQ-related discussions seldom, if ever, come up in the classroom.

The surveys were conducted last fall among roughly 9,000 people, including about 5,000 members of the general public, 2,500 public school teachers and 1,500 teens.

Do 'culture war' conversations cause discomfort?

A minority of the teens surveyed in the Pew sample said they are comfortable discussing these controversial themes in school. Just 38% expressed comfort with instruction about racism or racial inequality, and an even smaller portion – 29% – said they're fine with discussions related to sexual orientation and gender identity.

Teachers were mixed about whether conversations about LGBTQ+ people have a place in the classroom. About half said kids shouldn’t learn about gender identity in school; the other half said they should.

Among people who supported instruction about gender identity, teachers were twice as likely to say that instruction should acknowledge gender fluidity rather than emphasizing that a person's gender is determined by the sex assigned at birth. About a third of teachers said educators should teach that a person's gender “can be different from the sex they were assigned at birth.” Another 14% of teachers said they should teach that gender is fixed.

Parents are almost evenly split on this topic of instruction, according to past Pew research. In a 2022 Pew survey, 37% said students should not learn about gender identity in school. There were also 31% who said children should learn that gender can be different from sex at birth. And another 31% said children should learn that gender is determined by sex at birth.

Tiffany Justice, co-founder of the parental rights group Moms for Liberty, said she was concerned that the “hyperfocus” on sexualizing instruction across grade levels was happening at the expense of math and literacy education. “Kids do not need a sexual spirit guide in the classroom,” she said. “They don’t need to know the sexual orientation of their teacher.”

Justice believes that teaching about racism in an accurate and age-appropriate way is far more pertinent than teaching about sexuality.

Ginny Gentles, director of the Independent Women's Forum’s Education Freedom Center, shared that perspective. She highlighted nuances within LGBTQ-related instruction. It’s one thing to teach about same-sex relationships, she said, and another to explain that gender identity isn’t necessarily “aligned with biological reality.”

Kids “are inundated with alternative identities … bombarded with that culture,” she said. “It could be that they’ve had enough.”

One notable finding in the Pew study is how divided teens are – even more than teachers – in their stances on LGBTQ-related education. Close to half said they shouldn’t learn about gender identity in school. A quarter said they would rather learn that gender and sex at birth can be different, and 26% said they would rather learn that sex at birth determines gender.

“Teens are a lot more comfortable when topics related to racism or racial inequality come up” than when gender identity is discussed, Pew’s Horowitz said. “It may not even necessarily be a discomfort with the topic but perhaps it's a discomfort with the topic in the context of the classroom.”

LGBTQ+ advocates: Legislative trends hurt young people's mental health 

Casey Pick, director of law and policy at the Trevor Project, which focuses on suicide prevention for LGBTQ+ young people, said research shows the lack of inclusive classrooms in certain communities correlates with higher rates of youth suicide. Inclusion can mean offering lesson plans about the historic contributions of LGBTQ+ people or training that shows teachers how to be allies to queer youth and better respond to bullying.

Pick said she isn’t surprised “that public opinion is divided and that many people feel confused or conflicted on the topic.”

“In recent years we’ve seen a resurgence of legislation that would silence this kind of discussion," she said. "What this (trend) does is it capitalizes on the well-intentioned desire of parents to protect their children.”

Rae Sweet, a senior education coordinator with the It Gets Better Project, aimed at supporting LGBTQ+ young people, worries the legislative trend toward restricting teachers and the hatred it fuels may help explain the death earlier this month of a gender-expansive student in Oklahoma.

Nex Benedict died after being injured in a fight at school. Benedict's school district had been targeted by Chaya Raichik, a prominent conservative behind the social media account Libs of TikTok, who was recently appointed to a state library advisory committee.

“What would’ve happened if these schools were teaching acceptance?” Sweet said. Sweet said they’ve observed educators going “underground” in their allyship amid growing pressures to remove these lessons from their teaching.

Jeremy T., a high school student in the Houston area, said he has witnessed resources and supportive imagery being removed from his campus as the "culture wars" have exploded in his state. Pride flags have been banned, and the school library's shelves are largely empty as books go under review en masse over concerns about their coverage of topics such as LGBTQ+ issues.

Jeremy, who asked that his last name be concealed over fear of backlash at school, said his peers regularly make jokes and bullying remarks about queer people. He's surprised that the percentage of teens who said they'd rather not learn about gender identity in class isn't higher.

"It's a misconception from both the right and left, overestimating how progressive young people are," the senior said. "We aren't going backwards – we are (already) in the negative."

Divided opinions harm learning, separate report shows

A separate new report out of the University of Southern California, the largest and most detailed survey of its kind, found that partisan divides continue to determine perspectives on curriculum issues. Those divides were especially predictive of opinions on sexuality and gender identity, the study found.

Still, there are nuances. Fewer Democrats supported transgender inclusion in the curriculum compared with support for inclusion of other "culture war" topics and LGBTQ+ issues. For example, fewer than 2 in 3 supported using a student's chosen pronouns without asking the person's parents or discussing whether students ought to play on sports teams that match their gender identity.

“The trans issues and gender identity issues are by far the most fraught,” said Morgan Polikoff, an associate professor of education who co-wrote the University of Southern California report. “There is a very real and important discussion to be had about what is age-appropriate with regard to these topics. … It’s not that we should definitely do all of these things or shouldn’t do any of them.”

The intense partisan disagreement on LGBTQ+ issues may help explain why so many teachers want such discussions to stay out of their classrooms.

Of the teachers in the Pew survey, 41% said these debates had a harmful effect on their jobs. Just a sliver said the impact was positive. The remainder of the educators were neutral.

“Teachers are feeling like this conversation and these decisions are being made without them and without their guidance and without their involvement,” said Horowitz, from the Pew study. “We do see party divides, but when it comes to how much influence teachers have, similar shares of Democratic and Republican teachers say teachers don't have enough influence."

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Teachers, parents say racism is valid topic. Sexuality more divisive.