LGBT Groups File 1st-Ever Lawsuit Challenging “No Promo Homo” Bans In Public Schools

Utah Among 8 States That Prohibit Positive Speech About LGBT People

For the first time ever, LGBT advocates have filed a lawsuit challenging “no promo homo” laws, which prohibit positive speech about LGBT people in public schools. 

The National Center for Lesbian Rights brought the suit Friday against Utah’s State Board of Education and three local school districts. NCLR alleges the laws violate the U.S. Constitution and state education law by discriminating against LGBT people and restricting the First Amendment rights of students and teachers.

Utah is one of eight states with so-called “No Promo Homo” laws on the books. Some, like Utah’s, prohibit positive speech about LGBT people, while others require schools to portray LGBT people in a negative light. LGBT advocates are hoping the case will set a precedent for the laws to be struck down nationally, according to the Salt Lake Tribune.  

“These are some of the last remaining anti-LGBT laws that are currently being enforced in the country, and they’re especially odious, because they explicitly apply to school classes on every subject,” Equality Utah Executive Director Troy Williams said in a statement. “These laws send a message that our lives are shameful and must be hidden and censored. They create a deadly culture of silence and non-acceptance, causing harms that can never fully be undone. The time has come to end the stigma and strike down this shameful law.”

Utah, of course, is home to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, which last year adopted a policy declaring same-sex couples “apostates” and barring their children from being baptized. The policy led to a rash of suicides among LGBT Mormon youth, according to one advocacy group. 

NCLR is representing Equality Utah and three individual plaintiffs in the case, including a 7-year-old gender nonconforming boy who was forced to leave school after being teased and beaten by other students, who once pulled down his pants to see what type of underwear he wore. Another plaintiff is a gay high school student who’s suffered consistent bullying and was barred from talking about his uncle’s same-sex marriage at school. The third plaintiff is a lesbian high school student who was disciplined for holding hands with a girl and discouraged from asking questions about 

Utah’s “no promo homo” laws prohibits the “advocacy of homosexuality” in public schools and references the state’s unconstitutional ban on same-sex marriage, which is also still on the books. The laws also require schools to teach “abstinence before marriage” and prohibit advocacy of sex outside of marriage. 

“It is long past time for these dangerous laws to be struck from the books,” said NCLR Executive Director Kate Kendall, a Utah native. “The U.S. Supreme Court has held that sexual orientation is ‘a normal expression of human sexuality’ and that LGBT people must be treated equally under the law. These laws openly discriminate against LGBT students and teachers. They stigmatize vulnerable young people who should be celebrated and supported, and they censor constitutionally protected free speech, including students’ right to receive accurate information about sexual orientation and LGBT people.”

Read the full complaint here.