So…. back to Target. I have been reading how they have given over 2.1 million dollars to GLSEN (Gay, Lesbian, and Straight Education Network), which offers students and their school districts guidance on how to hide gender transitions from their parents. But GLSEN also wants to ensure that math is more inclusive of trans and non-binary identities. And look, I don’t mean to toot my own Torricelli’s trumpet, but as an SLP who spent many years helping my students with communication impairments understand the language of math, and a parent helping my kiddo with ASD understand math, I’m uniquely qualified to teach YOUR child math. Don’t worry, I’ve been trained in death. I mean, DYING. I mean, DIE. I mean, DEI.
Here are some samples of my work. You can add them to your curriculum, or divide my curriculum amongst you and your colleagues. I’m really offering you an array of options here, and I think you’ll find them congruent with the your formula for inclusivity. You’ll note that the common denominator in each of my math problems is that I care — not for math, but for inclusivity, and that, my friend, is the primary factor in understanding math. I don’t need to tell you that only a fraction of students really engage with math, and that the probability of success using my gender-affirming operations —math operations that is— is high. You might think my methods are full of irrational numbers, but that doesn’t matter as long as we are all equilateral.
Problem #1: Two gender-nonconforming persons walk into Target. They encounter three birthing persons and one cisgender male. How many meters do they have to walk before they encounter their first PRIDE display?
Problem #2: In 2013, there were 2 genders. In 2023, there were 107 genders. Continuing this trajectory, what will be the number of genders in 2033?
Problem #3: A non-traditional family-like unit, but not a family, attended a PRIDE parade at which 25 drag queens were present. Only 24 of the drag queens performed. How many members were there in the non-traditional family unit? EXTRA CREDIT: Name them and list their pronouns.
One of the truly great things about my more inclusive math curriculum is not simply that the problems it poses make no sense, but more importantly that there are no wrong answers. My math, much like my truth, is completely aligned with how your student feels about zer math skills. For example, if your student feels competent, ze simply assigns zeself a letter grade that represents that feeling. As Lynda Wiest, Professor of Mathematics Education and Educational Equity at the University of Nevada Reno, points out, “one of the setbacks for equality that has been observed in the mathematics field is a perception of objectivity…,” which could lead students to believe there is only one right answer. My math lets students know that these problems have as many right answers as there are genders.
Back to the beginning, though. Target has given money to this cause. I don’t mean to target them though — no pun intended. I wonder how many years these types of organizations have been funded by big companies like Target, and how many companies are doing this. It seems like this PRIDEful month has only just begun and yet every day I hear of a new company putting money toward an ideology based on lies that targets children. Today it was Nike, using one of its PRIDE days to honor Dr. Blair Peters, who proudly tweeted last year that he performs mastectomies on healthy minors. All I can do, I suppose, is do my best to keep this list so that as I move forward I try my best not to financially support them, and I can pray. I can also hope that my favorite places don’t join the list. Don’t let me down, local wineries and breweries. Mama needs to relax. ;-)