He’s been called the “Billboard Chris” of Rhode Island. And at the rate he’s going, children’s advocate Bob Chiaradio may well turn out to be the Canadian’s counterpart. Like Chris, Chiaradio is on a one-man mission to protect children from radical gender ideology. He’s taking that battle to every school district in the state, all 36 of them.
Chiaradio says he and others have testified on gender indoctrination at the State House numerous times, with little tangible success, due to the 90% Democrat make-up of the Rhode Island General Assembly. “We can’t win from the top down here in Rhode Island,” he explains, “so I’m doing it from the bottom up.”
In December 2022, we covered one of Chiaradio’s early showdowns with his hometown school board in Westerly over the obscene book Gender Queer. Chiaradio was convinced that if only people could see it with their own eyes, they would join his battle to remove the offensive title from the high school library. So he brought full-sized pictures—
only to be blocked off by several teachers teachers in the room who were “offended” because they “didn’t have a choice” about seeing the poster-sized illustrations from the book.
But whether they liked it or not, by the end of the evening, Chiaradio had made his point: Why was it fine for a 14-year-old at Westerly High School to see the book, but not the adults at the meeting?
Chiaradio returned to Westerly earlier this year to convince the board to rethink its gender policies—only this time, he walked away with the whole room on his side. On March 20, the school committee voted unanimously to replace the state’s guidance on transgender students with a new policy tailored to the sensibilities of the Westerly community.
Westerly’s existing transgender protocol tracks the Rhode Island Department of Education (RIDE) guidelines that provide for “secret social transitioning” and allow biological boys to compete in girls’ athletics.
Under Westerly’s rules, as elsewhere throughout the country, once a student tells the school they want to become the opposite sex, the school must develop a “gender transition plan.” The school then assigns the student a new name and pronouns, locker, and restroom facilities—all on the student’s say-so.
And, with secondary school students as young as 14, this can happen without the parents’ knowledge or consent.
Westerly’s policy also allows boys who identify as female to be on girls’ sports teams.
At the March meeting, Chiaradio urged the school board to put aside RIDE’s guidelines. RIDE relies on federal guidance under Title IX, recently revamped by the Biden administration to prioritize transgender rights.
But RIDE’s guidance is not mandatory, Chiaradio is quick to point out. To be clear, that doesn’t mean Westerly won’t be challenged in court. As we covered here, school boards in California and New Jersey have been sued when they defied secret social transitioning policies in their respective states.
Nonetheless, while there was some discussion about how, exactly, the committee would solicit input from the community, there was no disagreement when the time came to vote. School committee member Lori Wycall’s motion to replace the RIDE guidance passed 7-0.
Wycall was optimistic:
I’m confident that we can do something that’s going to ensure the safety of all students in Westerly, that is going to ensure a safe and supportive learning environment, that will keep the parents involved, that will keep everybody safe and that we can do it without some of the specifics that are in the RIDE guide that I don’t think fit with our community.
Westerly was the first school district in the state to reject RIDE’s guidance, and Chiaradio is determined that it won’t be the last. He’s undertaken an ambitious campaign to appear before each of the state’s 36 school districts to convince them to follow Westerly’s lead. So far he’s spoken in six districts, with one more scheduled this week, and two weekly thereafter, through at least September.
Chiaradio’s message to each school board: Do what Westerly is doing. Reject the state’s nonmandatory, radical transgender guidance and replace it with a common-sense version of your own.
From his Jamestown appearance:
[Transcript is auto-generated and cleaned up.]
I am here to inform members of this committee, those in attendance, those watching at home, that you are under no legal obligation whatsoever to comply with rights, transgender policy protocol, or the Obama-Biden administration’s rewrite of Title IX. RIDE’s guidance is just that: it’s guidance, not law….Under this guidance, boys identifying as girls are allowed to utilize the same bathrooms and locker rooms as girls … allowed to compete against girls athletically, and allowed to room with girls on overnight field trips. Teachers are compelled to utilize pronouns as for the student’s sexual identity, and there is no mandate that the school inform parents should their child decide to socially transition in school. This must change.Title IX was adopted in 1972, and it was written to protect women from discrimination. … It was not written to protect men who identify as women.
The Westerly school committee’s proposed revision to its policy … will keep boys out of girls’ bathrooms in locker rooms and the possibility of boys competing against girls athletically, outlaw boys rooming with girls on overnight field trips, and the illegal compelled speech of mandated use of pronouns, and ensure that parents are informed if their child presents to socially transition in school.These proposed changes make sense. These children do not belong to the state or the school. Until they turn 18, they are the sole responsibility of their parents or guardians….No matter how much a boy wants to be a girl, dress like a girl, thinks he’s a girl, or act like a girl, he will never be a girl.
In the months to come, Westerly may prove that you can craft a policy that is sensitive to trans students and supported on both sides. “Once the Westerly school committee decided that RIDE’s guidance and Obama-Biden’s hijacked Title IX policy wasn’t working for Westerly,” says Chiaradio, “we knew we were on our way.”
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