Parents Who Try to Have Gay Book Banned Fail

The US Supreme Court has declined to hear a case involving the use of a gay-themed book by a Lexington, Massachusetts public school.
Two sets of parents were appealing the dismissal of the case by a federal appeals court in Boston in January.
The Supreme Court, as is its custom, did not specify why it would not hear the case. The decision allows the lower court ruling to stand.
A teacher read the book King and King to second-graders at the Estabrook elementary school in April 2006 as part of a lesson about weddings.
Following the reading, the teacher noted that same-sex marriage is legal in Massachusetts, and that some children have two mommies and others have two daddies.
King and King is aimed at elementary school children and helps teach diversity. The book, by Linda De Haan and Stern Nijland,tells the story of Prince Bertie who searches for love through a bevy of eligible princesses before falling for Prince Lee.
Parents David and Tonia Parker, and Joseph and Robin Wirthlin, said the school was attempting to indoctrinate their children about an "immoral lifestyle."
The lawsuit said that school officials bypassed their parental rights to raise their children how they wish and in doing so violated their civil rights.
After the book was read to students, Robin Wirthlin complained to the school board that her seven-year-old son should not be exposed to discussions of such at such an early age.
School superintendent Paul Ash said that Lexington schools are committed to "teaching children about the world they live in."
Not satisfied the Wirthlins and the Parkers decided to sue.
Last year U.S. District Judge Mark Wolf ruled that federal courts have decided in other cases that the constitutional right of parents to raise their children does not include the right to restrict what a public school may teach them.
In January a three-judge appeals court panel upheld the ruling.
"Public schools are not obliged to shield individual students from ideas which potentially are religiously offensive, particularly when the school imposes no requirement that the student agree with or affirm those ideas, or even participate in discussions about them," Judge Sandra Lynch wrote in the unanimous decision.
Lynch also said that the parents who brought the suit have no constitutional "right to be free from any reference in public elementary schools to the existence of families in which parents are of different gender combinations."