Oklahoma’s Superintendent of Public Instruction Ryan Walters, left, and Republican state Sen. Tom Woods, right.
‘Ryan Walters, Oklahoma’s superintendent of public instruction, this week called out what he called “radical leftists” for using the Feb. 8 death of non-binary Owasso High School student Nex Benedict to further a political agenda while at the same time claiming that Nex’s death had nothing to do with them having been beaten up by three girls in a school bathroom the day before and denying that anti-LGBTQ policies and laws — like those promoted and enacted by Walters and Oklahoma Gov. Kevin Stitt — encourage an atmosphere of homophobic hate and bullying.
In that same interview with The New York Times, Walters also said, “There’s not multiple genders. There’s two. That’s how God created us.”
Non-binary or transgender people do not exist, he added.
Walters’ claim that Nex did not die as a result of the beating was apparently based on a statement last week by an Owasso Police Department spokesman that an autopsy indicated Nex did not die from the assault. That spokesman has since acknowledged that the autopsy is as yet incomplete and that the medical examiner had not actually said the beating was not the cause of death.
Meanwhile, last Friday, Feb. 23, Oklahoma state Sen. Tom Woods, a Republican, said while commenting on Nex’s death, “I represent a constituency that doesn’t want that filth in Oklahoma.”
Just for the record let me reiterate, the “filth” Woods was referring to was an Indigenous non-binary 16-year-old who, after enduring months of bullying, was beaten up in a school bathroom by three other students and DIED the next day.
A 16-YEAR-OLD CHILD!
Here is a link to some of the anti-LGBTQ policies and laws and actions from Walters and Stitt.
If you would like to register your opinion, you can call Tom Woods’ office at 405-521-5576, Ryan Walters’ office at 405-521-3301, and Kevin Stitt’s office at 405-521-2342. But if you call, please don’t sink to their level of hate; threats of violence are not only unproductive, they are illegal.
— Tammye Nash
