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A conservative legal watchdog group has filed a lawsuit against the University of California system for allegedly requiring the use of “preferred pronouns.”
“’Preferred pronoun policies’ subject students to formal discipline for referring to other students according to the pronouns that are consistent with their biological sex rather than their gender identity,” states the lawsuit, filed by Defending Education.
“Under these types of policies, a student who uses ‘he’ or ‘him’ when referring to a biological male who identifies as a female will be punished for ‘misgendering’ that student.”
A statement provided to The College Fix from the University of California that said the system “is committed to fostering an environment that is welcoming to all while respecting freedom of speech and expression.”
The 65-page civil rights complaint, filed June 18 in federal court, alleges University of California system policies violate the First Amendment by compelling speech and through viewpoint discrimination.
Sarah Parshall Perry, Defending Education’s senior legal counsel, said in a statement to The College Fix that the system’s policies run afoul of the Constitution.
“Universities may appropriately prohibit true harassment, such as targeted, severe, and pervasive conduct that interferes with a student’s education, consistent with Supreme Court standards,” Perry said, citing Davis v. Monroe County Board of Education as a legal precedent.
“However, they cross the line when they weaponize vague harassment policies to regulate viewpoints on matters of public concern, such as biological sex and gender identity,” Perry said.
The lawsuit flags UC’s Sexual Harassment, Anti-Discrimination, Prevention and Education training, noting it states that “[i]ntentionally calling someone their name used before transition, as opposed to their lived name, is called dead-naming, and may be a form of sexual harassment.”
UC’s anti-discrimination policy prohibits harassment that creates a “hostile environment,” citing protected categories of “gender, gender identity, gender expression, gender transition, [and] sexual orientation.” Under this policy, harassment may occur when someone’s preferred pronoun is not used.
Perry said that labeling any sort of dissenting speech, specifically, “biologically accurate pronouns or expressions of disagreement with gender ideology,” does not cross the line into “harassment,” but rather penalizes students for exercising their First Amendment rights.
The UC statement to The College Fix stated that the Sexual Violence and Sexual Harassment Policy and Anti-Discrimination Policy were “developed in alignment with federal and state law.”
“The purpose of these policies is to protect members of the University community from discrimination and harassment, not to regulate protected speech. Both policies explicitly provide that they will be implemented in a manner that recognizes the importance of rights to freedom of speech and expression,” according to the statement.
The lawsuit cites a mandatory training at UC Diego that teaches students that disagreeing with transgender ideology creates a “hostile environment.”
As The College Fix previously reported, screenshots from it illustrate the training teaches students that refusing to call a transgender student by their preferred name is “prohibited conduct” referred to as “dead-naming.”
One of the plaintiffs, named only as “Student B” in the complaint, attends UC San Diego “refrains from using pronouns and avoids conversations involving sex and gender in public because of UC’s policies,” it states.
“When he is called on in class, he feels like he has no choice except to tell professors what they want to hear and phrase his answers as narrowly as possible, because he knows that openly expressing his convictions can lead to disciplinary action,” the lawsuit adds. “Student B is often asked about his pronouns in campus-related programs, and he refrains from answering and hopes no one notices. He never states his true view that gender cannot change.”
The SHAPE training was also flagged last fall by the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression as a free speech violation, the Daily Bruin reported.
Defending Education was started in April 2021, and states on its website it is a “national grassroots organization working to restore schools at all levels from activists imposing harmful agendas.”
“Speech codes like those in UC’s SVSH policy impose vague, overbroad, content- and often viewpoint-based restrictions on speech. And, as the Supreme Court has routinely confirmed, they are unconstitutional,” the group said in a news release about its lawsuit.
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