A chemistry teacher at a Texas high school has been placed on leave for cross-dressing at school, apparently as part of his stated desire to “be an out role model in a professional setting.”
Last week, Libs of TikTok publicized several photographs and a video clip of Hebron High School teacher Rachmad Tjachyadi wearing dresses, a costume of female villain Ursula from Disney’s The Little Mermaid, and wearing a tutu in a classroom.
This week, the Christian Post reports that following public circulation of the images, Lewisville Independent School District announced it was “aware of the video and the staff member has been placed on administrative leave while the district reviews the situation, which is standard procedure. It would be natural for our families to have questions about this situation, but because this is a personnel matter currently under review, there is no additional information the district can share.”
Texas Republican Gov. Greg Abbott weighed in, calling the incident an example of the need for school choice.
The Post compiled several items from the teacher’s social media history offering a window into his activism, including an active role in the school’s Gay-Straight Alliance (GSA), for which in 2022 he put out a call for “someone who can teach my GSA Baby Gays how to VOGUE properly!! The GSA kiddos want to present voguing during a cultural festival at our school in a few weeks.” (“Voguing” is defined as “to strike poses in campy imitation of fashion models especially as a kind of dance” and in recent years has been claimed as a form of “LGBT expression.”)
He was also part of the Forward Slash Project, a so-called “queer archive” for “knowledge disruption that opens pedagogical space for queerness as an ideality that can be used to re/imagine and re/think futurity.” He has a biography on the project’s website (which has since been made private) that states his intentions to “utilize dress-up days at his schools to show off his feminine side in the education settings,” with his “”goal as an educator” being “not only to educate the students in science but also to be an out role model in a professional setting.”
The indoctrination of children with left-wing indoctrination on sexuality and other left-wing agenda items has long been a major concern in American public schools, from libraries to athletic and restroom policy to drag events to classroom materials to even “transitioning” troubled children without parental input. The influential American Library Association, currently helmed by a self-described “Marxist lesbian,” opposes denying children access to age-inappropriate materials.
Drag in particular has emerged as one of LGBT activists’ favored tools for exposing and acclimating children to the concepts of gender fluidity and sexual experimentation, via “family-friendly” drag shows at schools and community events or Drag Queen Story Hour (DQSH) events in which crossdressers read books to children, often at public libraries.
In recent years, these issues have helped fuel a parent backlash that has been credited with Republican gains in states like Florida and Virginia, whose current respective governors have taken leading roles in fighting back.