Trish Bryignless is a senior at Wahah’e High School, who grew up traditionally Christian. Bryignless filed a complaint on Jan. 12 with the administration over a failing grade she received on an assignment from Ms. Quinn Carter, a 15-year veteran. She also publicly bashed the teacher online and called her a “bigoted snowflake” and “the result of a radical woke mob.”
Bryignless claims that she was “wrongfully discriminated against” after receiving a zero on an assignment that included her personal religious beliefs. The essay included multiple comments about homosexual communities, calling them “demonic” and “perverted.”
“She failed me just because I said I don’t agree with homosexuality,” Bryignless states. “This is just the sad state of being a Christian in America nowadays, these homo leftists just hate God and Jesus and all want Satan to reign.”
Ms. Carter is an openly transgender woman. Although the school board stated that Carter’s curriculum does not include any forced coercion toward a particular belief, Bryignless maintains that this was an act of political and religious discrimination.
Because of the controversy, the administration first dismissed Carter from teaching. But the decision was promptly appealed after testimony from other teachers and students vouched for Carter’s innocence. Carter returned to her teaching position, and Bryignless was moved to a different class.
“After Quinn was fired, we all came together to say ‘Hey, she’s a wonderfully intelligent and professional teacher,’” Ms. Bridgette Murphy—another teacher at Wahah’e high school—states.
Murphy was one of the teachers who vouched for Carter during the appeal.
“Quinn is transgender, sure, but she never pushes her beliefs on students, you know?” Murphy explains. “This student is just angry because she was given a zero, but it was all based on the rubric and criteria. There are ways to include your personal beliefs and argue for them in an academically appropriate way. This student just didn’t do that.”
However, all of this has been the recent highlight of an overarching political discussion about the role of diversity vs religious beliefs in schools. Bryignless has since appeared on multiple right-wing talk shows and podcasts advocating for “stopping the oppression of Christians.”
“As teachers, we get dozens of students every year complaining about scores they were given, and it doesn’t make national news headlines,” Murphy argues. “It’s only because it includes Christian beliefs that it is suddenly a crime to give her a low score, no matter the basic rubric given.”
Turning Point USA did multiple segments about the situation, strongly advocating for Bryignless’s side. The whole situation has even led to strong online harassment of Carter, even going so far as to dox her, call her slurs, and threaten her life.
Carter was very hesitant to make any statements, worried for her own safety.
“It’s crazy to me how much this all got blown so out of proportion,” Carter expresses. “I have no ill intent towards the Christian community and no wish for them to be silenced. The score was purely based on the rubric and was more a comment on her lack of grammar and proper citations.”
Overall, the controversy continues to spark intense debate politically, with the looming question about the separation of church and state—
“Have you even seen the essay?” Murphy exclaims. “You can’t end on that! You’re not telling the full story!”
Why are we breaking a fourth wall here—
“It is frustrating to me when I read articles like this and discussion posts from my classmates of so many people trying to conform to the mundane opinion, so they do not step on people’s toes. I think that is a cowardly and insincere way to live—” to “—God says that it is not food for man to be alone, so He created a helper for man (which is a woman).”
Excerpt from Samantha Fulnecky’s essay from the University of Oklahoma.
…
I am now gonna write my news article like this, and if I get a bad score on this assignment, then my instructor is discriminating against me. Who needs grammar? Who needs proper Capitalization? Who needs sources besides my own opinion! Not academic writing ofc! Citation? ME.
Bryignless states that the grade has nothing to do with her lack of academic formatting, research, nor proper perspective. It’s just because she’s Christian.
She doesn’t believe in homosexuality—nor grammar, capitalization, formatting, citations, or research I suppose. But you can’t get mad at her or else you are a bigot against all Christians.
After much hesitation, Carter reveals one last bit of context about why she gave Bryignless a failing grade:
“I am a science teacher…” Carter states. “The assignment was about homoSAPIENS.”
…
What a bigoted leftist zealot.
