You really have to love the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in California.

Honestly, if their decisions weren't so tragic, they'd make great comedic material.

There are some pretty enraged parents of elementary students in the Palmdale School District in California.

See, the three-judge panel on the 9th Circuit ruled against the parents with regard to what the school district was asking their children about sex.

The judges rejected the parents' claim that they should have a right to control when and where their kids are taught about sex.

Circuit Judge Stephen Reinhardt wrote "no such specific right can be found in the deep roots of the nation's history and tradition or implied in the concept of ordered liberty."

In other words, the school can say what it wants about sex and you as parents, well, you just have no rights.

Here's what happened.

The school obtained permission from the parents to conduct a survey of its students.

The survey was described as being used to "identify internal behaviors such as anxiety, depression and external behaviors such as aggression and verbal abuse."

This was part of a "district-wide intervention program to help children reduce barriers to learning."

OK, I probably would have signed off on that. Of course, the specific questions weren't listed on the permission request.

The parents found out about those later after kids came home and started talking about the survey.

Now remember, these are kids ages 7 to 10 that are being surveyed by the school.

There were 54 questions on the survey, many of which were fairly innocuous.

However, it was questions like the following that riled the parents.

Kids were asked to rate the following activities according to how often they experienced the thought or emotion:

• 'Touching my private parts too much.'

• 'Thinking about having sex.'

• 'Thinking about touching other people's private parts.'

• 'Thinking about sex when I don't want to.'

• 'Washing myself because I feel dirty on the inside.'

• 'Not trusting people because they might want sex.'

• 'Getting scared or upset when I think about sex.'

• 'Having sex feelings in my body.'

• 'Can't stop thinking about sex.'

• 'Getting upset when people talk about sex.'

Now, I'm going to go out on a limb here and assume that most 7-year-olds probably would not be ready emotionally or intellectually to respond to those types of questions.

And if there was any debate as to the child's level of readiness, one would think that perhaps a parent might be consulted.

But no.

The court ruled parents have "no fundamental right ... to be the exclusive provider of information regarding sexual matters to their children, either independent of their right to direct the upbringing and education of their children or encompassed by it."

Neither did the parents have any "due process or privacy right to override the determinations of public schools as to the information to which their children will be exposed while enrolled as students."

The judges noted that they weren't really ruling on the appropriateness of the questions, but on whether parents have any say in what a school tells its kids about sex.

"We note at the outset that it is not our role to rule on the wisdom of the School District's actions. ... The question before us is simply whether the parents have a constitutional right to exclusive control over the introduction and flow of sexual information to their children."

So basically, the court's saying that in the absence of a fundamental, constitutional right, the only thing the school had to show was that there was a "legitimate state interest" to pass judicial scrutiny.

The court believed that "protecting the mental health of students and improving their ability to learn was a legitimate goal and it was not unreasonable for the district to think administering the survey would promote it."

So we are told the state knows best - even when it comes to asking 7-year-olds if they can't stop thinking about sex or wash themselves because they feel dirty on the inside.

With our culture becoming more and more sexually oriented, parents need all the help they can get guiding their kids down the path to puberty and beyond.

This panel of judges just placed a significant hurdle in that path. Parents have no rights with regard to what the school tells their kids about sex.

No wonder the chorus for voucher programs is growing louder.

No wonder private school enrollments are rising. [[In-content Ad]]