The Franklin Reporter & Advocate Eight Villages, One Community
A DeMott Lane resident is once again causing controversy with a sign placed on his front yard.
The sign pictures a small boy under the large text: “Boys have a penis. Girls have a vagina.”
The sign also quotes from the Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young song, “Teach Your Children,” and has a QR Code that leads to a version of the song on YouTube.
This is not the first time the homeowner, Robert Kashinsky, has stirred up emotions with a sign. During the last presidential election cycle, Kashinsky posted a sign that said, “F**k Biden,” and later, when former Pres. Joe Biden ended his re-election bid and Vice-President Kamala Harris stepped in his place, he changed the sign to hold Harris’ name.
While legislators generally ignored the election cycle sign – until it was set on fire – this sign has drawn a response from them.
State Assemblyman Joe Danielsen, Mayor Phil Kramer and Township Councilmember Ed Potosnak contributed to buy “Hate has no home here” signs, which several residents in the area are displaying on their lawns.
The reason for the signs, they said, is their belief that the Kashinsky sign targets transgender people.
Potosnak, who is Franklin’s first openly gay elected official, said the trio discussed what step they could take to show transgendered people that “we’ve got your back, we support you, we love you and we’re going to stand up together to show that Franklin is an inclusive community.”
The three decided to chip in, and Kramer designed and ordered the signs, Potosnak said.
The Councilmember said that he believes the sign is hateful because, “when I look at that sign I think back to Middle School biology. That is not biologically accurate. There are quite a few people, in the 4-8 million range worldwide, that don’t have a binary sex. They’re born with multiple genitalia, or none. And doctors make the determination of what they consider biological sex.”
“That sign is basically trying to erase those individuals,” he said.
“Furthermore, it’s clear that the trump administration and members of the MAGA Republican party have targeted transgender people in the policies,” Potosnak said. “They don’t want you to exist.”
“The sign is along that same rhetoric,” he said. “It’s meant to divide, it’s meant to dehumanize, it’s meant to make a statement about who belongs and who doesn’t belong. Because that sign is not inclusive of folks who are not born male or female, or who have made the decision to transfer from one physical gender to another. That sign is hate. I’m not on that sign, as a gay person, but it wouldn’t surprise me if another iteration targeted me.”
Danielsen said in an email that his reason for participating in the effort was to “provide a higher / more important message of love, respect and tolerance in Franklin Township.”
“There are many people who are worried about a lot of issues,” Danielsen wrote. “To the core of their discomfort are negative messages and harmful rhetoric from sources near and far. Simply put – Hate Has No Home Here.”
Kramer said the signs were necessary because “a segment of our population had politically been singled out.”
“We wanted them to know many of us care about them,” Kramer said in an email. “At the last Township Council meeting, I initiated a reciting of the ‘Pledge to Stand for the Other.’ I’m just living up to the pledge.”
Kashinsky said the sign is being misinterpreted.
“Every single American citizen is entitled to their own opinion,” he wrote in an email. “This is not my opinion. It is a line from a popular movie. A movie showing simply what the concept of what gender is.”
“Science simply states this fact,” he wrote. “Science is not hate. I have no hate for a single being. Including those who may be different than myself. They are entitled to their opinion, I am entitled to mine. Remember the band says, teach your children well.”
Stay ‘In the Know,’ subscribe to the Franklin Reporter & Advocate!
No other media outlet covering Franklin Township brings you the depth of information presented by the Franklin Reporter & Advocate. Period. We are the only truly independent media serving the Eight Villages.
But we can only do that with your support. Please consider a yearly subscription to our online news site; at $37 a year, it’s one of the best investments you can make for yourself.
To subscribe, please click here.
