In his 1789 work An Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation, Jeremy Bentham gives a definition for ethical behavior.
Ethics at large may be defined as the art of directing men’s actions to the production of the greatest possible quantity of happiness for those whose interests are in view.
Bentham’s thinking later became known as utilitarianism. Given two possible courses of action, the one that provides the greatest benefit to the greatest number of people is the one that is moral.
Against this backdrop we see the results of the opt-out movement. Recall this movement came about when MCPS engaged in coercive overreach by eliminating the ability to opt-out of LGBT studies. That decision set off a storm of protests and eventually a successful Supreme Court decision to reinstate the opt-out. (This blog has followed and supported the opt-out effort since its inception.)
Here we are, shortly into the 2025–2026 school year, and MCPS reports that only 43 students have exercised opt-out. Something is not adding up.
The number of protesters during the 2023 rallies was far larger than what would represent 43 students. Given that attendance at protests often reflects a larger sentiment, we would expect that far more than 43 students exercise opt-out. We are left with four possibilities:
- Interested parents/students are not aware of the opt-out being reinstated.
- MCPS is misstating the number, and more have opted out.
- Interested students migrated to private schools or away from Montgomery County.
- Only 43 students are indeed interested in opting out.
Even if ten times the students (430) opt out, we are talking about only 0.3% of the student body. All that effort for the benefit of 43, or 430, students.
The fight against oppressive government is always just, and the opt-out movement did us all a favor. Nevertheless, given these disappointing results, we now know that the effort to limit MCPS’s and the teachers’ union’s coercion would have been better applied to other objectives. The Mecca Business Learning Institute has a known constituency of 200 elementary school students (and another 900 on a waiting list), and they are continuously harassed by MCPS. There is an unknown number of families that are desperately looking for school choice and school vouchers. Montgomery County’s entire taxpayer base is subjected to colonialist resource extraction by MCPS. Had the opt-out movement applied its remarkable energies to these wider goals, far more than 43 students would have been rewarded. Jeremy Bentham would certainly agree.
