It’s abundantly clear that the transgender movement yearns to become the new civil rights movement. The Obama administration stepped into an area they should not have this past week. They issued so-called “guidelines” for school districts “directing public schools to allow transgender students to use bathrooms matching their gender identity”.

Obviously, this directive causes much turmoil for school districts and the parents who send their children to them across the nation.

While I don’t believe those who identify as transgender should be harmed or ridiculed in any way, this decree sets a negative precedent. It not only places feelings above biological fact, but it creates an environment of confusion for students as a whole in public school districts.

Take for instance this article from The Daily Mail regarding gender identity in the U.K., and how many more young children are being seen for such an internal dilemma.

The number of children referred to gender identity clinics has doubled in the last year.

Children as young as three were among the 1,419 under-16s who received support during 2015/16.

As someone who believes gender identity issues are a mental health crisis and not a physical deformity requiring surgical or hormonal intervention, this is quite troubling. Furthermore, when there are children as young as three who are confused about their identity, it’s because seeds of doubt have been placed in their minds by adults, many times their own parents.

Simon Calvert, of the Christian Institute think-tank, has said that there was ‘no way’ that three-year-olds were capable of making ‘such a life-changing choice’.

Mr Calvert said: ‘The fact that children as young as three are transitioning gender proves this is to do with adult political ambitions and not with what is best for the children.

‘What we will see in years to come are young adults whose lives have been ruined because their parents and doctors who should have known better told them they needed to transition gender when they were just going through a childhood phase.’

As we know, this isn’t a phenomenon limited to the United Kingdom, and transgender children in the U.S. make headlines. Transgenderism is the topic-of-the-moment in America, and parents with liberal leanings are more than willing to push their children to the opposite gender instead of realizing it is most likely a phase of childhood. This is most detrimental.

The best example I’ve seen that we should let children be children, no matter how much they identify as masculine or feminine, is from blogger Lindsay Leigh Bentley. Her post, I Am Ryland – The Story of a Male-Identifying Little Girl Who Didn’t Transition, talks about her own childhood as a tomboy. She preferred boy clothes, boy haircuts, boy activities, wished to be an actual boy, and shunned all things feminine. Thankfully, her parents let her be who she was as a child, and didn’t seek to make her transition.

…I never considered if some of the things that I enjoyed were “boy” things or “girl” things,  I was just me.  When we begin to tell boys that they must act “this” way, and that girls should act “that” way, and that if they don’t, they are transgender;  we put children in these tiny boxes that create confusion, frustration, and sometimes, lifelong psychological and emotional damage.

I am so thankful that my parents gave me the freedom to act more boyish than my sisters.  I am thankful that they didn’t freak out, or make any life-altering decisions for me.  I am so thankful that, for a season of my life, I was allowed to act more like a stereotypical boy than a girl.  I am also thankful that I was allowed to become more feminine later in life, when it felt natural to do so.

Adults must stop interfering in the lives of children as it relates to their gender identity. Instead of believing certain behavior is a sign that a life-altering transition must be made, let kids be kids. But because too many parents are eager to push them to the extreme, we are growing a generation of confused individuals. And the Obama administration’s decree will only help to spur that on.