Last year, the Oklahoma Department of Health for the first time issued a non-binary gender replacement birth certificate to an Oregon resident who had been born in Oklahoma.
The individual does not identify as male or female and uses they/them as pronouns.
The department initially refused, but reached a settlement after the individual filed a lawsuit.
Needless to say, news of the settlement did not sit well with many in red-state Oklahomans -- especially the governor and Republican lawmakers.
And so this week Gov. Kevin Stitt signed legislation into law making Oklahoma the first state to explicitly ban non-binary gender identification from state birth certificates.
We doubt it will be the last, though. This is exactly the kind of thing lawmakers in neighboring states like Texas can sink their teeth into.
These days it seems people can identify as anything they like and find plenty of support. But there is a lot of opposition, too, from those who question the validity of such claims.
We'll let medical professionals figure that one out. But we doubt there will be any answer that everyone will accept, at least not anytime soon.
So it begs the question: Just how far does a state have to go to accommodate individuals who do not identify with traditional gender or societal roles. Or, to put it another way, does a state have a compelling interest in denying such accommodation?
This will eventually be decided by the courts, of course. It will be interesting to see what the final ruling looks like. And as societal norms and acceptance continue to change, the one after that. And after that.