There's a petition currently circulating in my great home state of Florida to ask our lovely Governor Rick Scott to veto a bill proposing to let transgender people use the bathroom of their gender. I was going to reluctantly link the petition, featured on Change.org, to this article, but it appears to have been recently removed. Imagine my disappointment.

That being said, I want to address the claim made by this petition, and many others nationwide in the past few years: protecting our children. One petition from May of this year argues furthermore that Obama's actions forcing schools to comply to the new bathroom law "puts [children's] safety at risk."

Since right-wing extremists and religious zealots are so concerned with the safety of American children, here's a list of other things we can work on while we attempt to control what bathroom people use.

1. Step into the Spotlight

I don't know how many of you watched the Academy Award-nominated film "Spotlight" (if you haven't, I highly recommend it) but it essentially explores the complicated systems that have absolved Catholic priests from imprisonment when preying sexually upon young children. The film is set in early-2000s Boston, but this is an epidemic across the country and across the world.

The Vatican released information in 2014 which showed that over 3200 priests were sanctioned or defrocked due to sexual abuse of minors since 2004. That's just a 10-year span, of the incidents we know about, from the institution itself. Let that sink in for a moment. If 3200 priests were reprimanded by the Vatican, how many do you think have, for one reason or another, gotten away with raping children? Seems to me there are more dangerous people than the 8-year-old trans girl who wants to use the girl's bathroom.

2. Practice makes perfect

While we're at it, how abut we put the magnifying glass on a group that has repeatedly harmed children time and time again: Republican politicians. With DOMA author and former Speaker of the US House of Representatives Dennis Hastert convicted of molesting countless young boys, the list only continues to grow of GOP members being found guilty of sexual child abuse.

The Democratic Underground has a list spanning from 2007-2010 of hundreds of Republicans found guilty of child molestation. Hundreds. In just three years. If there was a single group that should be "profiled" to protect children from sexual abuse, it is the white, older, male, Republican politician.

3. Don't drink the water

Let's switch gears a little bit now and talk about other kinds of child endangerment. For example, this photo above is of a Flint, Michigan resident's baby bottles filled with water.

I know you've heard about the lead crisis in Flint and how dangerous it is. But have you heard that it's still not resolved? Or that parents have had to pull their children out of school because the lead has permanently damaged their cognitive function?

And this isn't just Flint; lead-poisoned water is an issue across this country, due to a crumbling infrastructure of pipes that have not been replaced in four decades. Before we worry about our children when they're letting stuff come out, let's make sure we're putting the right stuff in. Ya know, like maybe not poison.

4. Literally Eat Better

I don't even need to put a picture for this one, because there's too much to say.

Our government subsidizes farmers (if you can even call them that anymore because Monsanto controls almost all American agriculture) to overproduce corn and soy, which makes corn and soy cheaper, which makes corn and soy-based products cheaper. Corn's most popular derivative: corn syrup, which is in nearly every processed food. That's why you can buy a two liter soda for less than you can a two liter water. That's why a family of four can eat at McDonald's for $20.

The flip-side is that healthy foods, the ones we're supposed to eat, go up in price. As a result, we are seeing children with Type II diabetes for the first time in recorded history.

Why are people not up in arms about the way the food industry is run in this country? If we don't do something soon, the next generation's life expectancy will actually be lower than the current one.

5. Curb police violence

Remember when that police officer ripped that young girl out of her desk and proceeded to throw her across the room? No? Here's the video to jog your memory.

Or what about that incident in Texas where a group of officers attacked Black teenage girls because they received a complaint that they were being "disruptive"?

If we can't trust our police officers not to physically assault our children, how can we trust them to protect our children?

6. Guns

Let's be real, this list wouldn't be complete without addressing the serious gun issue we have in this country. In 2015, there were 265 children (under the age of 18) who accidentally fired off a gun, with 83 of those incidents resulting in the death of someone, usually another child.

But there's more to the story. Remember all that buzz about gun control after the shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary in 2012? You know what's changed about gun control laws since then? Nothing.

I want to close with my favorite tweet about this subject, from Dan Hodges: "In retrospect Sandy Hook marked the end of the US gun control debate. Once America decided killing children was bearable, it was over."