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Posts via daily email:Nashville, Knoxville Schools Unblock LGBT Web Sites
Jim Burroway
June 5th, 2009
School districts in Nashville and Knoxville have responded to the American Civil Liberties Union’s lawsuit demanding that Tennessee school systems remove Internet filtering software which blocks students’ access to legitimate LGBT educational and informational web sites. The Knoxville superintendent said that the blocking software was against school board policy.
The school systems used filtering software provided by Education Networks of America, which categorized some 1,000 web sites as “LGBT” and blocked access to them. The same software however allowed access to ex-gay ministries. David Pierce, CEO of ENA, said that they have upgraded the system to distinguish between web sites which provide information and those are more adult oriented.
The ACLU says that they will now likely drop their lawsuit but they are holding off for now, pending assurances that the filtering software won’t re-block access to LGBT sites in the future.
Why You Should Always Go To The Source
Jim Burroway
May 29th, 2009
I’ve adopted a policy of never believing what I read on most anti-gay web sites, simply because when you go to the source, you find that things are never — never! — as they appear. And I say that mindful of the dangers of speaking in such absolutes. But here is just another of one those examples. This email landed in my inbox:
I’m a faithful DAILY (HOURLY?) gay guy reader of your blogs. I LOVE YOUR WORK!! I am grateful for all you do!
Since I also read WND to “find out what those guys are thinking”…every once in a while I come across something that makes me wince. If the below is true (is it?), it doesn’t look A-OK for our side…do you guys have any back-story on this? I don’t like the fact that parents can’t opt-out. Is this another scare tactic?
http://www.worldnetdaily.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=99442
Good question, Thomas. Thanks for asking.
The WND article decries a “mandatory homosexual curriculum for children as young as 5.” But what is that “homosexual curriculum” that the Alameda (CA) Unified School District has developed?
Well, it’s all online right here. And as you look through it, you will find that it is simply a set of short discussions with students about fellow students’ families. Some of these families have a mom and a dad, some just a mom, some just a dad, some with two moms, and some with two dads, and some with no moms or dads but aunts, uncles or grandparents.
It’s the mentioning of two moms and two dads that’s stiring up the trouble. But having a child in school with two moms or two dads is just a fact of life. This curriculum is designed to reflect that ordinary fact, and to point out that ostracism, teasing, or bullying because of it are not acceptable.
But to anti-gay opponents, the possibility that we might just be ordinary families who happen to send children to school is very scary. So yes, it is a scare tactic. Anything that unmasks the horrible creatures invented by anti-gay activists and reveals that ordinary people in ordinary families send ordinary children to ordinary schools, well there’s nothing more frightening to them than that. And so they oppose it at all costs.
Our opponents are very good at scaring people. It’s all they have left. And so they label a curriculum designed to minimize bullying and ostracizing behavior as a “homosexual curriculum,” as if teachers were being ordered to teach the mechanics of homo-sex to school kids. But that’s not what this is. Not even close.
But the mechanics of hetero-sex, well that seems to be another matter.
[Thanks to Thomas for asking a very good question.]
Anti-Gay School Board President wants “Carrie Prejean Day”
Timothy Kincaid
May 8th, 2009
This is a week old, but I just noticed it.
Jim Gibson is a trustee of the Vista Unified School Board in Vista, the city in northern San Diego County that Carrie Prejean calls home. His wife, Cathy, is the San Diego area director for Concerned Women for America.
Gibson is delighted that one of his alumni has taken such a prominent anti-marriage position. So much so that he wants the school district to honor her.
Trustee Jim Gibson said this week he wants to make June 1 “Carrie Prejean Day” in the district. He called Prejean, a 2005 Vista High School graduate, a “good, strong role-model.”
“We’re setting her up as an example,” he said. “As far as I’m concerned, she’s a great role-model, and she’s a person who needs to be emulated.”
Gibson’s proposed proclamation calls Prejean an “exemplary student leader” who “showed integrity, leadership, dedication and high moral standards” in the Miss California and Miss USA pageants.
This is not the first time that Gibson has gotten excited about opposing same-sex marriage. He unsuccessfully tried to get the school board to endore Proposition 8.
Gibson is planning on presenting the proclamation to the board on May 14th. If it passes, perhaps the students can emulate Carrie’s high moral standards by coming to school topless.
More from Laurie Higgins on why She Supports a Culture of Disapproval and Condemnation
Timothy Kincaid
April 28th, 2009
On April 15, Laurie Higgins, the Director of the Division of School Advocacy for hate-group Illinois Family Institute, wrote an article about why she opposed Dr. Throckmorton’s efforts to get Christian kids to follow the Golden Rule in response to GLSEN’s Day of Silence.
She argued that Christian kids should not “do to others what you would have them do to you”, but rather they “must condemn volitional homosexual conduct”.
I found this to be an endorsement of the bullying that GLSEN sought to counter as well as a perverse distortion of Christianity. I responded with a commentary in which I stated that “Higgins opposes the Day of Silence because she believes it is a Christian kid’s duty to bully his gay classmates”.
This did not sit well with Laurie Higgins.
She countered with another article in which she accused me of spreading “pernicious lies” and tried to draw a distinction between “condemnation, which means strong disapproval” and bullying. She even went so far as to argue that “censoring” the public condemnation of gay students by other students “constitutes an act of incalculable harm”.
Higgins expressed no mention of the harm of allowing this “strong disapproval”, such as the suicide deaths of two eleven year-old boys in the previous week.
To Laurie, Christians students should show contempt and disgust and derision. It is a good thing to abuse their fellow students that they think might be gay. It’s the Christian thing to do. It’s just condemnation of sin, not bullying, you see. It keeps society on the straight and narrow way.
Now Laurie has responded again. In her opinion piece The Bullying Tactics of “Anti-Bullying” Activists, she seeks to defend her honor.
Rather than review her bullet points one by one, I’ll let my previous writing stand on its own. I think that the observations I have made about her character, values, goals, intentions and agenda are far more evident in her writing than are her new protestations.
And, perhaps most important, Laurie and I have found a common point. Referencing something I wrote in the comments to my own commentary, she indicates that I have, indeed, identified her intention and purpose (in the comments an individual who called herself “Teri” said I “hit the nail on the head”).
Though Laurie truncates my comment, I’ll repeat it in full.
Laurie’s defenders play the same game that she does. They talk about “homosexual behavior”.
What they don’t tell you is that they define “homosexual behavior” to include the simple act of identifying as gay.
You see, to the IFIs and Exoduses and others who “fight the homosexual agenda”, they really don’t care so very much what you do in the privacy of your home - so long as you are suitably ashamed and believe that you are a sinner.
What they oppose is gay people openly and proudly identifing themselves and living with dignity.
Laurie and Teri and their pals would FAR rather have a teenage kid sneaking off to a seedly alley to have shame-filled anonymous unsafe sex than they would some virginal boy announcing that he is gay and plans to stay pure until he falls in love and marries the man of his dreams.
You see, as long as he hates himself they have a chance to save his soul. And that is far more important to them than his body or his spirit or his health or his character.
This is why they fight so hard against the Day of Silence and Gay-Straight Alliances. Not because of sex, but because these groups help counter the culture of disapproval and condemnation.
Because what Laurie wants more than anything is that the culture and society be dominated by disapproval and rejection of gays. Not gay sex, but gay identity. [The section in bold is quoted by Higgins]
And on this Laurie Higgins and I agree. We both acknowledge that she sees her goal as defending the culture of disapproval and condemnation.
Where we disagree is that I find the suffering and dead children she leaves in her wake to be abominable and horrific.
In mentioning the deaths of Carl Walker-Hoover, Jaheem Herrera, and Eric Mohat (the first time she’s been inclined to do so) she finds no evidence that “compassionate, intelligent expositions of conservative views of homosexuality” (the condemnation and strong disapproval in which she says Christian kids must engage) are in any way to blame.
Even though the parent of all three boys lay the blame for the death of their children at the feet of anti-gay bullying, Laurie thinks that she’s identified another culprit. Believe it or not, it’s me.
Anti-Gay Slavs Voted Out of Student Government in Sacramento Community College
Timothy Kincaid
April 24th, 2009
In October, the student government of American River College in Sacramento endorsed Proposion 8. It was the only student government association in the state to do so. This engendered a recall effort but most students didn’t bother to vote and the anti-gay students remained in power.
We learned that these students were a coalition of five Slavic students associated with the virulently homophobic evangelical movement in Sacramento and three Mormon students who had joined forces to turn out voting blocks and advance socially conservative positions through student government. And their anti-gay activism was not limited to Proposition 8.
Last Friday the Sacramento Bee reported:
Student leaders at American River College passed a resolution Thursday opposing today’s nationally organized demonstration in support of gay rights.
The resolution asserts that “the Day of Silence has been used to silence and harass religious students at local public schools for expressing their viewpoints,” and instead calls for a “peaceful discussion of controversial issues instead of intimidation and censorship of opposing viewpoints.”
That may just have been too much for the students at American River College. They may have become too embarrassed about representatives that seemed anti-gay, anti-science, and anti-culture and they have voted the religious coalition out of office.
In elections held Wednesday and Thursday, American River College students ousted several conservative council members in favor of a slate that said it wanted the student government to stop focusing on divisive social issues.
Fourteen of 17 student representatives elected are part of the “ARC Students for Change” slate, including David Fisher, who won as student association president.
Congratulations to Fisher and his alliance of students.
Mother of Bullying Victim Speaks Out
Jim Burroway
April 24th, 2009
Sirdeaner Walker’s 11-year-old son, Carl Walker-Hoover, recently took his own life after having been continually harassed with anti-gay taunts. Yesterday, Sirdeaner appeared on Ellen DeGeneres’ show to tell her story and to plead for an end to bullying.
Another Anti-Gay Bullying Suicide
Jim Burroway
April 21st, 2009
Six hundred people gathered this evening to remember Jaheem Herrera, an 11-year-old Atlanta-area boy who hanged himself at home after relentless anti-gay bullying at his elementary school. According to his family, Jaheem came home from school last Thursday and hanged himself with a belt in his bedroom closet.
The DeKalb County schools, where Jaheem attended elementary school, reportedly have an anti-bullying program in place. But one classmate reported witnessing a bullying incident in the boys room that was so severe that Jaheem passed out. According to Jaheem’s mother, she repeatedly complained to school officials about Jaheem’s harassment, but nothing was done.
This latest death follows two other recent bullying-related suicides. Eleven-year-old Carl Joseph Walker-Hoover of Springfield, Massachusetts hanged himself with an electrical cord after repeated bullying with gay taunts. Seventeen-year-old Eric Mohat of Mentor, Ohio killed himself after a classmate publicly dared him in class to shoot himself. He was repeaetedly called “queer,” “fag,” and “homo,” often in front of his teachers.
Laurie Higgins Seeks to Justify her Endorsement of Bullying
Timothy Kincaid
April 21st, 2009
Laurie Higgins, Director of the Division of School Advocacy of the certified hate-group Illinois Family Institute, is not at all pleased with my observations about her advocacy for bullying.
The homosexual blog Box Turtle Bulletin carried an article last week in which Timothy Kincaid spread pernicious lies about me. I don’t know Mr. Kincaid, so I don’t know if he has a limited capacity for following the logic of an argument or if he has a limited commitment to truth and an unwillingness to provide evidence for his defamatory claims.
The crux of Higgins’ argument is the indignant insistence that she does not personally bully children but that “There is an important distinction between interacting with individuals and participating in public debates”
In my interactions with individuals who identify as homosexual, I would never articulate my views about homosexuality unless the topic were introduced by them. If the topic were introduced by them, I would speak the truth graciously.
Higgins goes on at quite some length in her “graciously truthful” way, crafting a world in which schools are hell bent on promoting a radical, subversive, ahistorical view about the nature and morality of homosexuality and are conspiring to censor conservative views. This makes it “ethically legitimate for all citizens to participate in the public discussion regarding what best serves justice and the common good.”
But let’s stop for just a moment and remind ourselves exactly what it is that we are talking about, exactly what it is that Higgins finds so objectionable: anti-bullying programs.
The constant use of “faggot” and “homo” and the constant deriding of students who may not fit the stereotype of sexual norms is pervasive in our public schools. And it is resulting in the staggering truth that children as young as 11 years old are killing themselves rather than face another day of this abuse.
And let’s also keep in mind that there is nothing whatsoever that these kids can do about it. They did nothing to start it, do nothing to contribute to it, and have no way of stopping it. Many of them do not identify as gay and most of those who do have never engaged in any sexual behaviors of any kind. These are just kids who - for reasons that adults can never fathom - have been declared to be “a fag” and therefore deserving of torment.
Think about this when you read the next paragraph.
The truth is that public schools can find ways to curb bullying without addressing homosexuality. For example, students who engage in promiscuous behavior, particularly girls, are often called “sluts,” “skanks,” and “whores.” Public educators deplore such bullying, and yet even in the service of ending bullying they would never permit books, plays, films, days of silence, newspaper articles, essays, speakers, panel discussions, and “diversity” weeks to be employed in the service of transforming students’ views on the morality of promiscuous behavior. They would find ways to curb bullying of promiscuous teens without ever specifically addressing promiscuous conduct.
I want to be charitable. I want to believe that no one, not even Laurie Higgins, would oppose programs that seek to stop kids calling other kids “skank” or “whore”. I can’t.
I want to believe that Laurie thinks it wrong to push gay kids into lockers, beat them up, threaten them, and subject them to a constant barrage of insults. I can’t.
I want to believe that she feels more empathy and a closer association with those being tormented than to those who doing the tormenting of their fellow students. I can’t.
There simply is no way to avoid it. There is simply no other possible conclusion. Laurie Higgins supports the bullying of gay students, she just refuses to think of it that way. Higgins sees the abuse as the legitimate response of moral kids to the immoral conduct they see in others.
Just like Laurie finds it reasonable to call a promiscuous girl (or one so accused) a slut or a whore, so too is it reasonable to torment gay kids (or those so assumed) with taunts of “faggot” and to physically abuse and threaten them. Because in her world Christians are required to “condemn” objectionable behavior – which means public derision and abuse – even if most of their victims have never engaged in any behavior at all.
To Laurie, Christians students should show contempt and disgust and derision. It is a good thing to abuse their fellow students that they think might be gay. It’s the Christian thing to do. It’s just condemnation of sin, not bullying, you see. It keeps society on the straight and narrow way.
And if there is collateral damage, that is of little concern to Laurie Higgins. She has never shown the slightest care for the victims, not even in passing. The important thing to Laurie is that students who share her contempt for homosexuality be unhindered in their efforts to condemn and berate.
And if this results in dead children, that is of no consequence; to Laurie it’s a small price to pay.
Laurie Higgins Endorses the Bullying of Gay Kids
Timothy Kincaid
April 17th, 2009
Illinois Family Institute is only one of 12 anti-gay groups assigned Hate Group status by the Southern Poverty Law Center. It is a well deserved designation.
Laurie Higgins, the Director of the Division of School Advocacy for the Illinois Family Institute, gives voice to the attitudes and beliefs that have led to IFI being identified as a hate group. Laurie is also one of the organizers of the Day of Silence Walk Out.
She is not pleased that Dr. Warren Throckmorton is suggesting that Christian kids should treat gay kids as they wish to be treated. She is angry that he wants them to stay in school on the Day of Silence. And she is particularly irate that Throckmorton opposes the abuse of gay kids.
In her article, Dr. Throckmorton’s “Golden Rule” Misguided at Best, Higgins makes minimal lip service to “the worthy goal of ending bullying, but it’s quite clear that she does not at all wish that the bullying of gay kids should end at all.
“So in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets,” means that Christians should affirm to others God’s Word–the entirety of God’s Word–in a godly way.
Higgins declares that the Golden Rule means the exact opposite of what it says. Rather than do unto others as you’d have them do to you, she endorses the “affirming God’s Word” (ie public condemnation and ridicule) of others “in a godly way”. It is difficult to fathom a more perverse interpretation of Christ’s commandment.
[If] we allow schools to define discrimination so expansively as to prohibit all statements of moral conviction, character development is compromised and speech rights are trampled. And if administrators continue to define discrimination in such a way as to preclude only some statements of moral conviction, they violate pedagogical commitments to intellectual diversity and render the classroom a place of indoctrination.
Higgins supports discrimination, as long as it is based on “moral conviction”.
Dr. Throckmorton believes that “Christian students should be leading the way to make schools safe and build bridges to those who often equate ‘Christian’ with condemnation.” In this statement, Dr. Throckmorton glaringly omits the truth that Christians must condemn volitional homosexual conduct. And to those who view homosexuality as moral, this necessary Christian condemnation of homosexual behavior renders homosexual students unsafe.
Yes, Higgins actually supports making schools unsafe for gay kids.
She believes that “Christians must condemn volitional homosexual conduct.” In other words, Christian kids have a moral obligation to harangue and harass gay kids and publicly condemn them.
[As] moral beings living for a time in a fallen world suffused with brokenness of all kinds, we are all charged with the same moral task: We all must determine which of our myriad messy feelings are morally legitimate to act upon. Adults are supposed to help children navigate those murky waters.
Higgins believes that adults - teachers and administrators - should also condemn gay kids.
Let’s be clear. Higgins does not oppose the Day of Silence because it is the wrong way to go about ending the bullying of gay kids. Rather, Higgins opposes the Day of Silence because she believes it is a Christian kid’s duty to bully his gay classmates.
COMMENTS (15) | LINK
Alan Chambers will say ANYTHING
Timothy Kincaid
April 16th, 2009
The Baptist Press says this about Alan Chambers, president of Exodus International:
For Chambers, the Day of Truth is personal. He struggled with and overcame unwanted homosexual attractions as a teenager and young adult. He is now married, and he and his wife and have two children.
“Many people don’t know that change is possible or that there’s any alternative out there for people,” he said. “… There was a time when I was trying to fit that with my life, trying to marry my homosexuality and my Christianity and trying to see if I could be a good gay Christian. It didn’t work.”
Really? Alan overcame unwanted homosexual attractions as a teenager and young adult? And his wife and children are evidence of this?
Now that’s a fascinating retelling.
Because I also happen to know that Alan has said that while his attraction has greatly diminished over the course of 16 years, he still struggles with homosexual temptation and lives a life of denial of what comes naturally to him. And it seems that in their effort to paint Alan as an ideal family man they forgot to mention that Alan took nine months to consummate his marriage or that his two children are adopted.
If Alan’s going to tell kids about the “alternative out there for people”, he should tell them what that alternative really is. But I guess telling the truth wouldn’t serve his goal of vilifying and hindering those good-hearted students who are trying to stem the flood of abuse against their gay classmates in public schools.
ACLU: Tenn Schools Illegally Blocking Access To LGBT Websites, Allows Ex-Gay Sites
Jim Burroway
April 15th, 2009
According to the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), as many of 107 Tennessee public school districts could be illegally preventing students from accessing accurate and balanced online information about LGBT issues. The same Internet filtering software however allows access to ex-gay groups. In a letter sent to Knox County Schools, Metro Nashville Public Schools, and the Tennessee Schools Cooperative, the ACLU demanded that they unblock access to LGBT sites.
This is from the ACLU’s press release (not yet available online):
“When I found out about this web filtering software, I wasn’t looking for anything sexual or inappropriate – I was looking for information about scholarships for LGBT students, and I couldn’t get to it because of this software,” said Andrew Emitt, a 17-year-old senior at Central High School in Knoxville . “Our schools shouldn’t be keeping students in the dark about LGBT organizations and resources.”
…In its demand letter, the ACLU notes that websites that urge LGBT persons to change their sexual orientation or gender identity through so-called “reparative therapy” or “ex-gay” ministries – a practice denounced as dangerous and harmful to young people by such groups as the American Psychological Association, the American Psychiatric Association, the American Medical Association, and the American Academy of Pediatrics – can still be easily accessed by students.
“One of the problems with this software is that it only allows students access to one side of information about topics that are part of the public debate right now, like marriage for same-sex couples,” said Karyn Storts-Brinks, a librarian at Fulton High School in Knoxville, pointing out that the software blocks access to organizations that support marriage for same-sex couples like the Religious Coalition for Freedom to Marry or the Interfaith Working Group while allowing access to organizations that oppose marriage equality. “Students who need to do research for assignments on current events can only get one viewpoint, keeping them from being able to cover both sides of the issue. That’s not fair and can hinder their schoolwork.”
The schools in question use filtering software provided by Education Networks of America (ENA). The software’s default settings blocks sites categorized as LGBT, which include:
- Parents, Families, and Friends of Lesbians and Gays (PFLAG)
- The Gay Lesbian Straight Education Network (GLSEN)
- Human Rights Campaign (HRC)
- Marriage Equality USA
- Religious Coalition for the Freedom to Marry
- The Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD)
- Dignity USA (an organization for LGBT Catholics)
The ACLU is giving the districts until April 29 to come up with a plan to provide access to LGBT sites or any other category that blocks non-sexual websites advocating the fair treatment of LGBT people by the beginning of the 2009-2010 school year.
CNN on Anti-Gay Bullying
Jim Burroway
April 15th, 2009
CNN’s Anderson Cooper did a marvelous story last night on Carl Joseph Walker-Hoover and Eric Mohat, and the daily anti-gay bullying which drove these boys to kill themselves. He was buried on Friday. Meanwhile, Focus On the Family, Exodus, and the Alliance defense, among many others, continue to defend the current status quo which leads to more deaths of young people — including straight kids as well as gay.
COMMENT (1) | LINK
Day of Silence and Various Responses
Timothy Kincaid
April 13th, 2009
In an effort to reduce bullying and to encourage tolerance, the Gay, Lesbian, and Straight Education Network created a program called The Day of Silence in which students show their sympathy for harassed gay students by pledging to be silent for a day. Those who “oppose the homosexual agenda” have responded in a number of ways.
I will briefly compare the various responses:
Sponsor: Gay, Lesbian, and Straight Education Network
Participants: Hundreds of thousands of students in over 8,000 schools
Purpose: The Day of Silence’s purpose is to bring attention to anti-LGBT name-calling, bullying and harassment and effective responses.
Date: Friday, April 17, 2009
Length of Program: Thirteenth year
Process: Participants take a day long vow of silence and distribute or wear speaking cards with information about anti-LGBT bias and ways for students and others to “end the silence.” Through Breaking the Silence events, which are typically held at the end of the school day, students can speak out against harassment and demand change for their schools and communities. Students do speak when required by class participation.
Message: What are you doing to end the Silence?
Handout:
Please understand my reasons for not speaking today. I am participating in the Day of Silence (DOS), a national youth movement bringing attention to the silence faced by lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people and their allies. My deliberate silence echoes that silence, which is caused by anti-LGBT bullying, name-calling and harassment. I believe that ending the silence is the fi rst step toward building awareness and making a commitment to address these injustices. Think about the voices you are not hearing today.
What are you going to do to end the Silence?
Response to Objection: In high schools, approval from the principal or other appropriate staff is important when student organizers are working on any project. When approaching your school’s administration, it helps to have the backing of a student club and its advisor(s). If your administration does not approve of or support the Day of Silence, you may want to consider planning a community event outside of school, in the morning or evening.
Theme: To draw attention to the abuse or bullying of GLBT people who are often silenced by social disapproval and unable to defend themselves alone.
Sponsor: Created by the Alliance Defense Fund. Currently administered by ex-gay group Exodus International.
Participants: Up to 13,000 students
Length of Program: Fifth year
Stated Purpose: The Day of Truth was established to counter the promotion of the homosexual agenda and express an opposing viewpoint from a Christian perspective. (It is a direct response to the Day of Silence).
Date: The Day of Truth is scheduled for April 20, 2009. This is three days after GLSEN (The Gay, Lesbian, Straight Education Network) will sponsor the “Day of Silence.”
Process: Participating students are encouraged to wear Day of Truth T-shirts, pass out cards, tell students about the evils of homosexuality, and inform same-sex attracted students about reorientation programs.
Message: It’s time for an honest conversation about homosexuality. There’s freedom to change if you want to. The truth cannot be silenced.
Handout:
I’m speaking the Truth to break the silence.
True tolerance means that people with differing — even opposing — viewpoints can freely exchange ideas and respectfully listen to each other.
It’s time for an honest conversation about homosexuality.
There’s freedom to change if you want to.
Let’s talk.
Response to Objection: If the principal or other school official asks you to stop, stop immediately. Please call 1-800-TELL-ADF so that we can help resolve the situation quickly.
Theme: Rather than encourage gay-specific anti-bullying programs, gay students should be encouraged to enter ex-gay programs.
Sponsor: A long list of anti-gay activist groups including Americans for Truth (Peter LaBarbera), Liberty Counsel (Matt Barber), Mission: America (Linda Harvey), and SPLC-listed hate groups MassResistance, Illinois Family Institute (Laurie Higgins), and Abiding Truth Ministries (Scott Lively).
Participants: unknown number of parents. In 2008, 600 students were kept home from a school in Washington
Length of Program: uncertain, perhaps second year
Stated Purpose: To actively oppose this hijacking of the classroom for political purposes and no longer passively accept the political usurpation of taxpayer funded public school classrooms through student silence
Date: April 17, 2009, the same day as the Day of Silence
Process: Parents are encouraged to express their opposition to the Day of Silence by calling their children out of school on that day and sending letters of explanation to their administrators, their children’s teachers, and all school board members.
Public school teachers are encouraged to plan activities for this day that involve student speech: Schedule speeches or oral exams; ask questions; or plan discussion-based activities
that require participation from all students.
Church leadership is encouraged to follow the bold example of Pastor Ken Hutcherson who vocally opposed the “Day of Silence” in his community in Redmond, Washington. (Hutcherson is threatening to oppose school bonds if Mt. Si allows students to participate in the Day of Silence again this year).
Message: Students being silent is disruptive and ought not be tolerated.
Handout: none indicated.
Response to Objection: Explain that school districts lose money for every absence, which may help convince administrations and school boards that it is not merely unethical but fiscally irresponsible to allow the classroom to be used for political purposes.
Theme: Fighting the homosexual agenda.
Sponsor: Dr. Warren Throckmorton, with some support from Campus Crusade for Christ Regional Director, Michael Frey and Bob Stith, National Strategist for Gender Issues, Southern Baptist Convention.
Length of Program: Second year
Stated Purpose: To provide a response for Christian and conservative students who do not affirm homosexual behavior but also loathe disrespect, harassment or violence toward any one, including their GLBT peers.
Date: April 17, 2009, the same day as the Day of Silence
Process: To answer the Day of Silence’s question with a commitment the safety of GLBT students and peers as well as other who appear different based on the teachings of Christ.
A variety of options exist on the DOS, including silence. Whatever option one chooses, we do not encourage protests, divisive actions or criticism of others. One way to live out our faith is to treat others fairly and with respect.
Message: Do to others as you would have them do to you. (Luke 6:31).
Handout:
This is what I’m doing:
I pledge to treat others the way I want to be treated.
Will you join me in this pledge?
“Do to others as you would have them do to you.” (Luke 6:31).
Response to Objection: None indicated.
Theme: To draw attention to the appropriate response of Christians when they are asked for respect and protection.
UPDATE: The previous version listed Americans for Truth (Peter LaBarbera) as a hate group and did not list Illinois Family Institute (Laurie Higgins) as such. These have now been reversed.
The Consequences of Anti-Gay Bullying
Timothy Kincaid
April 13th, 2009
Carl Joseph Walker-Hoover was so mercilessly bullied with gay taunts that on Monday he tied an electrical cord around his neck and hung himself. He was eleven.
Carl is not alone. Anti-gay bullying is a serious problem in public schools. It is rampant, it is pervasive, and often times it is ignored by those responsible for preventing it.
In Mentor, Ohio, the high school doesn’t think it has a problem with bullying. So they are being sued by the parents of Eric Mohat with a lawsuit that doesn’t ask for money but instead that the administration implement an age-appropriate anti-bullying program. The Mohats feel that the school has ignored the reasons why Eric, who suffered from persistent anti-gay bullying, killed himself in 2007. He was one of four bullied Mentor High School students who committed suicide that year.
Considering that children are dying and that the cause is obvious, you’d think that everyone would support programs to stop the bullying. You’d think wrong.
Anti-gay activists consistently oppose any effort to target and prevent anti-gay bullying. They say that programs which identify specific targets, including those tormented for being perceived as gay, are really “indoctrination of homosexuality under the pretext of anti-bullying curriculum.”
And they would much rather let children die than muffle those “students and school officials who object to homosexuality.”
Incidentally, neither Carl nor Eric identified as gay. That didn’t protect them.
COMMENTS (22) | LINK
Anti-Gays Scam Insurance Providers
Timothy Kincaid
March 27th, 2009
Maple Grove High School fought like the dickens to keep its gay students from meeting.
Although the Equal Access Act provides that schools have to allow all non-curricular student groups the same access, Maple Grove thought they knew better.
Their ingenious legal argument? That Straights and Gays for Equity (SAGE) was not a curriculum based organization but that cheerleading, Spirit Club, synchronized swimming, and the Black Achievers all were.
Nice try, but no first year law students would bet that outcome.
New York Law School Professor Arthur S. Leonard wrote, “The result in this case was quite predictable, because to date no school system anywhere in the country has ultimately prevailed in its attempt to exclude a gay-straight alliance while allowing other non-curricular student organizations to continue operating at their schools, and federal judges have uniformly rejected by attempts by the schools to mischaracterize social groups as “curricular” in order to escape the requirements of the statute.
But why did they go to court? And, having lost once, why did they appeal?
And isn’t all this futile legal work expensive? You bet it is. The Minneapolis - St. Paul Star Tribune reports just how expensive.
Osseo schools got hit with a king-size legal bill — $460,143 — in its fight to keep a Maple Grove High School student-run gay-rights group from having the same privileges as other, officially approved, school clubs.
OK. That’s a WOW moment. In this age of shrinking budgets and tightening purse-strings, 460 grand is a lot of money to me. But it didn’t cause the School Board to blink.
Asked about the legal fees, [Osseo schools spokeswoman Barbara] Olson replied:
“The district must pay those costs. It just so happens that all the costs are being reimbursed by our insurance.”
That’s right.
The school can go through nearly a half-million dollars on a lawsuit it knows it’s going to lose, all for nothing other than spiting its gay students. Because it’s insured and if it causes all the insurance rates to go up, well at least it got its day in court to besmirch and denigrate gays.
It is time that insurance companies cease to be the pawns and patsies of these anti-gay frauds.
They certainly wouldn’t fund a lawsuit for a principal seeking to place the cafeteria off-limits to black students or a lawsuit for a school board that wanted to force Jews to pray to Jesus. These are surefire losers and a predictable waste of money.
So too are legal efforts to ban gay students from equal access.
These school insurers need to look these principals in the eye and say, “Sorry, Bub, but if you want to run up legal bills to defend discrimination and bigotry, you’re going to have to do it on your own dime.”
Shhhh! If We Don’t Talk About Them, Maybe They’ll Go Away
Jim Burroway
March 19th, 2009
Tenn. Rep. Stacy Campfield (R-Knoxville)
If a Tennessee state lawmaker has his way, teachers won’t be allowed to discuss homosexuality in any way, shape or form. For the second year in a row, Tennessee Rep. Stacey Campfield (R-Knoxville) filed his “Don’t Say Gay” bill, which would essentially ban teachers from talkng about gay people:
I think our teachers need to stick with reading, writing, and arithmetic,” Campfield said. “It confuses a lot of children that are already in a difficult part of life, and it’s a very complex issue.”
Students who are expected to understand chemistry, trigonometry and “The Lady Or The Tiger” can handle complex subjects. Chris Sanders, with the Tennessee Equality Project, points out the bill’s far-reaching infringement not just on free speech rights, but on education itself:
“The problem with this bill is it would have a chilling effect on even being able to discuss the bill itself, and both sides of the bill in an 8th grade class where you are learning to write essays,” Sanders said.
Wiser heads prevailed and the Education Committee decided to hold off voting on the bill for another year to give it time for “more study.”
Wasting Taxpayer Money for Jesus
Timothy Kincaid
March 7th, 2009
Prior to 1984, some religiously devout students in some less supportive locations found it difficult to observe their faith in public schools. While they watched the chess club and fan clubs meet without restriction, requests for a Bible club were routinely denied.
To remedy that inequality, Congress passed the Equal Access Act which said that if a school allowed any non-curriculum student-led organizations, then it had to allow other such organizations to meet. Churches rejoiced and Bible clubs sprang up across the nation.
But, as is often the case, those who sought remedy for discrimination against themselves soon found that such protections also applied when they were the oppressors. And, ironically, perhaps those students who have most utilized Equal Access Act have not been Christian kids denied access by liberal secular humanists, but rather gay and lesbian kids denied access by anti-gay Christians.
The ACLU has now established a long history of using the Equal Access Act to force public schools to allow gay students and their friends to organize and work to oppose discrimination and inequality. In case after case, judges have found that if the Fellowship of Christian Athletes can meet after school in a classroom, then so can the Gay Straight Alliance.
Schools with anti-gay authorities aren’t too pleased about this. And they have frequently tried to bar gay and gay-friendly students from meeting, going to court and indignantly defending their position.
They generally argue that gay clubs are sexual hook-up clubs whose purpose is to advocate for immoral sexual behaviors -and provide sex partners - and that because they are an “abstinence only” school then they have a right to deny this “sex club”. Or they may argue that there is already a generic anti-bigotry club (usually in actuality a black or Hispanic student club) so there’s no need for a club to support gay students. Some - with a perfectly straight face - will argue that if gay students identify as such they will be picked on so the school needs to protect gay students by not allowing them to meet.
These arguments tend to be recognized as the defense of homophobia that they are and judges don’t often find them very persuasive. In fact, I can’t think of a single instance in which the courts found that schools, principals, or school boards could deny equal access to gay students.
About the best that a school can hope for is to be allowed to deny access to all non-curricular clubs. And some have found themselves in the uncomfortable position of having to take proactive steps towards affirming their gay students in what is obviously a hostile environment.
And they are not cheap. The Okeechobee County School Board recently paid $326,000 in attorneys fees only to be told that not only could the GSA meet on campus but that the school board had an obligation to provide for the well-being of gay students. And even if the loss of such a suit is covered by insurance, it plays havoc with insurance rates for schools everywhere.
So why, then, do school boards try so desperately to fight to exclude gay kids? In a time in which communities are hurting and budgets are tight, when parents are losing jobs and tax bases are eroding, why do these elected officials allocate hundreds of thousands of dollars for an effort that is almost certain to be a lost cause?
Well, I think we can find a clue in the Florida Baptist Witness story about the School Board of Nassau County and their desire to keep students at Yulee High School from starting a gay supportive club with the word “gay” in the name. The students were told that they needed to change the name of the organization to exclude sexual orientation in order to comply with school board policy and be allowed to meet.
In other words, you can get together but you can’t be gay.
Leading the charge against these students is Nassau County Schools superintendent John Ruis. He doesn’t want to let the gay students be “in conflict and at odds with regard to somebody’s freedom of speech or expression” and thinks that “you try and deal with [homosexuality] for the safety and the wellbeing of the children”.
But it’s pretty much a forgone conclusion at this point that the school board is going to lose. So why does Ruis continue spending taxpayer money - or risk insurance rates for years to come - on this case? I think I can guess.
Ruis said he appreciated the prayers and support of his church friends like Bryan, pastor of Brandy Branch Baptist, who he taught as a young man in Sunday School.
Nuff said.
UPDATE
In what is surely no surprise to anyone:
A federal judge this afternoon [3/11/09] ordered Nassau County schools to allow a Gay-Straight Alliance to meet at Yulee High School while a court battle over the right of the club to meet is pending.
Larry King’s Caretakers Seek to Profit from his Murder
Timothy Kincaid
February 14th, 2009
Lawrence King was adopted at age three by Gregory and Dawn King. According to the Kings, he never bonded with them. In November 2007 he was removed from their home and placed in a group home after he complained that Gregory King was physically abusive.
But none of that is stopping the Kings from seeking to be paid for their loss. And they are not above trashing Larry in order to get some cash.
To celebrate the one year anniversary of Larry’s death, Gregory and Dawn king have filed a wrongful death lawsuit assigning the blame for Larry’s murder on Larry himself and faulting everyone in sight. (SJ Merc)
The 18-page lawsuit filed by King’s parents and brother names nearly two dozen defendants. It claims that everyone from King’s teacher to his social worker failed to urge the effeminate teen to tone down flamboyant behavior. The suit also claims they failed to heed McInerney’s alleged threat to kill King a day before the shooting.
In addition to his teacher and principal, the suit names McInerney and his parents; the nonprofit Casa Pacifica, a shelter for troubled children where King had been living; counselors; a county social worker, and the Ventura County Rainbow Alliance.
The school and shelter knew that King’s behavior was “sexually assertive” and threatening but failed to take action, the suit contends.
The shelter gave him “cross-dressing clothes and makeup and women’s boots,” and the Rainbow Alliance encouraged King to make sexual advances on McInerney, the suit claims.
While the Kings can sue anyone they think has cash for wrongful death in every state in the Union, in Utah gay people don’t have the right to sue anyone at all for the loss of their devoted and much loved and cared-for partner.
More Details Come Out on Larry King’s Killer
Timothy Kincaid
February 12th, 2009
A year ago this week, 14 year old Brandon McInerney calmly walked up and shot two bullets into the back of 15 year old Larry King’s head. The students who knew both children said that King was killed because he was gay.
Almost immediately, McInerney’s lawyer started an image campaign designed to present King as the aggressor and McInerney as the victim. The pinacle of his efforts came in July of last year when Newsweek’s gossip writer Ramin Setoodeh ran a hit piece on King, claiming that he “flaunted his sexuality” and engaged in “inappropriate, sometimes harmful, behavior” and insinuating that King was a sexual predator who pushed McInerney beyond his breaking point.
Many in the gay community, being kind of heart and sympathetic to those who are hurting, joined the voices of those who called for leniency for McInerney.
And unless you’re heartless, one can feel badly for a kid who was raised economically disadvantaged in a family without structure and perhaps subjected to teasing. It is easy to think that this is just an otherwise good kid that snapped and in a brief moment acted impulsively. Maybe compassion would be a better response than incarceration in a cold penal system.
But in October, the LA Times revealed some information that suggested that perhaps Brandon McInerney wasn’t the all American good kid that his defense team would have us believe. We learned that he had a fascination with Adolf Hitler and like to doodle swaztikas. And the prosecution’s insistance on trying the child as an adult - with hate crimes enchancements - seemed less callous.
Until now the district attorney has not told the prosecution’s side of the story. But now the LA Times has reviewed court documents which tell of a very different Brandon McInerney and a very different Larry King.
Lawrence “Larry” King wasn’t sexually harassing fellow eighth-grade student Brandon McInerney in the weeks leading up to King’s shooting death, prosecutors contend in court documents.
McInerney was the aggressor, teasing the effeminate King for weeks and vowing to “get a gun and shoot” him, according to a prosecution brief.
The additional charges of the prosecution include:
- McInerney looked for other to join in a gang beating of King in the days before the shooting. Unable to find others interested he decided to kill King.
- McInerney was familiar with the gun with which he killed King, having used it for target practice.
- It wasn’t until King had suffered months of being called “faggot” by McInerney and others that he began to retort by making sexual taunts to McInerney.
- Other students heard McInerney threaten to shoot King in the days before he did so.
- In addition to the skinhead and neo-Nazi materials, McInerney also had a training video called “Shooting in Realistic Environments”.
It is difficult to know the appropriate response when a very young kid commits a premeditated act of murder, especially when the motivation appears to be bias based. But as more of this story comes out, it seems less like a mystery of children behaving impulsively and more of a cautionary tale about cauldrons of hate and the tragedies they brew.
This is, for all, a tragic story and a time for introspection. I truly wish all of those who are called to serve justice on this case much wisdom, compassion, and the ability to look to what is best for society.
Saddleback’s New Definition, Courtesy Of Dan Savage
Daniel Gonzales
January 28th, 2009
Gay sex advice columnist and author Dan Savage isn’t known for holding back against people he views as enemies of the LGBT community. Angered by anti-gay comments made by former Senator Rick Santorum, Savage named a rather disgusting and previously un-named phenomenon relating to anal-sex after him. Performing a Google search on “Santorum” turns up Savage’s definition as the top item.
And now we get to Savage’s recent anger with Rick Warren of Saddleback Church. What is a “Saddleback” exactly? Savage wasn’t sure it had any definition so he took it upon himself to create one. After polling his readers Savage has announced his new definition of Saddleback / Saddlebacking:
From the new website Saddlebacking.comSavage finds this new definition apropos because of Warren’s ideological promotion of abstinence-only programs which not only don’t work, but result in teens substituting anal-sex and oral-sex believing they aren’t “real” sex.
