# "Gay high school" opens in New York... Whaddya think? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [July 28, 2003, 8:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-high-school-opens-in-new-york-whaddya-think/191508 "2003-07-28T20:19:34Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 6
**Author:** ![Polycarp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/82dd89/32.png) [@Polycarp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Polycarp)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2003, 11:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-high-school-opens-in-new-york-whaddya-think/191508/101 "2003-07-29T23:15:50Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by matt\_mcl \* > \*\*I agree with the first six words of your sentence wholeheartedly (which explains why I volunteer for a program which does exactly that). However, until it has time to work, I don’t think it makes sense to let the kids who are served by this school twist in the wind. If someone’s drowning, getting them a life ring is a bigger priority than draining the lake. \*\* I wholeheartedly agree with this; thanks, **Matt**!! To do a parallel with Christianity, I have the utmost respect for the Rev. Troy Perry and the UFMCC, though I think they have no reason to exist. Because the people they were founded to minister to are people who should be welcomed and cared about at “regular” churches in an ideal world – but aren’t. Therefore they started up – to provide a church for people who wanted one and weren’t welcome elsewhere. When the sort of “everybody ought to be just like me” mentality that we’ve seen crop up on a regular basis gets eradicated, or at least marginalized, then we start worrying about whether this is unfair spending of money or whether controlling bullying might be the better move. But so long as **Archie** and his, uh, cohorts decide to “enlighten” us with their opinions about what’s abnormal and unnatural, programs like this are the proper move. BTW, one of my boys was adequately messed up when we got him that he was in an Individualized Curriciulum program (he weaned himself from it, with our help). Two teachers and a part-time aide for six students. We met two of his classmates – and they needed the program. I’ll bet that class cost five or six times as much on a per capita basis as will Harvey Milk H.S. ---
**Author:** ![Geek\_Mecha](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/ecae2f/32.png) [@Geek\_Mecha](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Geek_Mecha)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2003, 11:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-high-school-opens-in-new-york-whaddya-think/191508/102 "2003-07-29T23:39:19Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by ummm… yeahh… \* > \*\*My point was, where do we draw the line? If group A gets their own school and groups B and C are also picked on, shouldn’t they get their own school too? Seems to me this is more of a slippery slope. > > Your point is well taken but segregation is never the answer (which I don’t think you were implying). Let’s face it, for the most part, hardly anyone goes without getting picked on or feeling left out when they are in high school. \*\* I think it’s important to draw a difference between “being picked on” and straight-up hate-inspired harassment. I can’t speak for gay students, having come from a high school where there weren’t any openly gay students, but I can’t imagine that what gay students face is anything even remotely similar to the teasing I got for being fat or resembling the band teacher. If the taunting gay students face is exponentially worse than what other groups of students face, then why shouldn’t they be allowed to have a school of their own? Is that truly worse than not allowing them any alternatives and forcing them to endure four years or more of harassment? Which would you have a child you know face? I also don’t see this school as segregationist, at least not like how blacks were segregated from whites back in the day. I will concede it’s segregationist in the sense that it’s deliberate separation of one group of students from another. The difference, as I see it, are the intentions. The school has the welfare of the students in mind. Attendance by gay students in wholly optional. There is no sense of ‘getting the icky gay kids away from the normal kids.’ Obviously, this doesn’t help educate and enlighten other high school kids about homosexuality, but I don’t believe that it’s right to deny gay kids a school of their own simply to further this agenda. Gay kids are gay kids, sure, and it might be in their interest to fight bigotry and ignorance… but it may not be a battle they’re willing to fight, and it’s not right to put them in the potentially very hostile front lines. Furthermore, I don’t see why it’s an either-or proposition between opening a school for gays or educating high school kids about homosexuality. Both can and should be done. Perhaps it takes something like this for some people to realize exactly what gay kids go through. It tells you something when a kid doesn’t want to go to a regular public school, and that he feels comfortable elsewhere. It tells you something when someone doesn’t feel safe around around his peers. > [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by monstro \* > **I’m so glad that people didn’t feel like this before blacks were allowed into “white” schools. (Now that I think about it, a lot of people probably did.)** If you think I’m rationalizing racist segregation, you’re very much mistaken. I don’t feel that this school is comparable, and I don’t feel the circumstances or intentions are comparable. ---
**Author:** ![matt\_mcl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/7ab992/32.png) [@matt\_mcl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/matt_mcl)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2003, 11:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-high-school-opens-in-new-york-whaddya-think/191508/103 "2003-07-29T23:54:46Z")
A very apposite summary, AudreyK. ---
**Author:** ![monstro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ba9def/32.png) [@monstro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monstro)\ **Post date:** [July 30, 2003, 12:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-high-school-opens-in-new-york-whaddya-think/191508/104 "2003-07-30T00:54:34Z")
> [@](#): > > If you think I’m rationalizing racist segregation, you’re very much mistaken. I don’t feel that this school is comparable, and I don’t feel the circumstances or intentions are comparable. **Audrey** , the same argument that you used–that we should give up waiting for attitudes to change and just set up “special” schools–could have been used circa 1960, when black kids regularly caught hell in public schools. The problem is…it’s hard to change attitudes when the majority doesn’t have to face the minority. I have changed my mind on this issue, btw. If the kids going to this school are students who aren’t being served or _can’t_\* be served in traditional schools, then I have no problem with a special school for them. The education and safety of 100 at-risk students is worth the added expense. l ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [July 30, 2003, 1:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-high-school-opens-in-new-york-whaddya-think/191508/105 "2003-07-30T01:44:57Z")
Imagine a more inclusive policy. Designate a school that is a haven for the outcasts. They gay kids, the nerds, the kids who always get picked last at recess when teams are being formed, etc. Guess what will happen? There will be outcasts among the outcasts. For better or worse, it is human nature to form hierarchies. And this is especially pronounced in adolescence when everyone is sorting out his or her position in the group. I think the real answer to enforce better discipline in schools. I know that sounds simplistic and I don’t claim to know exactly how to do it. The “gay school” seems, at best, as stopgap measure. ---
**Author:** ![tilly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/e95f7d/32.png) [@tilly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tilly)\ **Post date:** [July 30, 2003, 1:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-high-school-opens-in-new-york-whaddya-think/191508/106 "2003-07-30T01:51:40Z")
Well thank the good lord I am no longer paying taxes in the state of New York. I would sue before my tax dollars would pay for such. Everyone wants equel rights but then they want special treatment for being different? Give me a FU&%!^g break… And just out of curiosity how do you prove that your gay? Do you have to do that to go to a Gay school. What if a hetro wants to go to the Gay school because it is “better”… If it is private by all means pay for what you want but not with my tax dollars… Where the hell are the bleeding hearts to scream about the injustice of exclusion on this one? :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![Mockingbird](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/c68b51/32.png) [@Mockingbird](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mockingbird)\ **Post date:** [July 30, 2003, 2:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-high-school-opens-in-new-york-whaddya-think/191508/107 "2003-07-30T02:50:25Z")
Am I the only one who finds it interesting that these new posters are the ones who keep using very similar terms like bleeding heart, liberal, and are against the school and gays in general. ---
**Author:** ![Lamia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8e7dd6/32.png) [@Lamia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lamia)\ **Post date:** [July 30, 2003, 4:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-high-school-opens-in-new-york-whaddya-think/191508/108 "2003-07-30T04:49:16Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by John Mace \* > \*\*Imagine a more inclusive policy. Designate a school that is a haven for the outcasts. They gay kids, the nerds, the kids who always get picked last at recess when teams are being formed, etc. > \*\* That is a rather negative, but not inaccurate, description of the alternative high school that my younger sister and I happened to graduate from. > [@](#): > > \*\* > Guess what will happen? There will be outcasts among the outcasts. > \*\* You may be guessing, but I actually _know_ about alternative schools, and I know that you are wrong. It does not have to be that way. Milk is a small alternative school with a self-selected student body that has a genuine desire for a comfortable, safe, and tolerant learning environment, and I doubt they will have much trouble in that department. Certainly far less than at a big mainstream New York public school. > [@](#): > > \*\* > For better or worse, it is human nature to form hierarchies. And this is especially pronounced in adolescence when everyone is sorting out his or her position in the group. > \*\* It is natural for people to form groups, but this does not have to result in a pecking order and it certainly does not have to lead to bullying or violence. I very much doubt it will at Milk. They must be feeling confident in their program if they’re looking to expand, and my own school did very well with even more students than the newer, bigger Milk will have. ---
**Author:** ![vasyachkin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/c5a1d2/32.png) [@vasyachkin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/vasyachkin)\ **Post date:** [July 30, 2003, 8:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-high-school-opens-in-new-york-whaddya-think/191508/109 "2003-07-30T08:09:30Z")
i think its a good idea. and i dont see anything wrong with specialized schools that spend more money per student, cuz those students actually want to learn. ok, they dont but at least they are willing to work for grades, and most students in regular schools are NOT willing to do anything, i went to such a shit school 🙂 and i think the tax money would be better spent if that school was closed down altogether, the students sent home and the money spent on a REAL school like stuyvesant 🙂 where i didnt go cuz i just came to USA at the time and didn’t know what was what. ---
**Author:** ![Geek\_Mecha](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/ecae2f/32.png) [@Geek\_Mecha](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Geek_Mecha)\ **Post date:** [July 30, 2003, 11:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-high-school-opens-in-new-york-whaddya-think/191508/110 "2003-07-30T11:24:38Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by monstro \* > \*\ ***Audrey** , the same argument that you used–that we should give up waiting for attitudes to change and just set up “special” schools–could have been used circa 1960, when black kids regularly caught hell in public schools. The problem is…it’s hard to change attitudes when the majority doesn’t have to face the minority. \*\* Read my posts, and you’ll see that “give up on attitude changes and set up special schools” isn’t my position at all. In my first post, I said: > [@](#): > > If “allocating funds to provide support” means implementing tolerance programs in high schools, then I’m going to have to disagree. As I see it, creating a high school of their own more assuredly provides a safe and comfortable environment for gay and transgendered kids than does throwing money and hoping attitudes change for the better. Nowhere did I suggest that anyone should be given up on, nor did I say that setting up special schools was the way to go for everyone who felt uncomfortable in or was undesirable for mainstream schools. I think I’ve made this clear. Please don’t mischaracterize my statements. I agree (and have said as much) that having gay kids in a separate school does not help enligten others or increase tolerance towards homosexuality. However, in addition to my earlier point about it not being their fight, it’s not as though high school aged kids are completely ignorant of homosexuality. It’s not like back in the 1960s, where few people knew folks who were black or saw how black people lived and worked. High schoolers know about homosexuality. They’ve heard about gay marriage and gay adoption. They’ve heard about hate crimes against gay people. They may have gay siblings, parents, friends, neighbors, or relatives. Then there’s all this controversy about this school. It’s not as though homosexuality is a hard-to-find discussion topic these days. It’s out there, and it’s slowly becoming part of society. Not having 100 gay kids in a mainstream high school isn’t going to alter or reverse that. ---
**Author:** ![tilly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/e95f7d/32.png) [@tilly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tilly)\ **Post date:** [July 30, 2003, 12:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-high-school-opens-in-new-york-whaddya-think/191508/111 "2003-07-30T12:12:19Z")
I guess I am a new member by your standards mockingbird, because from the looks of it you must have lived on here and post on every other thread that pops up for the last 4 years… Secondly I noticed that you grouped liberal and bleeding heart together in your reply to my post… How appropriate but you said it, not me… Thirdly, I come here and read when I have the time but do not have a chance to post very often. This of course does not have anything to do with the facts of this issue and you throwing out an immature insult about a recent member to skirt the constitutional issues just brings to the forefront even more the question. Why are the liberal bleeding hearts not screaming their heads off? If the public school system wanted to open a school for only heterosexuals and exclude gay students because they felt their life style and behavior was a negative presence in an adolescent learning environment, who the hell do you think would be screaming their heads off? For starters, probably everybody because it would be just plan common sense but I can assure you that the “liberal” contingency would be the loudest because it would be a violation of equality plan and simple. That of course seems to be one of their poster children along with being politically correct and god forbid taking preventative action against an aggressor who could pose an eminent danger before you could say 9/11 if given the chance… This issue however should have the same sort of attention brought to it that racial discrimination does on most occasions but I don’t see anyone who usually loves wallowing in the publicity that a protest or a TV rant would bring standing up screaming about it… Why? Because that would mean they would have to use logic and apply their rules of equality to both the establishment and the disadvantages and that just wont do, now will it? So out of those 5000 or so post you have contributed to this board how many of them contributed something informative? Because if I had to judge them from the one above I would say have to say, not to many… ---
**Author:** ![monstro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ba9def/32.png) [@monstro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monstro)\ **Post date:** [July 30, 2003, 12:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-high-school-opens-in-new-york-whaddya-think/191508/112 "2003-07-30T12:55:02Z")
> [@](#): > > I see it, creating a high school of their own more assuredly provides a safe and comfortable environment for gay and transgendered kids than does throwing money and hoping attitudes change for the better. I overlooked the “throwing money” and just saw the “hoping attitudes change”. I didn’t mean to mischaracterize you, **AudreyK**. Sorry! > [@](#): > > However, in addition to my earlier point about it not being their fight, it’s not as though high school aged kids are completely ignorant of homosexuality. It’s not like back in the 1960s, where few people knew folks who were black or saw how black people lived and worked. I think there’s a lot of kids out there who do not know a gay person personally. They may see the Jack and Will on _Will and Grace_ but they haven’t had homosexuality touch their lives on a personal level. Their idea of a “faggot” isn’t their English teacher or the captain of their swim team. If they aren’t flaming and they haven’t come out, “regular” gays are generally invisible The invisibility benefits the gay person, but it does a disservice to straight people who need to be enlightened. People have misconceptions about homosexuality just like they used to have (or still do) about blacks. They think gays are oversexed. They think gays try to hit on anything with a dick (or a vagina, if they’re lesbian). They think gays focus on nothing but their sexuality (see the ignorant comments above). I think these misconceptions won’t go away if gay people shy away from educating. It is their fight, whether they want it or not. But like I said above, I don’t think homophobia will increase by removing 100 kids out of the general population. But I would have reservations if this school was expanded so that every GLBT youth could attend. ---
**Author:** ![monstro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ba9def/32.png) [@monstro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monstro)\ **Post date:** [July 30, 2003, 12:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-high-school-opens-in-new-york-whaddya-think/191508/113 "2003-07-30T12:59:17Z")
> [@](#): > > _Originally posted by tilly_ > If the public school system wanted to open a school for only heterosexuals and exclude gay students because they felt their life style and behavior was a negative presence in an adolescent learning environment, who the hell do you think would be screaming their heads off? They would have to prove that gays provide a negative presence. I don’t think they would be able to. ---
**Author:** ![tilly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/e95f7d/32.png) [@tilly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tilly)\ **Post date:** [July 30, 2003, 1:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-high-school-opens-in-new-york-whaddya-think/191508/114 "2003-07-30T13:11:00Z")
So you are saying that the establishers of this bright ass idea, of pissing away tax payers dollars on an unconstitutional venue have proven that those that are not gay are a “negative presence” on those that are? I was throwing that example out by the way to show how bloody absurd this whole thing is and even more absurd that it even got to the drawing board much less is now a working entity! :smack: ---
**Author:** ![monstro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ba9def/32.png) [@monstro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monstro)\ **Post date:** [July 30, 2003, 1:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-high-school-opens-in-new-york-whaddya-think/191508/115 "2003-07-30T13:24:23Z")
Well, they must have done something to convince people that this would be a good idea. Unless you think the state of NY routinely signs off on any ole proposal that lands on its desk. ---
**Author:** ![monstro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ba9def/32.png) [@monstro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monstro)\ **Post date:** [July 30, 2003, 1:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-high-school-opens-in-new-york-whaddya-think/191508/116 "2003-07-30T13:25:30Z")
I mean the city of NY. ---
**Author:** ![tilly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/e95f7d/32.png) [@tilly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tilly)\ **Post date:** [July 30, 2003, 1:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-high-school-opens-in-new-york-whaddya-think/191508/117 "2003-07-30T13:41:23Z")
Well I certainly hope this party will last long. The fact that NYC like the State of California is about as cash strapped as a hooker in the middle of a deserted dessert right now, Bloomberg is working with a major deficit and the property tax and the haves are footing the bill for the economic shortcomings. 9/11 killed NY from a budget stand point even with all of the federal emergency funding coming in and of course the post 9/11 economy just added fuel to a volcano… For the city and state to even think of spending 3 1/2 million dollars on 150 some odd students when the overall system needs to be overhauled, child welfare is in crises to the point and not serving those children in life threatening circumstances is disgraceful and criminal. I hope who ever put this together and those that voted it through are run out of town on a rail and criminally prosecuted for gross mismanagement of taxpayer’s money. Not to mention the obvious constitutional issues concerning this… :smack: :mad: :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![Polycarp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/82dd89/32.png) [@Polycarp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Polycarp)\ **Post date:** [July 30, 2003, 1:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-high-school-opens-in-new-york-whaddya-think/191508/118 "2003-07-30T13:42:49Z")
**Tilly** , if you have read the discussion to date, you will find that the Harvey Milk High School is not, contrary to the “sound bite” summary, “a high school for gay teens,” but an alternative school, of a sort common in the NYC school system, for a particular group of at-risk secondary students, many of whom are homeless or in foster care, who have experienced the sort of intense harassment in “normal” schools that makes attempting to learn there next to impossible for them. And I suspect strongly that there is somewhere a similar program for paraplegic teens, in a building adapted to enable them to negotiate the school building in their wheelchairs – but that it’s not controversial and therefore did not get a press story such as this one. But I would like to know on what grounds you find this particular school unconstitutional. I find constitutional law an interesting subject, and would willingly listen to arguments either way on the subject. I will point out the comment made by Mr. Justice Stewart 35 years ago and echoed recently by Mr. Justice Thomas that because a law is “uncommonly silly” does not therefore make it unconstitutional – and I don’t see this particular bit of alternative school establishment as “uncommonly silly,” for reasons amply set forth by **matt\_mcl** and others. I can concede that _Brown v. Board of Education_ suggests one should not discriminate – but the difference there is that this is not a forcible segregation of gay students into one school and straight students into another, but rather an attempt by the NYC school system to provide a suitable learning environment for a group of students who are at-risk on account of being gay. If you see constitutional arguments other than the above, I’d very much like to hear them. ---
**Author:** ![tilly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/e95f7d/32.png) [@tilly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tilly)\ **Post date:** [July 30, 2003, 1:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-high-school-opens-in-new-york-whaddya-think/191508/119 "2003-07-30T13:47:59Z")
I certainly hope this party will not last long! But the longer it does last the more it will piss the hell out of those of us that do have some common sense and bring absurd waste of tax payers dollars to the forefront… The next time a child is found starved or beat to death in an abusive home due to the fact that the system could not afford the work force to address such vital issues remember that money spent on some liberal “must have issue” could have gone to preventing that Childs death instead of cuddling some high school student who has an alternative sexual preference and wants to be separated from those that don’t! :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![erislover](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/71e660/32.png) [@erislover](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/erislover)\ **Post date:** [July 30, 2003, 1:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-high-school-opens-in-new-york-whaddya-think/191508/120 "2003-07-30T13:58:55Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by AudreyK \* > If you think I’m rationalizing racist segregation, you’re very much mistaken. I don’t feel that this school is comparable, and I don’t feel the circumstances or intentions are comparable. I don’t see how the principle behind it doesn’t demand comparison. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-high-school-opens-in-new-york-whaddya-think/191508.md?page=5) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-high-school-opens-in-new-york-whaddya-think/191508.md?page=7)