screwed that up good. please disregard the end.
Marc, you’re right about the tolerance thing. Consider “tolerance” in my post to read “acceptance”. It’s, admittedly, a mistake in nomenclature I make a lot and need to start correcting.
No offense, Witch, but your school district has teachers devoted to special needs children, and classrooms, and a budget. What is your school district doing for gay kids?
See? There’s a difference.
And the page I posted earlier was from the Amphi School District Policy Manual, for all levels of school. And there was no requirement whatsoever that teachers contact the school board to set up presentations. So, all evidence points to the fact that the teacher followed procedure, and one school board member is throwing a hissy fit, and one TV station took it hook, line, and sinker. KGUN has dropped the story altogether, and none of the other local stations have run anything, and the local papers today didn’t have anything about it. I suspect we’ll get more on the story when the local weekly paper comes out on Thursday.
Meanwhile, my boyfriend and I had a wonderful night. We ate middle eastern food, and then caught a performance of The Fantasticks. Great performance, lousy seats. We walked a bit before the show, enjoying the lovely downtown. And throughout this wonderful date, we didn’t dare kiss each other, or hold hands. It’s much too dangerous.
Is that the kind of world you want your kids growing up in? Really?
Just so you know, Witch, I happen to work in the mental health field. I have spent a lot of time with schizophrenic clients. I’m not ignorant of some of the attitudes that are out there, but education about mental illness does not meet with the shrill, hysterical resistance that GLBT education does. I don’t hear Bill O’Reilly railing against mental illness activists. (actully he DOES tend to villify mentally ill homeless people, maybe that’s a bad example).
Anyway, I don’t object to a presentation about mental illness in school. It’s probably a good idea. I don’t even feel that I should be notified about it or be asked permission. But why does that mean we can’t also have GLBT education?
BTW, some mentally ill people are gay too, you know. I used to work with one. It can be an added complication to someone who is already struggling with major self-esteem issues.
The schools don’t do JACKSHIT for kids with mental illness, at in my experience.
Yea, he has an IEP (A special ed plan) which is completely fucking useless, because they don’t have the resources or the extra teachers to deal with kids like my boy. I don’t know where * you* live, but that’s not MY reality.
Aside from that, his teachers, the admistration and even his school counselors are woefully ignorant about his disorder, and I spend many. many hours trying to educate them on his disease and the many different facets of it. They have NO CLUE how to deal with him. So most days when he acts up they just send him home.
At least the gay kids get to stay and get their education.
I’m glad you had a good night. Sorry you couldn’t be affectionate with your S.O. At least the show was good.
I haven’t had a good night. My son is going through a heavy manic phase and he’s just now fallen asleep. Well actually passed out truth be told. The anti-psychotic finally kicked in. Another visit to the shrink in the A.M.
I don’t dare send him to school tomorrow , it’s much too dangerous. He’ll just get in trouble, sent home, and made fun of. This is the kind of world my kid is growing up in. Really.
Jeepers!
I come back from school and find that you guys are at 10 pages?!?!
I feel like I was left behind in the conversation about 7 pages ago.
…
Maybe I will get to finish reading all of this by thursday. Try to not add another 30 or so pages by then.
Dio…lets not open that can of worms again…I just said I wanted to be INFORMED ok? Why? Because my son is very immature and would probably giggle through the whole damn thing if I didn’t prep him first.
I’ve no doubt you think a mental illness presentation would be beneficial. I do too. but I won’t hold my breath. I bet you won’t either.
I don’t object to you being informed, Witch, I was just trying to head off any questions from elsewhere on the board.
I’m sorry about your son. May I ask how old he is?
Sure Dio. He’s 12. He’s been diagnosed with ADHD since 1st grade, and they dropped the bipolar bomb about 2 months ago, but he’s been on a steady downward spiral for sometime now.
Right now he’s taking Depakote, Zyprexa, and Concerta. I’m not seeing much of a difference yet, but it’s still pretty early on. I know it took me about 6 months before I found a cocktail that worked. I hope it’s sooner for him.
Why is it that you can’t grasp that it isn’t that we don’t understand you–it’s that we disagree with you about what you say? Yes, we disagree with that principle.
Erm, actually . . . .
I’ve seen people seriously argue that depression is nothing more than evidence of moral shortcomings, and getting treatment for it (and related disorders) is evidence that one doesn’t have the strength to overcome one’s difficulties on one’s own (or, for the religious, with the aid of whatever god is considered appropriate). And I’ve encountered more people who seem to believe that mental conditions are no more than signs of attention-craving, and that dealing with them will essentially create more people who aspire to that status, than people who think that exposure to the existence of homosexuality will recruit more gay people.
Mental disorders can interact really badly with other prejudices, too. Take the example of the black kid, disruptive in class to the point of being kicked out of something like three school systems, who was only after he was completely soured on the whole concept of education diagnosed with both a learning disability and a cognitive function disorder. This at the height of the Ritalin overdiagnosis craze, and somehow it didn’t occur to anyone to try it.
My experience of being a kid was that “retarded” was a much more common insult than “gay” or “fag”.
Now to the to-the-closer-to-original-topic part of this post:
A friend of mine came out to me in high school, and followed it up with the question, “Is that all right?” I think I couldn’t get the words to come out right, so I just gave him a hug; I was torn between baffled that he’d ask the question and horrified in my understanding of exactly what he was afraid of that made it matter to him to ask the question.
I find that sort of world really damn scary, to be honest; the sort of world where someone feels a need to make sure their sexuality is okay with someone else, especially someone else that they’re not going to ask into a relationship. I find it not only scary as a member of several sexually-associated minorities, but just as a human being. I think the best – perhaps the only – way to correct for this . . . I can only use the word “atrocity” . . . for this atrocity is to make it possible for kids to speak about sexuality without people getting hysterical about it. I found it sort of scary when I was in junior high that sex ed required a permission slip.
As to sexuality and parents and age issues – I think I was one of the luckiest people among my circle of friends where it comes to parental instruction on the subject of sex. At about twelve, they gave me a few books, told me to ask 'em if I had questions, and left me completely alone thereafter. I know people who were bitched out in their teen years for using contraception and people who were subjected to “It’s all my fault that you’re gay!” and people who were punished for masturbation and people who lost relatives to homophobic prejudice – being left alone and not indoctrinated or moralised at while still being provided with information is about as good as I’ve seen in practice.
Of the three major aspects of my orientation, two are non-mainstream; one of those I knew about at the age of nine or so. I’ve known the simple stuff like what sex I’m attracted to since I was six. And I beat the target of my affections in a wrestling match, which struck me as a perfectly good way to get my hands on him. 
Did I tell anyone? Hell no. I knew all too well that the adults wouldn’t take me seriously (“Isn’t puppy love so adorable?”) and my peers would tease me. Thus, I suppose, the myth that kids have no sexuality is preserved another generation.
I didn’t see anywhere that they taught that being homosexual is okay, they just said that you should be tolerant of people who are homosexual. Or are you actually suggesting that the schools respect a parent’s right to teach their kid that gaybashing is okay?
In one of my previous jobs I used to tutor LD kids in an inner city school. I worked with MR, MI, ADHD, and some that were probably undiagnosed bi-polar. Maybe I just didn’t have enough training but children in the throes of a manic episode were some of the most difficult for me to teach. The poor kids just literally couldn’t contain themselves. they couldn’t sit down. They WANTED to, but they couldn’t. It was often my practice at these times to simply take them outside and throw a football with them. I would have them recite a times table while we played catch. (7’s were good, because 7’s are touchdowns). It seemed to help a little bit to be able to relieve some of their physical energy, and it built good will for days when they were calmer.
I wish you good luck with your son. I do have a small idea of what your going through.
BTW, I’m familiar with Depakote and Zyprexa, but not Concerta. Zyprexa, IIRC is supposed to make him sleepy (ha, ha, ha) but I know from experience that it doesn’t always work. Has your doctor prescribed a sleep PRN for epiodes like tonight?
Can someone tell me, incidentally, how we ended up on the eighth page in 24 hours? The only thread I’ve ever seen that ended up anywhere close to that that fast was the September 11th thread in MPSIMS (“An airplane just crashed into the World Trade Center…”)
Concerta is the new long release form of ritalin.
Witch, I think there’s something in the air tonight. My darling young one is off the wall and I’m ready to scream very, very, very loudly. He’s just had an excellent 2 weeks after adding evening primrose oil to his tricyclic and dex. I guess I let my guard down and thought it was gonna be OK now, we’d lucked onto a good combo.
::sigh::
hope you got some sleep
Re-opening a thread closed by a moderator by posting a new thread on the same topic is against the rules.
By requesting the thread be closed you effectively shut down ALL debate on that specific topic, allowing yourself the final word, and arranging things so that anyone who does want to rebut is risking their posting privileges.
Yeah, way to encourage discussion.
Poor little Gobear, so put upon by the Straights. Whine all you want. Being gay doesn’t make you immune to being a bigot. You said some extremely hurtful and rage-provoking things, and now you’re backpedaling as fast you can. Sorry. Your words are still in black and white on a closed thread. You said what you said.
So, are you going to ask this thread be closed, too, because we aren’t agreeing with you 100%? Or ask the mods to remove the other thread so you can accuse us of being liars without worrying someone might go back and read the truth?
Gobear
I changed my mind about posting in order to ask you what you meant by this statement in your opening post from the McDonald’s thread:
If we back up and get back on topic, there’s still something that I’m not getting that I’d love to get clarified.
I understand your point, Witch, but here’s my problem with it. Follow me for a second. Imagine this scenario, this conversation between a teacher and a parent who has received a permission slip for a presentation from the Wingspan (or whatever GLBT group existed in imaginary parent’s city) representative.
Parent: I don’t think my child needs to be a part of this presentation.
Teacher: Why do you feel that way?
Parent: My child doesn’t even know what “gay” means!
Teacher: Are you sure? You know, kids talk, they watch television, you might be surprised about what they know.
Parent: We don’t allow Jimmy to watch adult television.
Teacher: And none of his friends have ever said anything that may have him confused?
Parent: He doesn’t have those kinds of friends.
Teacher: So what exactly is your objection?
Parent: He’s too young to hear about these kinds of things.
Teacher: About what, exactly? What is it that you don’t think he’s ready to hear?
Parent: I don’t want him to know about sexuality yet. He’s just a young child.
Teacher: You know that some of his peers are already having sex?
Parent: Not my Jimmy! He’s just a little boy. Don’t try to make him grow up too fast.
Teacher: Well, ma’am, there’s nothing graphic in the program, we’re just defining terms in the most basic language, and talking about tolerance and treating people with respect.
Parent: He’s just too young. He’s not ready for sexual information.
What’s the teacher supposed to say to that? Obviously the teacher will have to respect this parent’s wishes, but can’t you see how this parent seems to have their head somewhat in the sand?
Moreover, and I think that this is an important issue – we’ve heard from experts that open, early, comprehensive sex education is needed to reduce STD transmission and pregnancies in young teens and pre-teens.
We’ve heard stories from Dopers (and many of us have heard from friends and family) which indicate that their lives would’ve been better if their peers had been armed with facts instead of rumor, innuendo and that general “understanding” of what sexual minorities are that’s fostered by our generally intolerant society.
We’ve also heard how sexual minority young people themselves would’ve benefitted by being told that there were support resources available to them when they were young and alone and struggling.
Information helps. In a number of important and very meaningful ways, having factual, reasonable information and education has been seen to be a benefit.
So I pose this question to advocates of the “my child may be too young, and I want to be the arbiter of that” position:
How could having the kind of information we’re talking about harm a child? What would be the negative consequence of a child – even if (and I think it’s a big if, but in any case) that 11 or 12 year old hasn’t heard anything about “being gay” – being given basic, factual information at that age?
I’m not talking about sexual mechanics, or the deeper psychological issues behind being transgendered. TG can be easily defined for this age group kind of like this – sometimes men feel like they should have been born as women, and so they live their lives as women. They dress like women and wear women’s hairstyles and makeup and jewelry. They also usually use a woman’s name and act so that to all outside appearances, the people around them think that they are women. There are women who are this way, too, and who live their lives as men.
I’m also not talking – and I do not mean this with any offense toward you or your son, Witch, but just as a point of clarification – about special needs kids, I’m talking about your average sixth, seventh and eighth graders in a regular public school health or lifeskills or whatever class might find this topic gername to the curriculum.
Do you think that it would scar a child in some way to hear something like that? That it would encourage them to experiment with sexual behavior? That it would scare them about their own sexuality?
What is the damage that can be done by exposing young people to this particular type of education?
I ask this because it seems to me that if there’s no damage that can be done then getting explicit parental permission is unnecessary and this has been an argument over principles that were never in play.
But if there is some damage that can be done, then the presentation shouldn’t be given at all, whether there is permission or not. After all, the parents could be wrong about what their kids are ready for, and if they could be harmed, why risk it? Save it till later or leave it for the parents, even if that does maintain the status quo.
I think this is something to point out.
While the gay folks on this board feel there is nothing morally wrong with what they do, and quite a few of the rest of us agree, there are a LOT of other people in this world who, like His4ever DO believe there is something wrong with it.
One of the problems I have with “politcially correct” is that it is concerned not with changing peoples’ behavior, it wants to change their thinking. Which isn’t that far from an inquisition.
As an analogy, there are some people who think having sex with their spouse with the lights on is wrong. I don’t agree with them, but I’m not going to force them to have sex with the lights on, wire their light switch in the “on” position, deluge them with information on the Joys of Fully Lighted Sex, or otherwise attempt to change their thinking. I will not, however, let them impose their practices on anyone else merely because they are uncomfortable that someone, somewhere, may be fucking with the lights on.
Likewise, given that His4ever is a conservative Christian who’s stance on these issues is pretty well known, I am NOT going to attempt to convince this person that homsexuality is OK (even though that’s what I believe) or make them like the idea. Aside from the impossibility of moving someone whose position is backed by “God said so”, MY religion forbids me from trying to uproot someone else’s deeply held belief.
However, despite being at opposite extremes of the issue, I think both His4ever and I agree that there is no justification for bullying or assaulting gay people.
So, His4ever, would you object to a “tolerance program” that teaches tolerance for your viewpoint - that some people view homosexuality as a sin based upon the Bible - but that whether you approve of the acts or not, there is NO justification for violence, bullying, or abuse of a person, sinner or not? Because what I’m getting from the “it’s a sin” camp are objections based on the promotion by these programs that homosexuality is “morally acceptable”, which, to these people, it is NOT and never will be. Any more than many Christian churches are ever going sanction sex outside of marriage, or worshipping multiple gods, or the Muslims are going to suddenly start eating pork chops.
Because, folks, you will NEVER win over everyone to the “homosexuality is OK” argument, but I think you can get 99% on to the “violence is wrong” badwagon. Is that going to cure every problem of a gay teen? Of course not. But you’re not going to convince His4ever and cousins to approve of this behavior. Well, OK, they don’t like it - can we at least agree on a common ground that, whether you approve or not, as long as everyone is an adult and freely consenting no civil (that is, non-religious) crime has been committed? And that, even if you DON’T approve, violence and harassment is NOT acceptable?
Here’s the rub - if you make the argument that it’s wrong to bully gay teens because being gay is OK, then you may, unintentionally, give another message that it’s OK to bully those who aren’t OK. Which means, if someone doesn’t buy your “gay is OK” argument, they may feel justified in being an asshole. And that applies to any other issue over which hate crimes happen. There are certain rules of conduct that apply even if you hate the other person or find them repulsive.
Or, as mom used to say - you don’t have to like the neighbors, just have to tolerate them.