This is entirely fabricated- she waited until 10 seconds before the prom to cause a ruckus and not a moment sooner!
Hey, Grave, sounds like you’re bowing out, so I don’t know if you’ll read this, but I get where you’re coming from. Not a lot of people can empathize with a position they disagree with, and I respect your wanting to correct what you see as an unfair characterization of a group you are not aligned with.
I also think you’re wrong.
Outside of bottom feeders in the Klan and other such gangs, most people don’t like to think of themselves as bigots. That doesn’t meant that they aren’t bigots, though, because it’s not that hard to act like a bigot, and invent a justification for why what they’re doing isn’t bigotry. And if no one ever challenges those justifications, people can go their whole lives believing two contradictory things: that they aren’t a bigot, and that it’s okay to discriminate against gays. The only way that’s ever going to change is if it’s challenged every time it’s encountered.
It’s bigotry to support legal discrimination between gays and straights. It’s not different from race rights. It’s bigotry to support legal discrimination between gays and straights. It’s not “complicated.” It’s bigotry to support legal discrimination between gays and straights. There are not a lot of valid views. It’s bigotry to support legal discrimination between gays and straights. And it’s not a different kind of bigotry - there is no more justification for discriminating against gays than there is for discriminating against blacks, and those who practice discrimination against either group should be treated the same.
Now, I don’t generally support the idea of screaming insults at people as a method of changing their minds. But there’s a difference between an insult and an uncomfortable truth. It’s vital to challenge the disconnect between self-image and action at every opportunity, and one important part of doing this is to constantly re-enforce the similarities between homophobia and other, previously discredited forms of prejudice. In that goal, I think reasoned discussion is the best tool, but even the jeers can have their place: if the person doing the jeering displays the same attitude towards both racists and homophobes, at least the idea that theirs no moral difference between the two groups carries through, even if the message itself is otherwise devoid on content.
Nnnng. It’s fun to think that this stuff only happens in the South, but I could easily see this happening in Pennsylvania or Minnesota (I mean, somebody voted for Michele Bachmann). Blinkered thinking again.
Let’s blame the bigots for being bigots, not for being Southern.
I’m not seeing the evidence for that.
Thank you Gyrate.
Grave is in a position to hear the talk in the community, which you and I aren’t.
Re: Juin Baize, there are a lot of dress code rules which I find to be stupefyingly idiotic. Boys being prohibited from wearing dresses is one of them. IIRC, that was a rule in our handbook at my high school, and it is also a rule in the handbook of the high school my niece attends. Her school has some flaky rules, for example you can’t go around school with one pants leg rolled up.
I agree with the vast substance of your post, but the nit-picker in me wishes to make a slight comment here, one that does not change the message of your post in any real way… that legally, there IS a difference between race rights and rights based on sexual orientation. It’s not morally different from race rights to support legal discrimination between gays and straights, but it is (for the time being) legally different.
Yes, but based on what he’s shared and what we’ve seen on the 'net, I’m not seeing evidence for the idea.
This sort of reminds me of the parsing that was done by early civil rights activist to make sure the people/kids involved were above reproach. IE no young girls with children out of wedlock… no young men with previous criminal records… church going. So perhaps she wasn’t the “perfect” protestor. At that age its hardly to be expected to have the maturity to know when and how to “maximize” your cause.
As for African-Americans I’m seriously so past their (our) blatantly homophobia being excused by their bitter excuse of religion and “tradition” and being annoyed that those “gay” would dare invoke civil rights traditions. Here’s a hint… Black people don’t own protest. Dr King stole his ideas from Gandhi just as Keith and Mick stole hooks from Muddy Waters. That’s how progress is made. People steal ideas… both good and bad (see Hitler and Henry Ford) and attempt to implement them for their beliefs. As for the “south” I know it’s Atlanta… where the rest of the south writes off as “Hades” but this has been going on here at local proms for quite a while and hardly a head is turned now. We excused Miss when they stood in doorways to block students. We excused them when they unlawfully imprisoned citizens who were attempting to flee for a better life. I’m way past excusing them and their “ways” in 2010. And the Principal is gutless. If the Principal came out for the young lady vehemently the press and attention would have kept the board from dumping him. But no… he and the teachers who supported Constance can join the California Highway Patrol who stood by why Rodney King got the beating.
Yes, of course. I was speaking purely to the moral dimension.
Maybe he just wants to educate children, and didn’t sign up for being a political activist?
Yes, it would be nice everyone risked everything they had for people they don’t really know or like, and everyone pissed rainbows and shat puppies, but in the real world it’s ridiculous to condemn someone for not putting everything on the line for someone who they don’t really care about.
You can’t expect everyone to be a hero.
Yes I am more or less bowing out since the discussion has turned towards posters expecting me to defend the school or thinking that I am. That is not my intention and I do not want to encourge it.
I did, however, read your post and felt compelled to point out that the reason I bothered to share was to combat bigotry - the bigotry posters here are aiming at the Itawamba county community and Constance. That has not been as succesful as I might have liked, but I did try. No one has seemed interested in the slighest in seeing the participants as actual humans - it is more fun to uphold Constance and snipe the rest. Rigid devotion to your own point of view and hostility to those who don’t share it… bigotry, right?
The fact you felt compelled to mark me as wrong is troubling as well. Whether my lack of communications skills caused it or you felt that I was defending the school prompted it I suppose doesn’t matter. I have shared my opinion when asked but never tried to make a case for the right or wrong here. The wrong as it were runs much deeper than a dress code for a dance or a lesbian’s actions but it does run on both sides.
It is damn hard to try and see both sides in situations like this. That doesn’t make it useless to try and can often help create viable solutions rather than knee jerk patches. Difficult as it may be and not as fun as one liners, it is still important.
After being intimately involved in various struggles for individual rights in Mississippi for almost 20 years I suppose I have a viewpoint that is hard to articulate. There are great wrongs here (as in most states) and they won’t fix themselves. They also won’t get fixed by idealistic bullshit that sounds great when you are inexperienced or far removed from the community. I was just as guilty as anyone of saying and thinking that way once - not attacking anyone.
For all the bluster and media attention Constance created very little if any good will come from it. The odds of a judge ordering the district to change its policy are slim since it is based on minimizing distruptions and is / was applied evenly; that the ruling supported her Free Speech claim is heartening but far from setting a useful precedent. Neither gender identity nor sexual orientation are protected classes here beyond the small protection Federal laws afford so by applied evenly I do not mean to imply it was fair to those classes.
Still, I’ll help fight that fight among others. Bigotry does rile me so…
n.b. - ChicagoJeff, never excuse any of that no matter who does it.
So, kind of like this, right?
As an educator, I would argue that it is, in fact, his job to care about his students. Even the gay ones.
Care as in care about their education.
Not care as in go on TV and risk your livelyhood. Thats beyond the call of duty.
It’s also particularly insipid because queer people and black people are not two separate groups. As much as we’re ignored, black queer people are caught in a nasty place where we’re marginalized from every community we might be a part of.
Then he should have remained a teacher. He did not. He’s now a public school administrator. Public schools are run by politicians and administrators have to be political creatures to prevent non-educator school board members and non-parent members of the public from running roughshod over students and their rights to appropriate and equal educational access. If he’s not prepared to do that, then he’s in the wrong damned job.
No, not bigotry. What you cannot seem to grasp is that it is morally wrong to deny Constance and others who share her sexual orientation admittance to prom. The reach around the principal was doing was wrong as well–well intentioned, but wrong. Our position is not “rigid”–it is right. Sure, there have been some cheap shots–such is the nature of the internet. But you have lost sight of the bigger picture. It’s easy to poke fun and mock what you don’t know or haven’t experienced, IOW, from ignorance. So what is this town’s excuse? They know Constance. You say that there have been gay couples at prom before this. So what’s the problem?
No, there is not wrong on “both sides”. IMO, Constance is being ostracized for bringing unwelcome outside attention to a small community–she aired this county’s dirty laundry. You have tried to put Constance in the wrong by questioning her timing, her methods, her character. I don’t doubt that what is wrong runs deep: deep, entrenched and rigid.
I don’t see Constance as some kind of Joan of Arc. I see her as a determined teenager who stood up for herself. She’s not perfect–why would she be? I see the other teens as being average teens–normal, every day high schoolers. I do note that you expect a higher level of maturity for Constance than her classmates though (at one point you say that Constance at 18 should have adult judgement; at another point you say that these are just HS seniors on the brink of adulthood–I’m paraphrasing). Why is that?
Yes, change is difficult. Change on a community level is damned hard. But it is necessary. Status quo or tradition or “least said, soonest mended” is no excuse or reason. The irony is that Constance tried to create a viable solution–she wanted to stop the nudge/wink policy and make prom access open and above-board for all. Jeebus on a cracker–why can’t a girl wear a tuxedo to prom? A girl did to my prom in 1980 and it was no big deal. :rolleyes: If the town, county and all the good folk in it are so OK with gay couples at prom, then why the brouhaha?
And you still don’t see. Constance made a small step toward acceptance–she doesn’t want protection. She wants to live like an ordinary teen with all the perks and responsibilities that entails. She wants her sexual orientation to NOT matter in the day to day course of things in her town. So, I disagree that little good will come of this. What comes of it is up to the people and the county. And you are the one saying that they won’t change. You know them best, as you’ve said all along. Think about that and the criticism here–ironic, no? IMO, I’d prefer to think that the townsfolk will respond positively over time to teens like Constance.
Seriously, it does? I am not getting that from your posts. I am getting that girls who are different should keep their mouths shut, put up with the status quo, don’t make waves and by all means, don’t embarrass their elders. God help a teen boy who’s homosexual–he probably should never open his mouth and just move out.
Ah, yes. Intolerance to intolerance makes us bigots. I love that old chestnut so!
Ma’am, did you intend to prove my point about bigotry here in an ironic manner? I have not once claimed the school’s policy was right in any manner, nor that is was anthing but wrong to discriminate against her or anyone due to sexual orientation. My effort to show another side of this has caused posters to assume I do not support change. There is nothing to indicate she wanted anything other than personal gain at the onset - please refer to the discussions I have had with Marley previous in this thread. The way the media has portrayed her and the way most posters here idolized her and demonized all other parties I have issue with.
The way I expressed that was very poor on my part. If we are to forgive Constance for her manner due to her youth, then should we not forgive the actions of the other kids as well? If we hold her peers up to the light and try them as adults, then why not Constance? That was my thought process althought it came across very fragmented. For clarity’s sake, I do not like the way her peers acted either.
I did not claim the community at large was accepting of the situation. The faculty at her high school was doing was they felt was the best they could in the environment they were in. What I do not see is why people think Constance tried to change policy - she did not, she merely asked for a exception for herself and her companion. Once the ACLU got involved thankfully the entire rule was called into question and so it may change in the future, but that was not (by any account I have heard or read) what she requested initially. To assume she would have entered this fight had her original request been granted seems a leap to me. If the principle had said “Ok, I’ll give you written permission to break the rules” do you honestly think she would have gone any further?
See what? That you have made up your mind as to what was happening there and what she wanted? Can you support this somehow? She has no claims of persecution, no claims of previous denials of rights, no claims of threats or discriminatons… how do you see that she wasn’t treated like an ordinary teen prior to the prom incident?
Again where did I say they wouldn’t change? I suspect the community will eventually but this incident will set that change back considerably. That’s a signifigant part of my problem with making her some form of hero - she would have gotten just as much support (well, locally - I cannot speak for the rest of the country) had she asked the ACLU to challenge the rule at the first of the year. As I said, there are plenty of groups that would have supported her and helped in whatever manner they could. The way she chose to act validated alot of the stupid viewpoints held by the community and the effort to undo that will be much harder than a legal battle over a insipid rule. I’ll keep working towards making the community accepting of divergent viewpoints but making the climate colder is a loss even if the policy changes.
May I ask you to point that out via quotes? My views obviously differ from yours, but to say I expect people to shut up and put up is just vile. This seems like projection at its basest. Also, where ever you got that statement about the teen - please put it back. You have no idea how many teen boys are in the behavioural health unit down the road because when they came out their parents threw them out (no not just MS residents). It sickens me and breaks my heart at the same time.
It is rather dissapointing you would choose to make such a childish statement. Intolerance is bad, and I have never failed to say so.
Because Constance’s mistake seems to be that she didn’t go through the bureaucratic red tape in time and fill out the proper forms in triplicate. The mistake of everyone around her is to think that it’s fine and dandy to discriminate. You don’t think that discrimination is far worse than what Constance supposedly did wrong?
Wait, what? You originally said that Constance and everyone else DID have permission to go to the prom with whoever they wanted because the principal always turned a blind eye to students with same sex dates. You said she was causing a fuss because she wanted to change the policy so that in writing it said that anyone could go with anyone of whatever gender. Now you’re saying it’s not about policy. What WAS she asking for then?
And if she didn’t have permission for herself and her date, how is that not something worthy of protest?
Yep I don’t like discrimination, and have stated as much multiple times. Also, haven’t said she should have to cut through tape - I am very aware of how bureaucrats can delay issues - just that she should have started her complaint when she discovered the policy. To wait until the 11th hour casts a shadow over the whole event.
They had tacit approval, yes.
Nope
Again, she asked for a written letter allowing HER AND HER DATE to attend the prom and to wear non-gender specific clothing (that’s a nasty thing to have to type, btw). No request for a change to policy, a review of dress codes, nothing.
Who said it wasn’t?