You mean all this time I’ve been a lesbian?
Guess that’s why I was able to fall in love with kaylasmom. I wonder how she’s going to take the news.
Am i imagining things, or does shit like this seem to come out of Florida on a disproportionate number of occasions?
Anyway, the student herself doesn’t seem to feel that her sexual orientation was the main issuehere:
I also really loved this bit:
And it seems that the photo made it into the yearbook through another route:
Unfortunately, I don’t think your kilt-wearing antics would work here, where both diversity and kilts are encouraged.
Or at a school where the band is the Marching Scottish Rebels. Yes, they wear kilts - even in Mardi Gras parades.
Let’s keep something in mind here. The picture in question wasn’t an impromptu shot of students around the school. It was a senior picture, for that section of the yearbook. And there is usually a pretty strict dress code for them.
I had to wear a jacket and tie in mine. The girls had to be in dresses.
This phenomenon is so well known that most photographers today offer a package deal, with the more formal shots destined for the yearbook and more informal ones earmarked for family and friends.
So no, I don’t see this as a gay rights issue, nor one of personal freedom. What it is, ironically, is a freedom of the press issue. The school is sponsoring the yearbook, and has every right to control its content.
Anyone who doesn’t like it can publish their own yearbook. Does anyone else here remember the one from C. Estes Kefauver High, Dacron, OH 1964?
Heh, heh. On a popular radio show called “Loveline,” hosts Adam Corolla and Dr. Drew play this fun game called “Florida or Germany?” They have callers relate news articles with some really fucked-up content (i.e. “Man dies by asphyxiation from own farts in a poorly ventilated room”), and then guess whether the story originated from Florida or Germany. 
It certainly does have the right to control the content, a power so recognized by the SCOTUS…and have done so in a way that demonstrates the prejudices of the administration. What possible harm would come of publishing a picture of a girl in a tuxedo?
I put up with all this kind of nonsense from my high school (in fly-over country) and in retrospect am appalled by the decisions they made (someone doesn’t like a book? Throw it out of the library) and the policies they handed down, which led me to enroll in a different high school my senior year.
Stranger
Back in my high school years (1950s) in Dallas, a girl wouldn’t have been allowed to attend class had she shown up wearing pants, much less have her picture taken for the yearbook. I would have thought school administrators had mellowed during the last fifty years, but I guess not.
I’m almost embarrassed to mention that this is the county school system where my daughter graduated last year, although not the same school, obviously. The superintendent is an ass, plain and simple. Things have to be his way, period. For example, my daughter’s school went several years using block scheduling - 3 blocks a day rather than 6 or 7 periods. The kids wound up spending more time per class each week since each block was double-length, but without as much class-change time wasted. Just about everyone loved that scheduling. Except for the superintendent. So it went away.
I thought the picture of the girl in the tux was adorable! I certainly wouldn’t have been scandalized to see any girl dressed like that in the yearbook.
And when you come right down to it - it’s a high school yearbook! What’s the big deal?? Most of them wind up moldering in a basement or attic. Exactly who is hurt by this?
Sheesh. I am so glad to be out of Florida.
Stellar logic there, chief.
“That’s the way it’s done, it’s a system that’s been in place for a long time, so that’s all you need to know about it.”
I’m just glad the abolitionists and the suffragists didn’t feel the way you do.
Sure it’s stellar logic. American society imposes a dress code upon individuals for certain occasions. This is merely another example of this.
If you don’t like it, you can wear other clothing at other times or choose not to participate in that particular event.
Sexuality isn’t at issue here. I have little sympathy for anyone unwilling to make a small concession in terms of personal dress because of the formality of the occasion. It reminds me of that woman on a Whitewater jury who came to court every day in her Star Trek uniform, making herself a national laughingstock in the process.
If Kelli Davis is so inflexible in her choice of attire, she will find herself virtually unemployable and socially outcast. Her choice, surely, but others shouldn’t be forced to facilitate this choice.
I dress casually most of the time, but I put on a suit and tie when I need to do so. One of these times is when I got my senior picture taken. I’ll bet you’ve dressed formally at times when you’d be more comfortable wearing something else.
This is the kind of thing responsible adults do, and don’t complain about. If Ms. Davis can’t do this, perhaps she isn’t ready to graduate high school yet.
So we agree, then, that the school principal was being a jackass?
After all, the girl’s dress lacked none of the formality required of the occasion.
My female partner wore a tux to my law school graduation ball. The world continued to turn. Pity to those who live in socially backward regions.
Or, perhaps, the principal in this case isn’t mature enough to recognize that his penis will not get any smaller (if that’s possible) if he lets a female student appear “in drag” in the yearbook.
You can put forward any argument based upon tradition, appropriate attire, and so forth, that you like but the obvious fact is that the decision is based strictly on small-minded bigotry, whether it is in regard to her sexual orientation or attire. If she insisted on appearing in some kind of truly inappropriate attire (like a clown suit) or topless (hmmm?) then one could make some kind of case; but the fact is the outfit she chose was worn by roughly half of the people taking the picture. The principal objected to the fact that she wasn’t in the appropriate half.
Yes, she could choose not to participate, but given that she can’t participate in another venue, it isn’t really analogous to more voluntary situations. If she didn’t like the dress code at a job, she could find new employment; but she can’t insert herself into a different yearbook. As silenus so succintly stated, this is a case of “Conform or be cast out.”
And I think her parents are both very supporting and effing brilliant. Kudos to them.
Stranger
That sounds like fun. I might have to track it down.
I believe that school administrations may make reasonable expectations on the behavior of the students entrusted to them, for the sake of producing responsible, well educated adults.
That allowance ends sharply when social custom becomes “school rules.” It is perhaps to the advantage of those who would turn free American citizens into conformist sheep afraid to break any rule laid down by the authorities to inculcate this sort of attitude in students, and I’m not at all surprised at the people supporting the principal; it goes hand in glove with their apparent failure to consider liberty worth defending within America.
But, while this was obviously a “statement” by the young lady in question, it had her parents’ endorsement (to the tune of $700 paid for the ad!) and it is not the responsibility of the principal to establish a dress code for yearbook pictures, unless they plan to publish said yearbook at school expense and hand it out free, something I strongly doubt was the case.
Just from the flatulence angle, I’m gonna guess Germany. Based on their love for beer, oompaa music, anal compulsion, and physical comedy, slicing the ol’ limburger is probably a cherished form of cultural expression over there.
Ah high school…
Some damn shitty years in my opinion. Hated all the conformity, and “school spirit” being shoved down my throat constantly.
But basicly, that’s high school for ya: Conform (in my case this meant wearing baggy pants, polo shirts and listening to rap) or become a social outcast (I wore jeans, tee-shirts, and a top hat, and listened to metal). So glad I’m out of there.
Re: “I must be disconnected from reality, because I can’t imagine how people could be this dumb.”
Just imagine how dumb the average person is. Now realize that half the population is dumber than that.
During my junior year, a senior’s picture was published with him in a smoking jacket holding a pipe.
Strict dress code. Right.
[sub](I know you said ‘usually’, but I couldn’t pass it up.)[/sub]
That’s just amazing. Regardless of the outcome of this brouhaha, that right there should spark an audit of this guy’s ability to be principal. You can’t exactly run a school when you’re on a different planet, after all.