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Gay High School


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Where lives matter, the people who run these schools deserve a medal.

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/national/gay-high-schools-offer-a-haven-from-bullies/ar-BBkUJR3?ocid=LENDHP

Despite the anti-gay moves against such schools (Rubin Diaz and Westboro Baptist) the positive atmosphere give the gay students the one thing they need....an education. When a bully threatens a gay child they are creating more than physical harm, they prevent a student from learning. Every city should have schools like this, but where are they and why don't they?

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The most important content in this article is the section on the San Francisco School District which makes every high school gay-friendly. Scroll down to "The San Francisco Unified School District is one among a few districts that have made significant efforts to ensure the safety of all students..." and read those two paragraphs.

My personal opinion is that all-gay high schools are the wrong approach. What San Francisco is doing is the right approach.

In the Bay Area it's not just San Francisco being proactive. When I was in high school the district implemented a no-bullying no-harassment program and it worked. The main feature is that it integrated the students into the program, and was pro-active when bullying or harassment was reported. The majority of the students realized it was working when the district expelled two students for physically attacking a Muslim girl and another student for multiple incidents of bullying a gay student. The biggest win was when a student objected to the Day of Silence by wearing a "God Hates Fags" T and was told to turn it inside out or he'd be suspended for the day and a parent would have to pick him up if he didn't want to sit in the office for the rest of the day. His father sued the school district and the judge ruled the school did what was necessary to protect students.

Colin :icon_geek:

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I fully agree with Colin on this one. I live in a region where not so long ago it was deemed sufficient to provide schooling to black children in so-called 'separate but equal' all-black schools, and I think our cultural history has demonstrated clearly that the separate but equal doctrine is not only an evasion, it prevents the development of understanding and acceptance. I would hate to see us embrace a new form of sequestering as a way to "solve" the problem of bullying.

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I laud San Francisco for the right attitude and the conviction that all students in their schools are equal....we it so elsewhere. Looking back at 2014 we can see that too many gay kids don't seem to have a chance in public schools. Teachers don't care, school boards don't care, and some of them are plainly homophobic. Just look at the suicide rates.

When a teacher tells a gay kid that bullying is just a part of growing up that adult needs electric shock treatment. I think until all states adopt laws that suppress bullying and order school boards to follow the rules then we are going to continue damaging the gay kids. Bullies should be expelled, it needs to become a crime. As I have said, the physical assaults are criminal but the psychological assaults are just as damaging. When a child is prevented from learning by bullies or teachers we are faced with the larger crime.

Segregating gay kids is an act of desperation for a situation out of control. Until the political, and yes, the religious attitude changes we will never see progress.

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I totally agree with Chris. While what many schools now have is miraculous, in places where this attitude toward bullying has not been established, where administrators will not stand up for these kids, where school boards are indifferent to the problem, something has to be done. These bullied and terrorized kids cannot wait for the climate to change. They are living in the now, not some halcyon future.

Sure it would be better to have what Colin had, what many schools have now adopted. That's the ideal. But not all schools have that. Colin didn't grow up in the Bible Belt. But a lot of kids do. Are we just going to throw them under the bus? Society needs to change for this to work. It has changed in the Bay Area, and other places as well. We all hope that progress continues. In the meantime, takng kids out of harm's way is still the best course of action.

C

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Colin didn't grow up in the Bible Belt.

Of this I am glad. If he had, he might have been assimilated by the religious collective giving them access to a fully functional brain and that would make them much more dangerous.

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Of this I am glad. If he had, he might have been assimilated by the religious collective giving them access to a fully functional brain and that would make them much more dangerous.

Even if the religious collective had the structure of the Borg, I would not have been assimilated. Even when I was in elementary school my bullshitdar was fully functional.

I went to a Catholic school through fifth grade and told my folks I wanted out and to go to sixth grade at Walnut Creek Intermediate. They agreed.

Colin :icon_geek:

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