While I had a nice evening out (a business meal, but a nice restaurant nonetheless, and the mussels, sea scallops, and apple pie were mighty tasty), my Devoted Readers were bombarding my email inbox with this story. Devoted Readers Mike D and Reginleif get the credit for being the fastest with the news about the 2nd-grade student in Lafayette, LA, who was suspended for using the word "gay" in school.
No, not for using the term as an insult, or as a means to bully another student. Hapless little Marcus McLaurin was using the term correctly to describe his own family. Marcus has two moms, you see, and when another kid asked about his parents, Marcus simply replied that he had two moms because his mom was gay, and gay is when a girl likes another girl.
Too bad Marcus didn't realize the punishment that awaited him for telling the truth about his family in such an innocuous fashion:
A teacher who heard the remark scolded Marcus, telling him "gay" was a "bad word" and sending him to the principal's office. The following week, Marcus had to come to school early and repeatedly write: "I will never use the word 'gay' in school again."
A phone message left for Lafayette Parish schools superintendent James Easton was not immediately returned.
The ACLU is demanding the case be removed from Marcus' file and that the school apologize to the boy and his mother, Sharon Huff.
"I was concerned when the assistant principal called and told me my son had said a word so bad that he didn't want to repeat it over the phone," Huff said. "But that was nothing compared to the shock I felt when my little boy came home and told me that his teacher had told him his family is a dirty word."
What the heck was the school thinking? Marcus does have a lesbian mother. His mom clearly told him the simple version of their life, probably never imagining that Marcus's school would consider the word "gay" was in and of itself too bad to be repeated over the phone.
Is this homophobia on the school's part? If so, it's pretty extreme - I've never heard of too many homophobes who are this afraid of just the word. Or is the school administration like one of the library computer filters that makes sure a site with the word "breast" in the title never gets accessed, regardless of whether it's a porn site or a website with information about breast cancer treatment? Is the word "gay" just completely off-limits, just to make sure the school can punish any kid who uses it as an insult, too?
Preposterous.
Posted by kswygert at December 2, 2003 09:16 PM