Gay teen draws scorn for proposed club at school

[Herman Munster]

http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/16363726.htm

OKEECHOBEE - The message to gays in this rural cattle town is spoken politely, sometimes with a drawl, sometimes quoting the Bible, but the meaning is anything but a hospitable Southern welcome. High school senior Yasmin Gonzalez has been hearing it a lot lately -- from kids hanging out bus windows shouting, ''Are you the one that's gay?'' to the teacher who said homosexuals should die. Gonzalez, 17, has become something of a target since November, when the American Civil Liberties Union filed a federal lawsuit on her behalf against the Okeechobee High School principal and school board for refusing to let her establish a Gay-Straight Alliance, an after-school club that promotes dialogue and tolerance.

''There's so much discrimination here,'' she says. She is suing under the 1984 federal Equal Access Act, which ironically was initially pushed by evangelical Christians after some public schools banned after-school prayer meetings and other religious gatherings. It says that if a public school allows any extracurricular activities to meet on campus, it must allow all groups to do the same. Similar challenges have been mounted by other groups in Utah, Georgia and North Carolina.

But public sentiment runs against Gonzalez in Okeechobee, a town of about 5,500 residents and around 60 churches 70 miles northwest of West Palm Beach. ''I don't think it's right. If they're going to let that in school, it's showing it's OK. In the Bible it says it's an abomination. is not a message you want to give your kids,'' 31-year-old Dave Mangold said, sitting on a picnic bench in the heart of town one afternoon.

Gonzalez doesn't believe in God or pray anymore, ''because you can only be told you are going to hell so many times,'' she says. She has never really fit in here anyway, she says. She wears short, spiky hair and dresses like a boy.

[Ron Green]

1. Change is difficult, but it's worth doing.

Good luck to her in her struggle.

[terrya]

2. Yasmin Gonzalez is a heroine.

This gay man gets very discouraged and disheartened at the bigotry and ignorance displayed against GLBT people in this country. God knows it's worse in schools....

My admiration of Yasmin Gonzalez and others like her who tries to combat homophobia knows no bounds. My very best wishes to her and others like her.

[mitchtv]

3. Chistians

or rather Pharisees

[theoldman]

4. 5500 residents and 60 churches does not sound right.

[RubyDuby in GA]

6. It's the South. That sounds just about right.

[tkmorris]

9. It does to me

That area is the kind of place you have to see to believe. This kid is a lot braver that you probably think; this sort of thing could get her shot out there.

[Tempest]

11. It's right

Go to the chamber of commerce web sites of towns in the south and you'll find the resident to church ratio to be rather high. Especially in states like Texas and South Carolina.

[RubyDuby in GA]

5. Screw public sentiment. The law is the law.

It says a lot of things in the Bible. What the hell happened to common sense and compassion?
I hate bigots.

[Goblinmonger]

7. They must not eat lobster in Okeechobee

nor wear cotton/polyester blend t-shirts since those, too, are abominations.

[CornField]

8. "you can only be told you are going to hell so many times"

Technically, Yasmin, I don't believe there are any stead-fast rules concerning such things. At least, it has been my experience that even when you stop attending church and stop praying, some folks still feel the need to inform you where you soul will end up.

Don't let it get you down. From what I've been able to gather, a wide majority of the best people on earth have been condemned to hell. At least we know we'll have good company.

-----

I think Moore's bus should take another road trip to Okeechobee.

[gratuitous]

10. Does the law apply to everyone, or just the popular folks?

How, er, ironic (?) that the persecuted majority, seeking to cast their own rights in stone, wind up enabling the rights of true minorities, and sufferers of real persecution at that.

Keep on, Sister Yasmin; and if you ever find yourself up my way, you and anyone you want to bring with you are welcome in my church.

[knitter4democracy]

12. Her teacher needs to be dressed down in the teachers' lounge.

That kind of antagonism from a teacher is never okay.

I just wish I could give her a big hug and help her get through her days. I hope she has at least one teacher doing that.

[msongs]

13. 100's of millions murdered in 2000 years, so what's a little gay bashing? nt

[Hippo_Tron]

14. The bible also says you can't eat shrimp or grow different crops side by side

These people are certainly selective about what they decide to interpret literally.