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Should the Classroom be a Battleground Over Sexual Orientation?
I live relatively close to a community that just made national headlines thanks to a group of high school kids who reportedly decided to protest against gays in response to their high school’s “Day of Silence” — an event that’s supposed to raise awareness about LGBT bullying. I am not at all surprised at the situation, including the actions of both the students and the administration (at least as it was reported in Huffington Post.)
This is an inherently contentious issue — particularly, between liberals promoting the LGBT agenda and social conservatives — but I’m falling back on my previous experience in education. To put it bluntly, this battle is turning teens into pawns in an adult game of chess, and, unfortunately, those kids have no idea what is happening to them. While the liberals claim that they are trying to make schools safer for kids who are different, the bottom line is that they are doing them a disservice. The fact remains that they are trying to force radical change in societal norms and mores – something that we’ve seen before in history, after the abolition of slavery. The difference now is that instead of attempting to force acceptance of people who simply have a different skin color, they are trying to force acceptance of a behavior.
It doesn’t matter that anyone considers this activity a sin. The context here is our schools, the intended audience is immature teens, and the behavior in question is just different. That is more than enough to cause social problems and bullying. Even worse, all of the adults concerned—on both sides of the argument—seem to be ignoring a key fact: While we haven’t reached the point where we can specifically say exactly what causes homosexuality, one thing that the mental health experts agree on is that sexual orientation can be fluid. From Psychiatry.org:
Some people believe that sexual orientation is innate and fixed; however, sexual orientation develops across a person’s lifetime. Individuals maybe become aware at different points in their lives that they are heterosexual, gay, lesbian, or bisexual.
While there is general agreement on that concept in the field of modern psychiatry, there are at least a few arguments about when children develop sexual identities. Those arguments mean that even teens in high school may not be considered mature enough to fully understand their own sexual identities. Most experts seem to agree that kids have a clue before puberty, however they may engage in denial or experimentation well beyond their high school years. So, what is this “Day of Silence” really about?
Dr. Susan Berry’s article at Breitbart likened the LGBT movement to a cult — at least in some respects — and she may not be far off. This intense desire to have teens pigeonhole themselves and force everyone to validate everyone else’s lifestyle is dangerous. Negating the opinions of teens that are uncomfortable with the concept of homosexuality results in the “anti-gay” protests seen here in Pennsylvania. While there is nothing invalid about teens thinking that they might be attracted to people of the same gender, wishing to have nothing to do with those kinds of feelings and activities is equally valid. What everyone seems to be forgetting is that these are not adults.
Teens today are arguably far less equipped to deal with adult issues like this in anywhere close to a mature manner than teens of previous decades. Child-rearing in America has changed significantly over the past 30 years, and the end result is a generation of children who expect adults to take care of them well into their 20s or even 30s. We are arguing over whether or not children can walk to a playground alone, while simultaneously getting upset about teens not managing to deal with sexual identity issues in a civil manner! It could be said there’s nothing wrong with the kids; the adults are the ones in need of mental help.
It’s time to stop putting children, including teens, in the middle of this argument. Find a middle ground, and fast. If nothing else, stick with the science that professionals seem to agree on—that human sexuality is developing continuously through a person’s life. Society as a whole doesn’t need to weigh in on who is right or wrong, provided that those involved are consenting adults. (Yes, I know that’s a rough one for many social conservatives.) Most of all, teens need to feel that they can speak freely on sexuality to adults.
Perhaps a return to what liberals might call the dark ages is needed. Instead of schools encouraging teens to be open about sexuality with each other, we need to return to rules that discourage “public displays of affection” and sex talk among students. They’ll still talk and make out, of course, but that behavior doesn’t need to be in the spotlight all the time.
The funny thing is that most of the experts also seem to agree that kids, regardless of age, tend to hide sexual experimentation from adults. Who told the adults pushing all this open sexuality in schools that it was a good idea? It’s time to call those people to task for this, and ask them why they think it’s a good idea to force what had normally been a private part of development into the public eye.
Published in Culture
From what I understand, he was nice enough in high school because he was stoned all the time. All the stoners I knew were nice enough too.
yes, so much time is wasted. In the past two weeks, students in my school have missed class or disturbed the regular flow of instruction for some sort of drug dog search, a drug assembly, some other assembly, the day of silence, and the grim reaper. Barely a week goes by without some ‘event’ that disrupts what should be uninterrupted.
While day of silence is supposedly a student led action, it is planned and delivered inside the school, with faculty support as part of a ‘club.’
If parents want to support these protests and community actions, with their children and peers, outside of school, I’d say that is a much more appropriate venue to accomplish whatever goal they may have in mind.
Personally, I want our young people to be happy and well adjusted, and I care about them and their feelings. But I’m just tired of teenagers bringing every bandwagon in to distract themselves and their peers from learning.
Right—which the VRWC didn’t have to dig too deeply to discover since he outed himself in Dreams of My Father. Better a stoner than a bully.
I don’t doubt for a moment that Mitt led the hair-cut brigade back at Cranbrook—he didn’t even deny it, only said he couldn’t recall, which is lame. He should have said “yes, I was a real jerk in those days. I hope God has made some improvements to me since high school” and been done with it. It was high school! And boarding school at that—everyone I know who went to boarding school has Lord of the Flies stories to tell.
Which brings us back to the subject of the post: the stoners and the bullies are easy to spot, but I’d offer one cautionary note for my fellow middle-aged posters— only since becoming an adult did I learn that one good friend had been raped as a little kid. Or that another was being savagely mistreated by her step-mother. Or–yes— that a few were gay and terrified of revealing it. Nor did even my good friends know, of me, that I had been sexually abused. I’m all for modesty, but I have to recognize that the dark side of “modesty” is misplaced and undeserved silence and shame.
Gary, yes, the HuffPo piece was written from a gay rights perspective and that the OP here was not. HuffPo is a liberal website. This is not. Perhaps that would explain the difference in perspective.
And, yes, I went to high school in the U.S. (Very insulting, btw, to suggest that because I disagree with you, I must have been raised abroad.) Guess what: I was mocked and sometimes had a rough time because I was fat. I wish kids were nice to each other. I sure hope mine are. But there are no days of silence and constant hand-wringing over the plight of fat kids or the nerdy and awkward or the stupid or the pimple-faced or the smelly or the poor. I’m not sure exactly why, but the bottom line is that these groups aren’t in the coalition of the oppressed, so nobody worries about them. It’s troubling to me that LBGT kids are mocked and bullied. But, I also find it utterly unremarkable. Their difficulties in youth do not separate them from the rest of us; it’s a common struggle.
Most of all, I think the Liz makes a great point. If we all kept our sexuality to ourselves a bit more, there’d be less to mock. After all, high school kids are simple, and they mock what they see.
A bit older than you, Cato. And you are right, I don’t think he was openly gay. But he was also a male cheerleader, if I recall correctly- he must have been fearless. He was charming and genuinely nice to everybody. It wasn’t till he ran for homecoming queen that I remember any thought he might be gay, but it really was not a big deal. I remember another boy who was seriously into theater, and he also was a respected leader though much quieter, and everybody assumed he was gay. Neither of them had a boyfriend that I know of, but neither did I :)
Our school was amazingly safe, sane and pleasant, in retrospect. With three 850-student high school classes we were not all friends, and there was teasing and verbal bullying (and outside of school no doubt physical bullying) but overall we rubbed along pretty well. I suspect that is because the parents and administrators were level-headed grownups.
Really? I have no doubt 99% of Romney’s classmates thought he was nice enough, too. Maybe I’m paranoid to think it’s odd that we pretty much know what Romney had for breakfast in high school, but Obama apparently did nothing that was the least bit interesting, for good or bad, ever. Or maybe you are oddly incurious.
I think we got male cheerleaders not long after I graduated. But they wore pants, not skirts, and if you’ve ever watched cheerleading, it can be a pretty athletic activity. So I think they got a pass on that. Also definitely had threater and music kids. My HS was very big into that and put on some awfully professional looking productions. I guess looking back, there was always maybe a vague sense that some of those boys might have been gay. At least one I know turned out to be. I’m not close to him but by coincidence he wound up a year ahead of me at the same law school, so we have mutual friends even today. He would never have acknowledged being gay back then though, nor would I have. It literally would have brought the whole community down on us, destroyed our families, humiliated our parents. It was just unthinkable. It was a shame we had to bear in silence. I’m still glad less kids have to go through that today.
Everyone got bullied by today’s standards, even the popular kids. They had their own pecking order, I’m sure. I wouldn’t know cuz I was a nerd. Everyone got bullied, but no one will cop to having done the bullying. Probably because we all did it, at least in our hearts. Nobody in high school is fully tolerant, even the nice nerdy kids complained about the jocks. Nowaways, complaining would be considered bullying and intolerant and non-inclusive and other-ing.
I agree, thank goodness it’s not as difficult. The two boys I remember were remarkably confident, serene and mature. Maybe they figured out they had to be.
gts109, given the state of our high schools, when I ask if you’ve been schooled overseas it’s a compliment–and since it displeases you, I’m happy to retract it. You were the one who brought up HuffPo not me, and I pointed out that the article didn’t back up a word of the OP.
Everyone on here is telling a personal story–you, me, Cato, Jojo, Kate. You’ve heard Cato’s, so when I read you say the “alleged plight” of these gay kids then yes, I take that as insulting the honesty of each commenter who’s trying to clue you in on how non-alleged it is. Maybe you and I are easily insulted.
Not all bullying is related to gayness. Have you seen anyone here who has ever said anything to the contrary? Point it out.
Gary, most of us are Americans. I’d stray from insinuating otherwise (no offense to our openly Canadian brethren). It’s likely to be taken the wrong way, your good intentions aside.
Anyway, I didn’t mean to suggest that LGBT kids are not subject to bullying. I should have said “over-exposed” plight instead of “alleged.” I’m sure it’s incredibly difficult to grow up gay, even if it’s not the subject of ridicule or worse. But being bullied doesn’t set them apart. You don’t even contest that, yet you maintain that conservatives are obsessives for scratching their heads over the left’s singular focus on one kind of bullying.
You’re missing the point about HuffPo. HuffPo’s coverage of the issue pre-dates Liz’s post, thereby blowing up your claim that this issue is a particular obsession of the right. Frankly, these kinds of discussions begin on the left with the right on its heels reacting. That’s how the culture war operates. Some element of the cultural left picks a new thing about our culture that must go now, and social conservatives scramble to try and preserve tradition.
I grew up in a small Georgia town, the class of 79 was around 200 people, I can say that I didn’t know a gay person til I went to college ( my randomly assigned roommate at a small baptist school( Mercer University) was gay I found out sophomore year). None were out. It was a subject that wasn’t talked about, or in my case even thought about. There was some use of gay slurs, the n word, not to much bullying, but definite groups that people segregated themselves into. we had racially segregated proms and homecoming kings and queens for each prom. No inter-racial dating.
I’m not so sure the left’s focus on bullying (and frankly, I’d hope we could make it “our” focus — I assume no one’s “pro-bullying”) is limited to gay kids. I think it’s easy to get that impression for a couple of reasons: 1) “faggot” has topped the charts as a schoolyard taunt for a long time; and 2) the gay rights movement was a real innovator in bringing the bullying of gay kids to public attention at a time when there wasn’t much public attention paid to bullying of any kind. But in that I think we did a real public service whose benefits now extend beyond gay kids. Think of the phrase “fat shaming.” It sounds PC as all get out, but it’s basically the notion that bullying people for being overweight is a nasty anti-social practice. That public recognition followed in the wake of the movement against anti-gay bullying, as has a more general movement to try to reduce bullying of all types among kids. I just don’t see how that’s a bad thing. No, we’ll never stamp out all bullying. It’s too hard wired in human nature, especially for kids. But to have the people who’s job it is to supervise children a third of the day on notice that they need to be on the lookout for it and take it seriously is not a step backward.
Cato, right, no one is pro-bullying! Sometimes, liberal culture warriors have a good point, as you note so well. Nobody should be called nasty names, or worse, because of sexual orientation. That norm wasn’t widely recognized even 20 years ago. I agree that’s progress.
I just bristle at the notion (which was not something that you put forward) that social conservatives are on the offensive on these issues. Liz’s point–that stepping back open discussion of sexuality (without going back to shameful hiding)–is a good one, I think, and a fair response to the push that everyone just accept that some young men are going to wear high heels on the school bus. A step back or two towards Victorian morals would help everyone get along in the public sphere, and then people can get their freak on in private without judgment.
As for fat issues, please don’t take me as some kind of fat advocate. I think fat people should lose weight, and they’ll be so much happier. At the same time, it’s still widely acceptable to mock the fat very openly and hatefully. Much moreso, IMO, than it is to mock gays.
I will seriously ask,
What do professional looking productions have to do with being gay?
and
What is this “vague sense” and how does it work? and does it only work to identify gay boys/men?
It doesn’t matter why you are being ridiculed, it is not pleasant to be the recipient. It is the mark of a cruel heart to deliver it to another person.
That bullying is such a behavior issue highlights a level of rampant, unkind and cruel behavior in our society.
I might suggest that instead of a day of silence, that students might consider joining together to create ‘scripted’ responses to intervene when the are witness or victim of various types of cruel, ridiculing behavior.
As a teacher, when I witness or hear any sort of unkind or cruel commentary or conversation, I declare to those students that is not ok, and follow-up further if necessary.
The truth is kids generally know what they say and do is wrong, and keep it out of earshot of adults. So the elimination of bullying really needs to begin with peer interactions.
Rather than being silent, the way to stop cruel and unkind behavior for peers to CALL IT OUT en masse for what it is, whenever they see it, or hear it.
The last thing a victim of ridicule and attack should do is be silent.
1) The comment about the productions being professional was independent of the comment about the vague sense that some of the participants might have been gay. They just happened to sit next to each other. No causal connection was intended.
2) There is a stereotype that many men in theater are gay. In fact, in musical theater which is what my HS did so well, it is true. Mr. Rand worked in Broadway theater for many years and at all levels of the industry, gay men are noticeably overrepresented. So the “vague sense” in this case was really based on a combination of that stereotype and – frankly – other stereotypes of gay men that certain of the guys in question seemed to fit.
3) As far as men/women, no. The stereotype (and I believe the reality) of the over-representation of gays in theater is really mostly a male phenomenon.
FYI, Mitt didn’t board there; he was a resident of Bloomfield Hills MI and lived at home. And I’m quite familiar with Cranbrook because my high school boyfriend attended the school. He and his friends were often snarky, rude, disdainful and sometimes insulting but they didn’t punch people out. In other words, they were acting like typical teenagers but never like thugs.
There is a difference.