Comments on: Neff: Homophobes for hookie

By: Morgan

Morgan — Mon, 19 Apr 2010 04:27:23 +0000

Shame on AFA, Liberty Council,CWA, PFOX, Campaign for Children and Families and other enemies of GLBTs. By challenging the Day of Silence, you vote to continue to bully GLBT youth. You show yourselves to be anti-family, anti-youth and an enemy of the right of all to have a safe and quality education.
Get out of the way of the right of youth to finish their education and to make it to college.

By: Corey Allen

Corey Allen — Mon, 19 Apr 2010 01:09:35 +0000

What burns me about this is that those retarded overly self-righteous religious groups want to claim that A Day of Silence shoves propaganda in their faces. So being silent is shoving a message in their face?

What their really offended by is the fact that we have the audacity to say that we have the right to exist and live our lives as we see fit regardless of what they say. That we even exist without fear anymore insults them. If they wanna play homophobic hookie, let them. They can just be pissed later that the gay students has higher test scores than the straight ones.

By: Ed Gould

Ed Gould — Fri, 24 Apr 2009 05:01:06 +0000

Either coming to understand your sexuality or knowing that you are a GBLT person in this period of your life is really difficult and you must stand up to the authority figure (principal or teacher) and let them know that you are being mentally and physically harassed because of other students not being able to accept others as being different.
Personally I would do this:
1. Talk with your parents and have them accompany you to see the principal and have a witness to the Principals reaction.
2. WRite a letter to the Principal outlining your understanding as to how he is going to address the issue and *WHEN* this is going to happen.
3. Also let the teachers know and tell them you have talked with the principal.

If this does not help the next step is different as each school district is done differently.
Either write a letter to the school superintendent (or who ever has control over the Principal and let him/her know exactly what was said to the principal and enclose a copy of the letter you sent. You should also ask that a resolution needs to happen soon. Keep copies of all correspondence.
If nothing happens then you go to the mayor of the town with copies of all the documentation and ask that the education system be brought into the 20th century as well as the students be informed that gay bashing is *NOT* to be permitted and will be punished.

If you get no action then it is time to bring in the lawyers. Schools get nervous if you have lawyers around. BTW it would be helpful if you have a friend and him/her to take pictures (better) videos of the bashing (that is extremely important as then the school cannot say it is not happening). The other option is to carry around a tape recorder with you. Check with your state to see if that is legal as state laws vary.

Just remember to fully document each time you talk with any teacher/principal or any other school administrator. Again either by return email or by letter (with someone to accompany you to prove the individual has received the letter. EMAIL is OK but the email “proof issue” can be dodgy and might come back to bite you later on. *IF* this becomes a major issue you should probably consider Registered mail. Yes I know its $$ but again if it comes to a trial you will have an iron tight trail and the school personnel cannot get out of it in court. You might want to pay for return receipt as well and KEEP a copy of *ALL* correspondence and photos and eyewitness names.

I know this sounds like a pain but it will serve you better if it comes down to a lawsuit. Yes it is expensive but again it will make the lawyers (yours) job a LOT easier.

By: Alex

Alex — Wed, 22 Apr 2009 17:14:14 +0000

What this article doesn’t say is that the boy who hung himself didn’t even identify as LGBT. So it isn’t just some ‘deserved punishment for being gay’ or anything like that either. This was just a boy who didn’t fit into the mold, like most of us at that time. But none of the organizations that supported the walk out would think anything of that, I’ll bet. It’s horrible. Hopefully one day soon it will end. But until then, we must be silent one day, and too loud to ignore every other day! Don’t let anyone ever forget who we are, or what we’re fighting for.

By: brian

brian — Tue, 21 Apr 2009 02:23:56 +0000

I was bullied back in the late 70′s and early80′s for not only being gay which I didn’t know at the time and for being fat no one cared ,the school as today blamed me thus I was kept home which is too long a story for here needless to say the Government needs to get laws passed to protect children from bulling its just plain cruel and when teachers and principal ignore its just not right

By: Bart Phelps

Bart Phelps — Tue, 21 Apr 2009 02:22:09 +0000

American River College in Sacramento California has elected a Slavic-run homophobic student government that not only Supported Yes on 8, but has publicly denounced the day of silence. Someone should bring attention to this hate filled campus. There was an attempted recall of these officers but the student body failed to unseat the homophobes. This campus is a public community college with 32,000 students

By: KenByTheBeach

KenByTheBeach — Tue, 21 Apr 2009 02:20:26 +0000

This abuse must stop now! How does the school remain silent? IF a child is harassing another child, then they need to intervene. Advise the parents. If the abuse continues, keep disciplining the child. Counsel and advise the child why it is wrong to hurt and hate another child. Teach them how to respect diversity. Expel them if they wont stop. If one student called another one a “nigger”, would you stop it? Would you allow it to continue? Of course not! Then why do you allow the viscous name calling and even physical abuse and torture of a gay (or perceived to be gay) student?

By: Gretchen

Gretchen — Tue, 21 Apr 2009 02:04:50 +0000

fr Jessica:

>…im 14 and go to middle school were i EVERYDAY get picked on for being bisexual!Infact some of my teachers also join in on this tourment!just because i can take it dosent mean other kids can!<

Jessica, what you need to do, and have the RIGHT to do, is tell the principal about what is going on. INSIST that they listen to YOU. If you feel safe about it, tell your parents and DEMAND that the school board find out about what is going on in your school. You have the RIGHT to a harassment-free education.

By: Sarrellec

Sarrellec — Mon, 20 Apr 2009 22:53:04 +0000

Who but these psychopaths could view SILENCE in a classroom as detrimental to learning?!
When I was in school, they really LIKED silence, unless, as the kids who participate in the Day of Silence practice, it was to speak in response to a teacher.
Only these psychopaths could see SILENCE as *disturbing* to other students.
I suppose yelling names and pushing students and harrassing students isn’t *disturbing* to other students and detrimental to the learning experience.
Again…when I was in school…such rowdy behavior was the definition of disturbing the classroom.
Up is down, white is black, War is Peace, Freedom is Slavery, Ignorance is Strength, silence is disturbing, verbal and physical attack is conducive to the learning process.
Yep…psychopaths all.

By: Matt

Matt — Mon, 20 Apr 2009 22:49:36 +0000

I’m a teacher in the Dayton OH area and didn’t observe any drop in attendance- but I also didn’t observe anybody participating either.

Personally, I think the DOS ought to be rebranded as the “Day of Making A Ton of Noise” instead- the notion of “silence” doesn’t do enough to address this issue. Better still to make it some kind of national day of gay service, to show how useful we are to our communities.