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Articles From Our April, 2003 Newsletter |
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April Meeting Our own Helma Hawkins, Director of Youth Services and Collection Planning for the Kansas City Public Library, will present the April program on one of her favorite topics, books for glbt teens. We will learn about the changes in publishing trends since she first began presenting programs about literature for glbt youth in the late 1980s. It will be a good time to learn about award-winning new books in this Among the books Helma will discuss are: Come join us on April 13 at Village Presbyterian Church at 3pm. The We are living in difficult times. The rulers of America have declared
a "preemptive war" against a country ruled by a ruthless dictator.
That country is not a threat to us, however the Washington D.C. regime, in its
quest for empire and control over oil has embroiled us in an illegal war.
In order to wage its aggressive war these rulers are threatening our civil
rights at home. All of this means that anyone or any group viewed as Helen Cohen ARKANSAS SCHOOL ACCUSED OF HARASSING GAY STUDENT "The assistant principal called me out of seventh period, asked if my parents knew I was gay, and when I said no, she said I had till 3:40 to tell them or the school would," said Thomas, a 14-year old student at Jacksonville Junior High School in Arkansas. "I was too upset to sit through eighth period, so I went to the guidance counselor, and she made the call. Later, the science teacher wrote me a four-page handwritten letter about the Bible's teachings on homosexuality, telling me I would be condemned to Hell. I threw it out." That was a more than a year ago. Since then, the McLaughlin family says, the school has continued to harass Thomas because of his homosexuality. The teachers and administrators who outed Thomas last year now want to silence him, the McLaughlins say, by telling him not to discuss homosexuality in school and disciplining him for doing so. They also say that a different assistant principal called Thomas to his office this year and made him read aloud a Bible passage condemning homosexuality. The McLaughlins' account is the only one made public so far. The school district, citing student privacy rights, has not provided any details of its actions. The superintendent, Don Henderson, said that he could not respond to the accusations because the facts had not yet been established. Jay Bequette, the lawyer for the district, said he had no comment on the case. Earlier this month, the American Civil Liberties Union, representing the McLaughlins, wrote to Dr. Henderson, accusing the school of violating Thomas's rights to free speech, equal protection and privacy, and asking for assurances by last Friday that there would be no further violations of Thomas's rights. "Students should not be punished for being honest about their sexual orientation," Leslie Cooper, a lawyer with the A.C.L.U.'s Lesbian and Gay Rights Project, said. "Jacksonville Junior High School has trampled on Thomas McLaughlin's constitutional rights." On Friday, the A.C.L.U. deadline, the district released a brief statement on the case, saying: "Based on the information the district has received, the district is unable to substantiate, and therefore denies, the specific allegations set forth in the letter. The district denies that it intentionally violated the student's constitutional rights, and no disciplinary action has been taken because of the student's sexual orientation." The statement went on to say that if school personnel had" advocated religious beliefs," as the A.C.L.U. asserted, "such action was not appropriate and is not condoned by the district." The district said it could not comment on a student's confidential disciplinary record without permission from the student and his parents, so without that permission there would be no further comment. Ms. Cooper said the A.C.L.U. would take the matter to court,
if the school Thomas said the issue of his sexual orientation first arose when a classmate asked if he liked a certain girl, and he responded that there was a reason he was not attracted to that girl or any other in the school. The other boy then asked if he was gay. "I said, if I am, I am, and if I'm not, I'm not," Thomas said. "The science teacher overheard us. He told me to stop talking about that stuff. The next thing I know, the assistant principal calls me out of class." His mother, Delia McLaughlin, said she was shocked that afternoon to get a telephone call from the guidance counselor about her son's sexuality. "I remember she said he was having feelings for other males," Ms. McLaughlin said. "Those were the words she used. I was upset in the first place that I'm finding out my son's gay, but that it was a school administrator who told me, that was beyond my reasoning. Thomas didn't tell me about the Bible preaching until recently. That's what made me call the A.C.L.U. We're Christians, but this isn't the school's business. It's something for us, the parents, to talk about." Heartland Men’s Chorus shows military pride can coexist
with activism Of course, the choir had no idea a year ago, when it made its plans, that we'd be embroiled in war. If the resulting concert seemed refreshing on Sunday, it was perhaps because one hears so little dissent about anything military these days. The program of music and narrative told the long history of gays in the service, beginning with the Revolutionary War, when George Washington brought an allegedly gay Baron Von Steuben to discipline his troops. Shortly afterward, the military began to expel gays from its ranks. Today's military continues to create an atmosphere in which "discrimination and harassment are tolerated, in some cases even encouraged," said Col. Margarethe Cammermeyer, who once was discharged from the Army for being a lesbian after decades of heroic service in Vietnam and at home. She spoke of her experiences and of others in a commentary that tied together the disparate musical elements on Sunday's program. Also on hand were Kansas City residents Wally and Patricia Kutteles, whose son, Barry Winchell, was beaten to death in his Army barracks because he was presumed to be gay. Winchell's father spoke with great emotion about a song whose lyrics had meant much to his son: "What Is America to Me?" The program responded with sensitivity to the seriousness of the theme. There were comic moments, such as Randy Hite's solo in "I Joined the Army" or the seven soloists of the HeartAches in "Don't Ask, Don't Tell." Thomas G. Anderson was a fine soloist in "The Ballad of Mrs. Nash." "We Kiss in a Shadow" from "The King and I" got a new gay spin from the HeartAches. Tunes like "Who Are the Brave?" seemed to strike a nerve. The encore of "America, the Beautiful" reminded us that all this talk of freedom is not just theoretical. |
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