Don't say gay

[jp1]

Back in 1980 when I was in sixth grade my elementary school had a "talent contest". One of my classmates decided to do a lipsync thing. They had a couple of friends holding up a beach towel as they danced to the tune of Itsy Bitsy Yellow Polka Dot Bikini. The towel was hiding the top half of their body from the audience but the bottom half of their body was in the bottom half of a yellow polka dot bikini. At the end of the song their friends dropped the towel and they made a shocked face and threw their hands up in the air. Of course the top half of their body was in the other half of the yellow polka dot bikini. The student body audience went nuts cheering at that point and my friend absolutely won the talent contest that day. You've probably figured out by now that my friend E, in his itsy bitsy teeny weeny yellow polka dot bikini was a guy. Doing drag in a sixth grade talent show. With his mom in the audience taking pictures. And everyone loved it. No freak outs from anyone from the school Principal on down to the youngest kindergartner and their parents. In florida today half the people in the room would probably have gone to jail.

[Yppej]

What a specious post. The law covers teachers providing instruction, not students, and grades 3 and under, not grade 6. But wallow in your false righteous indignation if it makes you feel good.

[happystuff]

Back in 1980 when I was in sixth grade my elementary school had a "talent contest". One of my classmates decided to do a lipsync thing. They had a couple of friends holding up a beach towel as they danced to the tune of Itsy Bitsy Yellow Polka Dot Bikini. The towel was hiding the top half of their body from the audience but the bottom half of their body was in the bottom half of a yellow polka dot bikini. At the end of the song their friends dropped the towel and they made a shocked face and threw their hands up in the air. Of course the top half of their body was in the other half of the yellow polka dot bikini. The student body audience went nuts cheering at that point and my friend absolutely won the talent contest that day. You've probably figured out by now that my friend E, in his itsy bitsy teeny weeny yellow polka dot bikini was a guy. Doing drag in a sixth grade talent show. With his mom in the audience taking pictures. And everyone loved it. No freak outs from anyone from the school Principal on down to the youngest kindergartner and their parents. In florida today half the people in the room would probably have gone to jail.

Cute story! Sounds like it probably ended up being a wonderful memory for your friend.

[jp1]

What a specious post. The law covers teachers providing instruction, not students, and grades 3 and under, not grade 6. But wallow in your false righteous indignation if it makes you feel good.

You don't think some of the kids would go back to their classrooms and ask "Ms. Yppej, why was that boy dressed up like a girl? What's that about?" How would a florida teacher answer that question without running afoul of the law.

But I'm not surprised that you don't give a shit. You've made it abundantly clear that the only thing you give a shit about when it comes to other people is their right to exhale potentially deadly virus on anyone in their vicinity.

[Alan]

You don't think some of the kids would go back to their classrooms and ask "Ms. Yppej, why was that boy dressed up like a girl? What's that about?" How would a florida teacher answer that question without running afoul of the law.

I think the teacher would be perfectly safe under Florida law to say "He was just pretending". What part of the law might lead you to believe otherwise?

[jp1]

‘But Ms Yppej why would a guy want to pretend to be a girl? My mommy took me to drag queen hour at the library and he was pretending too. That’s just gross.’

The appropriate answer is ‘because some people enjoying pretending which is fine.’ But because of the vagueness of the law Ms Yppej is like to say something less positive, or at best less clear and more confusing in order to avoid risking any trouble with the law. No one with any sense would want to become the test case for figuring out what that stupid law actually does.

[jp1]

Cute story! Sounds like it probably ended up being a wonderful memory for your friend.

He was a really nice guy. Definitely a bit of a clown but never mean to anyone in any way that I saw, just a big joker. Our elementary school was small (only 1 1/2 classes for each grade) so everyone was kind of/sort of friends with each other, but we were never close friends and in Jr High and Sr High, where there were a lot more people, didn't run in the same circles so I have no idea what became of him. When I told my older sister this story she was shocked. She had been in the same grade as E's older brother and responded "OMG. J (E's brother) would NEVER have done something like that. He was waaaaay too shy/introverted to perform in front of the whole school in drag as a joke."

[jp1]

And now the NH legislature’s republicans are working on an ‘out the kids’ bill that would require school staff to out kids to their parents if they talk to a teacher about gender issues or join a gay straight alliance. The harm they are willing to inflict on LGBT youth just to score a few votes at the polls is remarkable.

[Chicken lady]

My pottery students make wall tiles for my classroom at the end of the year. K-12.

student on Thursday “can I put a pride flag on my wall tile?”
me”it’s your tile, you can put whatever you want.”
pause
me again “wait, no, you can’t put a naked person, swear words, slurs or hate symbols on your tile. Other than that, you can put anything you want.”
Another student “what if I leave some of the letters out of the swear word?”
me “if I can figure out that it’s a swear word it won’t go up. And I use Google translate and read Tolkien based runes. (Pointing to Latin on existing tile) this says “truth is eternal.”

Another student “what if it’s just a naked butt and not the whole person?”

follows values trade off discussion on the permissibility of nudity in art vs. the desirability of me keeping my job and students whose parents might be upset by naked butts having the opportunity to take my classes.

Every year I ask myself more than once 1) what is the likelihood that this will get me fired? 2) will it have been worth it?
I have no interest in being in a position where I have to ask myself “what is the likelihood that this will get me a felony conviction?”

[flowerseverywhere]

Food for thought in Florida.

You can substitute teach with a high school diploma or equivalent. Pay average is $124 per day. Average teacher salary in the fourties. Our school board meeting have non parents screaming about masks, getting books off shelves they deem inappropriate and so on. Books quietly disappear from libraries. Our governor mocked high school kids for wearing masks. So much for parental choice.

I imagine getting well qualified teachers will continue to be difficult in this environment. Who in their right mind would risk being sued and putting up with the rest of the bull here. I would never live here if I had kids in school.

The irony is I live where there is a very large openly gay community. I have never once felt in any way uncomfortable or intimidated by anyone. Why anyone cares what color your skin is, who you love, what god you believe in or if you don't believe in any god I'd beyond me. Oh yeah, there are points to score with Rich white republican voters through fake moral outrage so you and they can get richer while ordinary working barely get by. And no expanded Medicaid here. Who cares if you work full time and have no health insurance?

You have to be taught to hate and they are doing their best.