As expected, lawmakers have passed the bill that would make it illegal to talk about gays in Tennessee schools. Or, as Mr. Sulu would have us say, “to talk about Takeis.”
The crazy law limits sex education to “natural human reproduction,” which is a very nice topic and certainly worthy of discussion, but to the exclusion of all else? That’s just nuts, given how often humans have sex for reasons other than reproduction. Humans like, oh, for example, Republican Paul Stanley, a former Tennessee legislator who had to resign after admitting to an affair with a 22-year-old staffer.
But hope is not lost: The Tennessee Equality Project Foundation is organizing an “It’s OK to Say Gay” rally this Sunday (Harvey Milk Day!) from 2 p.m. until 5 p.m. Head on down to the Tennessee Valley Unitarian Universalist Church, at 2931 Kingston Pike, to participate.
tjr101
Really? Don’t these people have more urgent issues to deal with? Idiots electing idiots to implement idiotic laws!
Mike
@tjr101: They also want to override Nashville’s civil rights ordinance by saying that such ordinances can only be granted at the state level…which of course they won’t grant before hell freezes over.
McMike
WTF? I was being called a ‘fag’ by the time I hit 2nd grade back in the late 1970’s. The anti-gay discrimination going on has increased ten-fold in the past few months due to the Tea Party. IMO, gas chambers aren’t too far away if they ever obtain more power. Someone needs to bring a federal lawsuit because this legislation does not seem legal at all.
skipfoss
I hope to hell that our reps find a way to have you damn queer’s put on an island somewhere surrounde by sharks to keep you freaks of nature seperated from actual people. When I was a kid we used to beat the hell out of you freaks now we have to put up with your bunch of crap because it’s ilegal to exterminate
Duck
Skipfoss, you are a vile human being. And boohoo that you can’t beat up innocent people anymore.
Marc
skipfoss we are gay but are also americans and as such are armed give it a fucking whirl!
Mark
couldn’t this be seen as infringing upon free speech??
Jeffree
So, what’s to be gained if a LGB or questioning kid asks a question about sex and the teacher can’t respond? How does that do anybody any good?
Seems like a backward way to keep from fully educating students about human sexuality at the age-appropriate level.
Classes on music will have to skip songs by Cole Porter, literature will bypass Oscar Wilde, and no one will EVER be able to ask why Ellen Degeneres doesn’t have a husband or a Prada skirt.
Whoa, better not bring up Abe Lincoln in history class either! Total gray area there…
Added complexity: school counselors may not be able to even broach the topic of why 7th grade Billy gets bullied for wearing lavender jeans or Lucia in 5th has two dads.
How civilized is that?
Hyhybt
Queerty’s RSS feed put out an article entitled “At Least 13 Huge Companies Supported Tennessee’s Repeal Of Nashville’s LGBT Protections” at 11:01 PM. Trying to follow it back to the site yields an error page. What’s up?
I don’t just mean “was the article deleted or something?”, but why would it be? Was it false, in which case, since it was at least partially available, a correction is in order? Was it some sort of joke? Was it not supposed to go out until tomorrow? Something else?
matt baume
@Hyhybt: Made a few switches in the lineup — it’s scheduled for first thing tomorrow morning.
Hyhybt
@matt baume: Thanks for the answer; looking forward to reading it, and glad I finally got something like that right no later than the third guess đ
The idea of a shark-surrounded island in *Tennessee* is… intriguing.
J.D.
That’s fine, I prefer the word “queer” myself.
JJ
Skipfoss, why are you trolling a gay website? Are you a self-loathing closet case struggling with his sexuality? That’s the usual reason any “straight” individual would give gays more than a passing thought. Maybe you’re just curious and can’t quite understand why you become aroused when you watch Spike TV? There’s nothing gays like better than UFC Fighters. Not even “Glee” gets us and obviously you worked up. I pity you.
Happy End of the World Day, Dipshit
Mike in Asheville
Censorship in public schools … brought to you by the very same legislature that made it illegal to teach evolution too! Oh, how did that go, Tennessee? The only ones left looking like monkeys were the creationists.
As it took the Scopes trial, and later vindication, over years, this idiocy of legislation will fail too. Personally, I was hoping that the rapture would take each and every legislator who voted for showing themselves to be a moronic homophobic hypocritic assholes that they are.
MattGMD
With all the other issues facing TN, and every state legislature for that matter, there is always time and room for some anti-gay legislation. We, “The Gays”, need to start our own campaign in re: to all the allegedly hetero lawmakers that are so obsessed with The Gays. I suspect many of them have the Ted Hagard Syndrome. Throwing some doubt and cynicism on the hating heteros should liven things up.
Jim Hlavac
Outlawing a word seems to me not a Liberty thing to do — but a communist thing — and Stacey Campbell reminds me of Stalin. The man should get a man’s name, maybe he’ll feel better.
And what are they going to do — arrest a bunch of 10 year olds for saying “gay” — yikes!
Bear
@skipfoss: Skip, you should hope the days of trying to push us around don’t come back. I’ve beaten the crap out of many jerks in Middle School and High School. Taking martial arts and a refusal to be pushed around for being a geek made me stronger. No one (regardless of reason) should fear going to school. Everyone has a right to be themselves.
Aaron in Honolulu
FREE SPEECH!!!! Kids have those rights too.