Alabama High School Forbids Lesbian Couple From Attending Prom

[FreeState]

http://www.towleroad.com/2009/11/alabama-high-school-forbids-lesbian-couple-from-attending-prom.html

The ACLU has intervened in the case of a lesbian high school student in Alabama whose principal has forbid her from attending prom with her girlfriend:

"Cynthia Stewart, a 17-year-old junior at Tharptown High School in northern Alabama, is a member of her school’s prom planning committee, had personally raised over $200 for the prom, and created the theme her classmates had chosen for the dance. She is also an out lesbian. When Cynthia approached her principal to ask if she could bring her girlfriend with her to the prom, he said no. He also made Cynthia remove a sticker she was wearing that said, 'I am a lesbian,' telling her, “'You don't have that much freedom of speech at school.' Cynthia’s aunt and guardian, Kathy Baker, then appealed the principal’s decision to the school board. But the board let the decision to bar Cynthia from bringing her girlfriend to the prom stand."

The school has apparently threatened to cancel the prom for everyone should Stewart bring her girlfriend.

[tblue]

1. Fine. Then cancel the damn prom. I'm just mad. Let me blow off some steam.

Can't we ever just live and let live? Do we have to instill bigotry and/or self-loathing in our children? Why? Why? Why?

[virgogal]

2. Words fail me. Thank God I live in MA.

[imdjh]

18. Yeah, home of Mass Resistance "Homosexuals brainwashing our children in elementary schools"

Don't kid yourself.

[T Wolf]

3. If this was a more-enlightened place than Alabama, I bet the other students would

take Ms. Stewart's side. I know the kids at my daughters' HS would have.

In Alabama, I doubt it. That is the region of separate-by-race proms, after all.

[imdjh]

19. There are no more enlightened places. There are places where more work has been done.

[MineralMan]

4. Alabama, eh? I'm not surprised.

By the time the ACLU is done, the prom will be over, I'm afraid.

Moral: Move away from there.

[TheWraith]

8. Actual moral: They shouldn't have been allowed back into the Union. nt

[imdjh]

20. Maybe if generations of liberal people didn't leave for the coasts there would be fewer Tharptowns.

[LeftHander]

5. This is the real reason for the marriage bans...

To justify punishment and discrimination of homosexuality by denying same sex couples acceptance, inclusion and even existence.

They want US TO SIMPLY NOT EXIST...and they will use what ever means that look pretty to make it happen.

[RetiredTrotskyite]

6. Good Point...

It is so sad to see this shit happening in the first decade of the 21st Century. Hell I wouldn't have asked, I would have just brought her and if we were turned away, I would have sued their asses for discrimination.

I was over at change.org and you should see the way Mike Jones is attacked for describing some comments of Joel Olsteen as "sugar-coated homophobia."

You are right. They want us to simply not exist. I've long believed that the opposition to marriage equality is merely the spearhead of a concerted effort to drive us back into the closet.

[LeftHander]

14. or throw us into a mass grave....nt

[thereismore]

7. I hope ACLU has some free hands! I also hope that the rest of the students will show solidarity

and boycott the f'ing prom.

[mimitabby]

9. poor kids. what a world...

[ThomCat]

10. Then cancel the prom, and put the blame on the school

for ordering it.

It would be because of their bigotry that there would be no prom. Any straight ally would support this.

Straight people who attack the girl for the cancellation of the prom (unfortunately, we know there would be many) would be showing their true support for homophobia. Get it out in the open so we know who the homophobes are.

I do not support allowing bigots to keep their privileges.

[Toasterlad]

11. The Other Students Should Be Behind Cynthia and Her Girlfriend

They should all be threatening the school with repercussions if the prom is cancelled and/or the lesbian couple are not permitted to attend. If they don't, they don't deserve a prom.

[Veruca Salt]

12. Er.... maybe this is a stupid question... but why did she have to ASK

to bring her girlfriend to the prom? She should have just went. I don't think any of the straight people would have bothered asking the principal if it was okay to bring such and such to the prom.

I'm going to guess that she knew she would be kicked out (or not let into) the prom had she just shown up and wanted to force confrontation early. Which actually makes a hell of a lot of sense now that I think of it.

[LoveIsNow]

13. She most likely went to a different school.

When I was in High School you had to fill out a form to bring a date from another school or who didn't go to school to a dance.

[donco6]

22. You do here, too.

And that could have been the case.

[imdjh]

15. Making her the bad guy is a nice twist on the principal's part. What an asshole.

[imdjh]

16. Here's the aclu letter (pdf link)

http://www.aclu.org/files/assets/Stewart_Demand_Letter.pdf

[imdjh]

17. Tharptown High School "reconsidering"

http://blog.al.com/live/2009/11/lesbian_couple_prom_alabama.html

Lesbian couple may be allowed at Alabama high school prom

School officials say they were already re-evaluating the issue and concluded Stewart's girlfriend can attend the prom in March as long as she is cleared through a screening process that all out-of-district dates must undergo when attending similar school functions.

"All I want is to be able to be myself and go to my prom with the person I love, just like any other student wants to do," Stewart told the TimesDaily, adding that Tharptown High School Principal Gary Odom told her she would not be allowed to attend the prom with her girlfriend.

[LittleOne]

21. Unless you live in the deep south

you can't even begin to imagine what the homophobia is like.