Connect with us

An Open Letter To All LGBT Students Of The Anoka-Hennepin School District

Published

on

Dear LGBT Students of the Anoka-Hennepin School District:

This letter will help to clarify your rights, and also will instruct you on how to protect yourselves against those who mistakenly believe they can deprive you of your rights.

It is urgently important for you as LGBTQ students to understand that under the “No establishment of religion” clause of the United States Constitution, no religious superstition, hate, bullying non-acceptance of your gayness or any other religious stricture can be forced on you by means of any government entity including your public schools.

Deplorably, your public schools Superintendent has caved to many of the demands of certain adult, theocratic anti-gay bullies. If these anti-gay bullies, these adult theocrats, want their children to be raised in a religious environment hostile to LGBT human beings, then they have to send their children to anti-gay religious schools, not to public schools. They have no constitutional right — none whatsoever — to bully your public school administration into imposing a religiously-motivated anti-gay bigotry onto you. By contrast, you do have a right to a safe public school learning environment; one in which you may at times say “I am an out, proud gay student,” and never be harassed or assaulted for having said it.

The controlling legal standard for public school students’ free speech rights is that if something you say is not disruptive to the learning environment, you can not be stopped from saying it. The basis for teaching and learning in a public school is scholarly method and science, not the Bible and even more particularly not a nasty anti-gay bigot’s misinterpretation of the Bible. Ergo, for you sometimes to say “I am an out, proud gay student” is not disruptive of a public school learning setting, but for somebody to say “God hates fags,” – or anything that expresses that concept – however “polite” the language – is disruptive of and inappropriate to the public school learning environment and your right to a fear-free public school setting. If anti-gay bullying theocrats want for their children to be in school environments where people may say “God hates fags,” they have to send their children to that particular kind of religious school.

To emphasize the point that science, not anti-gay bigotry is the basis for teaching in public schools, I am now calling your attention to the booklet Just the Facts About Sexual Orientation and Youth. That booklet was produced by major medical and professional associations to educate school administrators, teachers and personnel and to counter the harmful effects of anti-gay bigotry. The organizations that endorsed this booklet are — get ready, this is a long list — the American Academy of Pediatrics, the American Association of School Administrators, the American Counseling Association, the American Federation of Teachers, the American Psychological Association, the American School Counselor Association, the American School Health Association, the Interfaith Alliance Foundation, the National Association of School Psychologists, the National Association of Secondary School Principals, the National Association of Social Workers, the National Education Association and the School Social Work Association of America. The American Medical Association is not on that list, but has a policy firmly against all forms of anti-gay bigotry and discrimination.

Hateful anti-gay bigots — including those who abuse God and/or Jesus as excuses for their repugnant bigotry — do not know better than the collective minds of all of those professional medical, science and educational organizations what is healthy for school communities in the 21st century. Obnoxious, anti-gay bigot pigs have no basis in law for torturing you or for pressuring for you to be tortured in public school settings.

I am now going to name some of the theocratic bullies that have been attempting to transmogrify your public school lives as LGBT students into living hells. The professional anti-gay bigot Tom Prichard of the so-called Minnesota Family Council has a history of telling lies about gay human beings. The MFC website makes clear that Prichard is gay bashing on the basis of religious motivations. A tab on his site’s homepage is labeled “Pastors” and then there are pages devoted to what these filthy anti-gay bigots have the nerve to call “The Truth Project.”

“The Truth Project” aims to shove anti-gay bigots’ uniquely hateful interpretation of the Bible down innocent gay victims’ throats. It is a product of the anti-gay hate group “Focus on the Family,” whose executive Tom Minnery was called out by Senator Al Franken for falsifying evidence when testifying against the inalienable rights of gay Americans. Again, the public school standard for determining “truth” is scholarship and science, not the Bible. This is not to say that there are not huge numbers of religious people, including Christians of course, fully accepting of LGBTers and supportive of their equality. (Here is a list of 236 gay-welcoming churches in Minnesota).  But it is to say that the cowardly anti-gay bigots hiding their hate behind their veils of phony and fraudulent religious excuses have no constitutional right to impose – or to cause to be imposed — a theocratic anti-gay regime on you through and in your public schools. Another shameless, lying anti-gay theocratic bigot who has been trying to make your lives hell in Minnesota is Barb Anderson, also of the so-called Minnesota Family Council.  These and other bullying, lying, anti-gay theocrats may have cowed your irresponsible school superintendent, but you must not be afraid of them because the Constitution is on your side against the religiously-motivated, mean-spirited, anti-gay tyranny they want to impose on you.

A recent, disturbing article in Rolling Stone magazine – School of Hate; One Town’s War on Gay Teens – makes clear that you have not been adequately instructed on how to gather evidence for legal actions against anti-gay bullies and school administrators who fail sufficiently to protect you against anti-gay bullies.

Every single time you are a victim of anti-gay verbal harassment or of a hate-motivated physical attack, you must create a written record of the harassment and/or of the attack, who you reported it to and what they did about it. If school officials have not taken measures adequate to stopping a anti-gay tormentor from tormenting you, then you must create a written record of your complaint about the tormentor and of the official’s response. You can create a useful record with letters. Make copies of the letters with your complaints to school officials. Mail one copy of each letter to yourself. Keep that letter mailed to yourself inside its sealed envelope. The Post Office cancellation stamp on the unopened envelope is your legally-valid documentation of the date you sent the letter.

If you are having ongoing problems with anti-gay bullying, you must create as thorough and detailed as possible a record of the bullying and of school officials’ inadequate responses. Such a detailed record with names, dates and times will help you to win eventual court cases against your tormentors and their enablers in the public school system. When school officials see that LGBT students are organized and empowered against bullying in this way, they will become far less likely to cave to the anti-gay demands of bullying adult theocrats. The school officials will see that their dereliction of duty to uphold your constitutional rights is about to cost them money. Here, you can read of a bullied gay student awarded $100,000 by a court. Here, you can read of a school having to pay $225,000 for not doing enough to stop bullying.  There have been dozens, and dozens, and dozens of these cases. Your public school officials will see that you have the knowledge and the evidence to go to a competent school bullying attorney and to say “This public school is not adequately protecting me. Here is the record of all the bad things that have happened to me in this public school. Will you represent me in a lawsuit against the school?”  What wins money in lawsuits against public schools is the fact that bullied students and/or their parents or guardians have let school administrators know about the bullying, yet the administrators have not done enough to protect the victims. That is what will make creating a thorough record so empowering for you as an LGBT student in a public school.

Additionally, cowardly theocratic anti-gay bullies will try to make you feel isolated and alone, without support. But they are not going to succeed in torturing LGBT public school students that way any longer in the United States. You have human rights supporters all over the country and the world. Your human rights supporters will leap into action in your defense if bullying theocrats continue to try to make your lives hell in the Anoka-Hennepin School District. If you are experiencing anti-gay bullying in those schools, and school officials are not adequately protecting you, contact me with the story. I will expose your tormentors to the world and activate the human rights community nationwide on your behalf and in your defense.

Image: A Gay-Straight Alliance school bus from Seattle Pride, 2008. By jglsongs.

 

New York City– based novelist and freelance writer Scott Rose’s LGBT– interest by– line has appeared on Advocate .com, PoliticusUSA .com, The New York Blade, Queerty .com, Girlfriends and in numerous additional venues. Among his other interests are the arts, boating and yachting, wine and food, travel, poker and dogs. His “Mr. David Cooper’s Happy Suicide” is about a New York City advertising executive assigned to a condom account.

 


Related Topics:
Continue Reading
Click to comment
 
 

Enjoy this piece?

… then let us make a small request. The New Civil Rights Movement depends on readers like you to meet our ongoing expenses and continue producing quality progressive journalism. Three Silicon Valley giants consume 70 percent of all online advertising dollars, so we need your help to continue doing what we do.

NCRM is independent. You won’t find mainstream media bias here. From unflinching coverage of religious extremism, to spotlighting efforts to roll back our rights, NCRM continues to speak truth to power. America needs independent voices like NCRM to be sure no one is forgotten.

Every reader contribution, whatever the amount, makes a tremendous difference. Help ensure NCRM remains independent long into the future. Support progressive journalism with a one-time contribution to NCRM, or click here to become a subscriber. Thank you. Click here to donate by check.

News

Justices’ Views on Trump Immunity Stun Experts: ‘Watching the Constitution Be Rewritten’

Published

3 hours ago

on

April 25, 2024

By

Legal experts appeared somewhat pleased during the first half of the Supreme Court’s historic hearing on Donald Trump’s claim he has “absolute immunity” from criminal prosecution because he was the President of the United States, as the justice appeared unwilling to accept that claim, but were stunned later when the right-wing justices questioned the U.S. Dept. of Justice’s attorney. Many experts are suggesting the ex-president may have won at least a part of the day, and some are expressing concern about the future of American democracy.

“Former President Trump seems likely to win at least a partial victory from the Supreme Court in his effort to avoid prosecution for his role in Jan. 6,” Axios reports. “A definitive ruling against Trump — a clear rejection of his theory of immunity that would allow his Jan. 6 trial to promptly resume — seemed to be the least likely outcome.”

The most likely outcome “might be for the high court to punt, perhaps kicking the case back to lower courts for more nuanced hearings. That would still be a victory for Trump, who has sought first and foremost to delay a trial in the Jan. 6 case until after Inauguration Day in 2025.”

Slate’s Mark Joseph Stern, who covers the courts and the law, noted: “This did NOT go very well [for Special Counsel] Jack Smith’s team. Thomas, Alito, and Kavanaugh think Trump’s Jan. 6 prosecution is unconstitutional. Maybe Gorsuch too. Roberts is skeptical of the charges. Barrett is more amenable to Smith but still wants some immunity.”

READ MORE: ‘To Do God Knows What’: Local Elections Official Reads Lara Trump the Riot Act

Civil rights attorney and Tufts University professor Matthew Segal, responding to Stern’s remarks, commented: “If this is true, and if Trump becomes president again, there is likely no limit to the harm he’d be willing to cause — to the country, and to specific individuals — under the aegis of this immunity.”

Noted foreign policy, national security and political affairs analyst and commentator David Rothkopf observed: “Feels like the court is leaning toward creating new immunity protections for a president. It’s amazing. We’re watching the Constitution be rewritten in front of our eyes in real time.”

“Frog in boiling water alert,” warned Ian Bassin, a former Associate White House Counsel under President Barack Obama. “Who could have imagined 8 years ago that in the Trump era the Supreme Court would be considering whether a president should be above the law for assassinating opponents or ordering a military coup and that *at least* four justices might agree.”

NYU professor of law Melissa Murray responded to Bassin: “We are normalizing authoritarianism.”

Trump’s attorney, John Sauer, argued before the Supreme Court justices that if Trump had a political rival assassinated, he could only be prosecuted if he had first been impeach by the U.S. House of Representatives then convicted by the U.S. Senate.

During oral arguments Thursday, MSNBC host Chris Hayes commented on social media, “Something that drives me a little insane, I’ll admit, is that Trump’s OWN LAWYERS at his impeachment told the Senators to vote not to convict him BECAUSE he could be prosecuted if it came to that. Now they’re arguing that the only way he could be prosecuted is if they convicted.”

READ MORE: Biden Campaign Hammers Trump Over Infamous COVID Comment

Attorney and former FBI agent Asha Rangappa warned, “It’s worth highlighting that Trump’s lawyers are setting up another argument for a second Trump presidency: Criminal laws don’t apply to the President unless they specifically say so…this lays the groundwork for saying (in the future) he can’t be impeached for conduct he can’t be prosecuted for.”

But NYU and Harvard professor of law Ryan Goodman shared a different perspective.

“Due to Trump attorney’s concessions in Supreme Court oral argument, there’s now a very clear path for DOJ’s case to go forward. It’d be a travesty for Justices to delay matters further. Justice Amy Coney Barrett got Trump attorney to concede core allegations are private acts.”

NYU professor of history Ruth Ben-Ghiat, an expert scholar on authoritarians, fascism, and democracy concluded, “Folks, whatever the Court does, having this case heard and the idea of having immunity for a military coup taken seriously by being debated is a big victory in the information war that MAGA and allies wage alongside legal battles. Authoritarians specialize in normalizing extreme ideas and and involves giving them a respected platform.”

The Nation’s justice correspondent Elie Mystal offered up a prediction: “Court doesn’t come back till May 9th which will be a decision day. But I think they won’t decide *this* case until July 3rd for max delay. And that decision will be 5-4 to remand the case back to DC, for additional delay.”

Watch the video above or at this link.

READ MORE: ‘Doesn’t Care if Pregnant Women Live or Die’: Alito Slammed Over Emergency Abortion Remarks

Continue Reading

News

Justices Slam Trump Lawyer: ‘Why Is It the President Would Not Be Required to Follow the Law?’

Published

6 hours ago

on

April 25, 2024

By

Justices on the U.S. Supreme Court hearing Donald Trump’s claim of absolute immunity early on appeared at best skeptical, were able to get his attorney to admit personal criminal acts can be prosecuted, appeared to skewer his argument a president must be impeached and convicted before he can be criminally prosecuted, and peppered him with questions exposing what some experts see is the apparent weakness of his case.

Legal experts appeared to believe, based on the Justices’ questions and statements, Trump will lose his claim of absolute presidential immunity, and may remand the case back to the lower court that already ruled against him, but these observations came during Justices’ questioning of Trump attorney John Sauer, and before they questioned the U.S. Dept. of Justice’s Michael Dreeben.

“I can say with reasonable confidence that if you’re arguing a case in the Supreme Court of the United States and Justices Alito and Sotomayor are tag-teaming you, you are going to lose,” noted attorney George Conway, who has argued a case before the nation’s highest court and obtained a unanimous decision.

But some are also warning that the justices will delay so Special Counsel Jack Smith’s prosecution of Trump will not take place before the November election.

READ MORE: ‘To Do God Knows What’: Local Elections Official Reads Lara Trump the Riot Act

“This argument still has a ways to go,” observed UCLA professor of law Rick Hasen, one of the top election law scholars in the county. “But it is easy to see the Court (1) siding against Trump on the merits but (2) in a way that requires further proceedings that easily push this case past the election (to a point where Trump could end this prosecution if elected).”

The Economist’s Supreme Court reporter Steven Mazie appeared to agree: “So, big picture: the (already slim) chances of Jack Smith actually getting his 2020 election-subversion case in front of a jury before the 2024 election are dwindling before our eyes.”

One of the most stunning lines of questioning came from Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, who said, “If someone with those kinds of powers, the most powerful person in the world with the greatest amount of authority, could go into Office knowing that there would be no potential penalty for committing crimes. I’m trying to understand what the disincentive is, from turning the Oval Office into, you know, the seat of criminal activity in this country.”

READ MORE: ‘Doesn’t Care if Pregnant Women Live or Die’: Alito Slammed Over Emergency Abortion Remarks

She also warned, “If the potential for criminal liability is taken off the table, wouldn’t there be a significant risk that future presidents would be emboldened to commit crimes with abandon while they’re in office? It’s right now the fact that we’re having this debate because, OLC [Office of Legal Counsel] has said that presidents might be prosecuted. Presidents, from the beginning of time have understood that that’s a possibility. That might be what has kept this office from turning into the kind of crime center that I’m envisioning, but once we say, ‘no criminal liability, Mr. President, you can do whatever you want,’ I’m worried that we would have a worse problem than the problem of the president feeling constrained to follow the law while he’s in office.”

“Why is it as a matter of theory,” Justice Jackson said, “and I’m hoping you can sort of zoom way out here, that the president would not be required to follow the law when he is performing his official acts?”

“So,” she added later, “I guess I don’t understand why Congress in every criminal statute would have to say and the President is included. I thought that was the sort of background understanding that if they’re enacting a generally applicable criminal statute, it applies to the President just like everyone else.”

Another critical moment came when Justice Elena Kagan asked, “If a president sells nuclear secrets to a foreign adversary, is that immune?”

Professor of law Jennifer Taub observed, “This is truly a remarkable moment. A former U.S. president is at his criminal trial in New York, while at the same time the U.S. Supreme Court is hearing his lawyer’s argument that he should be immune from prosecution in an entirely different federal criminal case.”

Watch the videos above or at this link.

READ MORE: ‘Blood on Your Hands’: Tennessee Republicans OK Arming Teachers After Deadly School Shooting

 

Continue Reading

News

‘To Do God Knows What’: Local Elections Official Reads Lara Trump the Riot Act

Published

8 hours ago

on

April 25, 2024

By

The county clerk for Ingham County, Michigan blasted Republican National Committee co-chair Lara Trump after the ex-president’s daughter-in-law bragged the RNC will have people to “physically handle” voters’ ballots in polling locations across the country this November.

“We now have the ability at the RNC not just to have poll watchers, people standing in polling locations, but people who can physically handle the ballots,” Trump told Newsmax host Eric Bolling this week, as NCRM reported.

“Will these people, will they be allowed to physically handle the ballots as well, Lara?” Bolling asked.

“Yup,” Trump replied.

Marc Elias, the top Democratic elections attorney who won 63 of the 64 lawsuits filed by the Donald Trump campaign in the 2020 election cycle (the one he did not win was later overturned), corrected Lara Trump.

READ MORE: ‘I Hope You Find Happiness’: Moskowitz Trolls Comer Over Impeachment Fail

“Poll observers are NEVER permitted to touch ballots. She is suggesting the RNC will infiltrate election offices,” Elias warned on Wednesday.

Barb Byrum, a former Michigan Democratic state representative with a law degree and a local hardware store, is the Ingham County Clerk, and thus the chief elections official for her county. She slammed Lara Trump and warned her the RNC had better not try to touch any ballots in her jurisdiction.

“I watched your video, and it’s riveting stuff. But if you think you’ll be touching ballots in my state, you’ve got another thing coming,” Byrum told Trump in response to the Newsmax interview.

“First and foremost, precinct workers, clerks, and voters are the only people authorized to touch ballots. For example, I am the County Clerk, and I interact with exactly one voted ballot: My own,” Byrum wrote, launching a lengthy series of social media posts educating Trump.

“Election inspectors are hired by local clerks in Michigan and we hire Democrats and Republicans to work in our polling places. We’re required by law to do so,” she continued. “In large cities and townships, the local clerks train those workers. In smaller cities and townships, that responsibility falls to County Clerks, like me.”

READ MORE: ‘Doesn’t Care if Pregnant Women Live or Die’: Alito Slammed Over Emergency Abortion Remarks

She explained, “precinct workers swear an oath to uphold the Constitution of the United States and the Constitution of the State of Michigan.”

“Among the provisions in the Michigan Constitution is the right to a secret ballot for our voters,” she added.

Byrum also educated Trump on her inaccurate representation of the consent decree, which was lifted by a court, not a judge’s death, as Lara Trump had claimed.

“It’s important for folks to understand what you’re talking about: The end of a consent decree that was keeping the RNC from intimidating and suppressing voters (especially in minority-majority areas).”

“With that now gone, you’re hoping for the RNC to step up their game and get people that you train to do god-knows what into the polling places.”

Byrum also warned Trump: “If election inspectors are found to be disrupting the process of an orderly election OR going outside their duties, local clerks are within their rights to dismiss them immediately.”

“So if you intend to train these 100,000 workers to do anything but their sacred constitutional obligation, they’ll find themselves on the curb faster than you can say ‘election interference.'”

READ MORE: ‘Blood on Your Hands’: Tennessee Republicans OK Arming Teachers After Deadly School Shooting

 

 

Continue Reading

Trending

Copyright © 2020 AlterNet Media.