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Politics : To be a Liberal,you have to believe that..... -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: greenspirit who wrote (1386)	9/9/1999 2:47:00 AM
From: Dayuhan	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 6418

Is anybody really teaching 3rd graders that it's ok to be gay? I would think that unnecessarily young. It is a difficult situation, with no easy solution. I think that many gay men remember the time when they discovered they were gay. They remember fear, and hatred, and physical abuse, and self-loathing, and contempt, a pretty vicious emotional cocktail. They imagine what a difference it might have made to them if there had been someone there to tell them "you are human, there are others like you, and there is no reason that you cannot live a full and rewarding life". And they want to tell the other children "go easy on these people, they are no different from you, they hurt when hit, they have families, they are no threat to you". An understandable objective, which can be reasonably argued to have entirely positive motivations. Unfortunately, there will always be parents who see it as an effort to steal their children away and make them gay. My off-the-cuff reaction would be to conduct studies in as scientific a manner as possible, with the aim being to discern the age by which a majority of gay people came to realize that they were gay (I would guess early adolescence) and begin dealing with the subject then. This will not please everyone; neither will anything else. I believe that all sexual matters are ideally handled by parents. Unfortunately, huge numbers of parents have abdicated the role of sex educator, leaving it to be taken over by the peer group. The school is hardly an ideal venue for sex education, but it is better than the playground or the street corner.

To: greenspirit who wrote (1386)	9/9/1999 7:30:00 AM
From: DJB	Respond to of 6418

<<I'm still not sure I fully understand why you feel it necessary to specifically teach this type of information to my 3rd grader. Especially since so many people feel so strongly about it>> First of all you brought up the question of the 3rd graders not me. I am not an educator and don't know that the 3rd grade is the right time for this. I was just following your scenario. However I do believe that tolerance should be taught sometime at the elementary level but I can't say at which grade. <<I also think the gay community is making a mistake forcing issues like these into young childrens classroom as a means to garner more tolerance toward their lifestyle. I would much prefer they trust the parents to do what is right with regard to teaching these type of moral values to their children. Some of the backlash against gays are probably a reflection of this, "get that stuff out of my kids face" reaction.>> Isn't that what we have done up to now? So if that is the solution why am I so fearful of hate crimes. This has not worked as far as I am concerned so a change is needed. And teaching tolerance is not just a homosexual issue it is a human rights issue for all people. People are afraid to have homosexuality taught in there schools because they think their kids will be converted to homosexuality. Believe me that just does not happen. <<res- Without the racial slur it is not a hate crime. That is the way the law is written so it is not slanted towards one group or another. This is interesting, then how does it apply toward homosexuals?>> racial slur is a bad term in the case of the homosexual but I could not think of anything else. Just substitute the word fag for nigger or honky and you have a hate crime. The hate crime law in Chicago specifically includes sexual orientation, race and religion. There may be others but I am not aware of them. Physical attributes such as tall, fat, etc are not covered. Erase Hate, Dennis