Same-sex couples and high school proms

[Lidless]

Meanwhile homophobia is alive and kicking...

http://www.afterellen.com/blog/dorothys ... -fake-prom

Unbelievable.

[ToshoftheWuffingas]

Let me get this right: the school staff colluded with the deceptive fake prom? And the other victims of the deception were students with disabilities?

Someone has to be making this up. There can't be schools and teachers like that in real life.
If it is approaching truth then that girl Constance has my deep admiration. She outclasses those who are meant to be teaching her by a long mile.

[Túrin Turambar]

Let me get this right: the school staff colluded with the deceptive fake prom? And the other victims of the deception were students with disabilities?

Someone has to be making this up. There can't be schools and teachers like that in real life.

Yeah, it seems pretty unbelievable. Still, some schools in the Deep South still hold racially-segregated proms, so it doesn't seem like too much of a stretch.

[River]

Let me get this right: the school staff colluded with the deceptive fake prom? And the other victims of the deception were students with disabilities?

Someone has to be making this up. There can't be schools and teachers like that in real life.
If it is approaching truth then that girl Constance has my deep admiration. She outclasses those who are meant to be teaching her by a long mile.

If this story pans out...wow. Just wow. I think that, if I were a parent, it wouldn't matter which prom my kid was invited to, I'd be pulling htem out of that school. That's sort of toxic environment is not one I'd want to be in nor want anyone close to me subjected to.

[Dave_LF]

I'm skeptical too. The whole community would have to be pretty sick to pull something like that knowing full well that the whole story would end up on the national news, or so far gone it just doesn't care anymore.

[Frelga]

I keep quoting an article I saw once that said "Results were astonishing but not really surprising."

However, that linked article was written very well, right up until the last sentence. Way to stand up for inclusiveness and against stereotypes.

[Cerin]

Perhaps a new thread should be started to discuss this, as it doesn't have to do with the gay marriage issue.

[yovargas]

Way to stand up for inclusiveness and against stereotypes.

(Figured that was sarcasm.)

[Griffon64]

Google search provides lots of blogs, etc reacting to the news, mostly repeating the same template, so I went looking for the source.



The local newspaper seems to be the Northeast Mississippi Daily Journal. From its web site, it reports this:

http://nems360.com/view/full_story/6891 ... n-on-again?

and then an update:

http://nems360.com/view/full_story/6946 ... y-attended?

and lastly:

http://nems360.com/view/full_story/6951 ... court-case?

The news articles paint a slightly different story of events than the one repeated on some blogs, but the fact of the matter still remain that a bunch ( majority ) of students split off to do their own thing. I imagine it is possible that the prom that McMillen attended was meant to be the "real" one, hence officials were present at it, and the other prom was a "rogue" one organized on the sly and on the side by the un-enlighted.

Meanwhile, many more IAHS students went to an event held at the community center in Evergreen, another community in Itawamba County. McMillen said she knew about that event but when she asked another student if she was invited, the student told her, “the prom is at the country club.”

Bottom line seems to be: something fishy was done, and the proper authorities are looking into it. I didn't notice anything pointing to this thing being an officially condoned act but I didn't read and re-read the articles. It seems like the kind of thing a high school "queen bee" would organize, doesn't it: organize something on the side and let only the "cool kids" know about it. Immature, intolerant, unenlightened behaviour.

[Dave_LF]

That sounds like a more plausible story, except the articles make it sound like it was a group of parents who set up the unofficial prom that everyone except McMillen and 6 others attended.

[Griffon64]

Yep - I don't mean to say that I think the kids actually organized it, I mean to say the behaviour reminds me of some of the more cruel bullying tactics that children employ.

[Hachimitsu]

When trying to force schools in some areas to give up racially segregated proms they would do something similar to this, although not as bad. To be frank I think it is what the first article said. You think the school and parents didn't know that almost all the kids would go the prom?

When I first read this thread title, I thought it would be similar to what happened in my hometown when the local catholic school a friend of mine went to. He had to sue the school to let them take his boyfriend to the prom.

The very idea of separate proms altogether boggles my mind. It seems they had this mini prom to avoid getting sued. What terrible people.

[Padme]

This is horrid in all aspects, the hatred is mind boggling, the bully aspect is beyond comprehension. And all done in the name of God hate Fags.

[Primula Baggins]

I'm sure it was officially done in the name of "Our kids deserve to be comfortable at their prom." Comfortable meaning, not sharing the dance floor with anyone different from themselves. That was the argument for segregated proms, after all, sometimes even extended to the "other" people: "I'm sure they'll be more comfortable with people like themselves."

[River]

Comfort is overrated.

[Primula Baggins]

Comfort can be stifling.

[Lidless]

Comfort means you don't develop. It's the slowest of deaths.