If You Don't Say It, It Doesn't Exist

My home state of Tennessee has 2 very important bills ahead of us this week, both directly impacting the LGBT community. The first, SB049 or the "Don't Say Gay Bill", I have written about before and has made national news in the past few weeks. As a gay an that grew up in in the Memphis City Schools system, I know exactly how this could effect students. While Tennessee in general is a much more LGBT friendly state than one might think, it still isn't California. If it hadn't been for some of the amazing friends and teachers I had going through school, I would have eventually succeeded in my adolescent attempts to end my life. While the climate towards the LGBT community has changed drastically even in just the 7 years since I graduated high school, there is still much work to be done. If SB049 passes, the repercussions are likely to be felt for years and years to come.

The second is HB600, the Special Access to Discriminate Bill. This bill came about after Nashville passed an ordinance "which bars the Nashville government from doing business with any entity that does not prohibit discrimination in employment against LGBT workers. Mayor Karl Dean signed it into law three days later. (The Bilerico Project)" Not only would this bill nullify the Nashville ordinance, it would prevent any other municipality from passing similar legislation.

Tennessee is a "Right to Work" state, meaning that an employer has no obligation to give a reason for firing an employee. While it is well established that a person can't be fired for race, gender, or disability without serious legal and financial repercussions, but sexual orientation and gender identity protections are still lacking in most states, let alone at the federal level. If we want to attract larger Fortune 500 companies to Tennessee, we need to implement protections similar to the ones that their companies are already practicing.

As of late this afternoon, there have been addendums to the the bill to to allow for the defund Planned Parenthood in Tennessee as well as a severability clause, only adding to the fact that they know that even if this bill passes at the state level, legislators know that it will never last after challenges to its constitutionality.

You Can't Say That Here

Today is a sad day in my home state of Tennessee. The Senate Education Committee approved SB49 with a vote of 6-3, banning any teacher in grades K-8 from saying the word “gay” or “homosexual” in the classroom.

Your first thought may be, “why would an elementary school teacher need to discuss these topics in the classroom?” But it’s not just about discussing the topic. The supposed reason for the bill, sponsored by Sen. Stacey Campfield (R - Knoxville), was to prevent homosexuality being discussed in a sex ed setting for young students. I don’t necessarily agree with that thought, but I can see someone’s point. One problem: no curriculum in the state has sex ed that mentions homosexuality. The spokesman for the State Board of Education and the State Department of Education both say that they have no knowledge of anything like this going on. But the language of the bill prohibits the words from being used at all.

What about all the kids who need to speak to a guidance counselor and can’t, but need someone to talk to about their thoughts on sexuality. Kids today seem to become aware of their sexual orientation at earlier and earlier ages. Even in the late 90’s and coming from a militantly conservative Christian family, I knew at 12 years old that I was gay, although I was too afraid to even admit it to myself. This can do nothing but exacerbate the issues that LGBTQ teens face today. I attempted suicide three times from 1998 until 2002 and I never felt I had anyone to talk to about it. But if a child is told that they’re not even allowed to use the word, what does that do to their self-esteem to not be allowed to use a word to describe themselves.

No good can come from this. And, unfortunately, in our currently Republican controlled house, it likely to pass when it comes in front of the full floor. I only pray that something can be done to stop it.

Louisiana Adoption

I debated for a while whether or not to talk about this.  But, I decided I would.  The reason I hesitate is that it doesn't solely affect Southern gay couples, but I feel that gay couples are the target of the spirit f the law.  Louisiana recently defeated a bill that would have allowed unmarried singles to adopt children together.  Married couples and single individuals are not affected by this bill. 

Ok, so what's the harm? Married couples can adopt.  Great.  They should be able to.  But not everyone can legally marry, effectively keeping children out of loving homes of gay couples.  There's still single adoption, right?  Well, sure.  There's nothing that explicitly says that a single gay person can't adopt children.  However, that leaves one parent with absolutely no parental rights.  They can't make medical decisions in an emergency or technically even sign a permission slip for a field trip.  It doesn't matter how much that 2nd parent is involved in the child's life.  They have no say.  I'm assuming here that in the event the legal adoptive parent dies or is unable to care for the children, they would be placed in state custody, even if the 2nd parent was willing and able to take care of them.  It's possible that state custody would be temporary, but it would require court hearings and a lot unnecessary red tape.  And there's always the chance that the courts would say no, especially if they came before a judge that was adamantly opposed to gay adoption in the first place.  Let's be honest; as much as I love the South, we encounter more obstacles here than other parts of the country.  I hope to see the day that these issues aren't a problem here.  But there's a lot of work to be done.  

Mississipi Is On A Roll...

Mississippi has really been hit hard this year in the public realm.  Or rather, they've been hitting LGBT youth pretty hard.  There have been 2 major cases of LGBT discrimination in high school from my neighbor to the south of home in the past couple months.  In the first, an Itawamba County refused to allow a lesbian student and her girlfriend to attend prom together.  When the courts ruled that the school was violating Constance's civil rights, they canceled the prom all together.  
But this second case is just ridiculous.  A lesbian student was completely left out of her senior yearbook because the school didn't like that she was wearing a tuxedo in photo that she submitted.  Come on, now!  There's not a single thing wrong with the photograph.  She's not flipping the bird, sticking her tongue out, throwing a peace sign, and she doesn't even have any facial piercings for them to complain about, all things that were complained about during my senior year!  It's a cute photo!  Not only did they leave out her photo, they didn't even mention her.  They just straight up left her out.
How can anyone think that just leaving a student out of a yearbook is even remotely appropriate?  I was livid when the photo studio submitted my unretouched photo for the yearbook because I didn't order prints from them, even though they promised they'd retouch it either way.  I feel so bad for this poor girl.  Mississippi's gonna need to take a step forward in time if they want to stay out of the public eye for things like this.  I know both of these decisions were made by local school authorities, but the state of Mississippi can step in if they chose to.  I think it's about time.  
On a semi-positive note, a Georgia student was allowed to take his male date to his prom.  I say semi-positive because even though he was given some level of public approval, he got kicked out of his parents' house. I can only hope that he had plans for college and to live in the dorms.  Maybe by the end of his first year, they'll realize that he's still their son.