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March 27, 2008
Say whaaaa?
Posted by: Chris
I've read this article twice, about how upset some Marylanders were when a small town council member responded to a question about school bullying by noting the higher incidence of bullying of gay and gender-nonconforming kids:
At a town hall meeting in Clarksburg last week, Councilman George L. Leventhal said many victims of bullying are gay after a resident commented about that her daughter was being bullied at school.
‘‘It was totally inappropriate,” said Kathie Hulley, president of the Clarksburg Civic Association. ‘‘If the County Council is going to come out to a town meeting and somebody in distress asks a question, to go off on a tangent, which has no bearing to what she was asking, is really bad.”
Councilman Marc Elrich, who also attended the meeting, said ‘‘I don’t know why [Leventhal] went there.”
Huh? Were they upset because the remarks suggested the daughter was gay? Or minimized her victimization if she wasn't? The article never says, dancing around it in some sort of silly suburban code.
Even more bizarre than the reaction to Leventhal's answer was the rambling question he was responding to:
During a question-and-answer segment, Derwood resident Valerie Ricardo described how her daughter was being bullied at an area middle school. Ricardo went on to discuss the county’s anti-discrimination law covering transgendered individuals, and also discussed her fears of being approached by ‘‘a man with an exaggerated walk, a female walk” and ‘‘evil intent in his eye.”
‘‘So I want to say that the risk is real and I think that we need to take these situations of violence and bullying and crazy situations for what they are and begin to do something about it,” Ricardo ended her statement.
Double huh? So we feel sorry for her daughter -- and we do -- and we blame it on men who prance a bit too much?
Can anyone else translate this for me?
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Comments
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Chris:
My partner and I live right in the middle of this (between the two towns). This is the first time I've heard of this. I'll investigate, and send to Equality Maryland. The lastest issue we've had here, which I THINK is unrelated (we have no kids and I don't keep up with public school things), is we got several automated phone calls from this rightwing "Christian" whacko organization (notmyshower.org), about a law the county (Montgomery) was going to pass about transgendered kids.
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Why is anyone surprised by America's blissful denial of the real world?
There are Americans who repeatly tell me, the reason we invaded Iraq was because of Hussien's 9-11 attack.
When fear enters the equation, reason flys right out the window.
The answer to Maryland's problems will probably be witch burnings.
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It's incredibly unfortunate that ignorance has gripped some individuals so tightly that they feel the need to treat others in such a way. And it puzzles me that they don't even consider the FACT that their actions or remarks are prejudiced. /shakes head/
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Hello. I ran across this blog while looking for something else specifically. But this looks like a good place to post it if anonymous posts are allowed...
I am a Christian, and I want to apologize for every so-called 'Christian' who has ever bashed or spewed hatred toward the gay/ lesbian/ bisexual community. That kind of blind, vitriolic hatred is not what Jesus taught by a long shot. Homosexuality is NOT the only sin God cannot forgive.
Those people who say those terrible things are morons. You know, instead of counter-protesting at gay pride rallies, they should be handing out bottled waters.Maybe this doesn't help erase even one bad comment that a Christian has made toward someone else, but somebody has to say it. Its way overdue. I'm very sorry my brethren hurt you. I'm very sorry some will continue to hurt you. And I am sorry that, right now at 11 pm from somewhere in Texas, this is all I can offer y'all.
The comments to this entry are closed.
Scott on Mar 27, 2008 10:15:07 AM:
Kathie Hulley and Valerie Ricardo are straight supremacists. They want to control want, where and when people can talk about LGBT people. They either believe that gay people are not worth talking about or are a grave threat. And they use a different standard for gay people than straight i.e. we can't talk about gay people in a non-bigoted manner at a city council meeting.
These are the three signs a point-of-view is apart of the straight supremacist ideology:
CONTROL: straight supremacists want to control what gay people can and can't do.
INSIGNIFICANT/ SUPERSIGNICANT: straight supremacists will treat gay people as if they are insignificant or supersignificant. Example of insignificant treatment: gay people deserve AIDS. Example of supersignificant treatment: gay people are destroying society.
DIFFERENT RULES: straight supremacists will apply different rules to gay people than straight.