Controversy Continues Over Virginia Beach School Board LGBT Policy

When it comes to getting itself embroiled in controversy. few public bodies show the ineptitude of the Three Stooges like Virginia Beach School Board.  The board's public relations skills are nil and those on its PR team truly seem to be utterly incompetent. A case in point is what many see as the board's anti-LGBT mentality in the wake of the abrupt cancellation of a Gay-Straight Alliance assembly at Frank F. Cox High School, the neighboring high school to my old neighborhood in Virginia Beach. The Virginian Pilot is carrying another guest editorial  on the issue which like that by Grace Bonney previously highlighted is authored by two individuals who I have known for years.  Like others, they call on the Board to clarify policies towards LGBT students who still face daily harassment and bullying in far too many instances.  While Virginia Beach likes to picture itself as a modern city, it remains among the most reactionary cities in Virginia with Christofascists still holding too much sway in the public arena and in school policies.  It is long past time that the city moved into the 21st century. Here are op-ed highlights:

AS ALUMNI of Virginia Beach City Public Schools, we have followed the cancellation of Cox High School’s Gay-Straight Alliance event with concern and dismay. While the event has been rescheduled, the School Board has neither acknowledged any potential homophobia inherent in the event’s postponement nor addressed the atmosphere of harassment that LGBTQ students face in Virginia Beach schools. We find this troubling.

Incoming School Board member Victoria Manning, who called for the cancellation of the GSA assembly, noted in The Pilot on Dec. 9 that certain parents were upset about “the timing and nature of the event.”

This is puzzling. The “nature of the event” was to promote acceptance of differences and combat bullying. Despite Manning’s language, we don’t find anything controversial in that objective, and we suspect that opposition to the event reflects ingrained homophobia as much as procedural error.

We agree that club meetings and assemblies during the school day must be rare. But we are concerned here about process.

We suspect not. We note that the planned GSA gathering was optional; surely a parent concerned about a child missing class time might simply have advised her son or daughter not to attend.

The school division’s policies in this area are, by the board’s own admission, ambiguous. We are interested in the history of school-day gatherings at Cox and other schools. Under what circumstances and for what organizations have such assemblies been held? Indeed, the Virginia ACLU has asked the School Board for such data.

Manning has suggested that her 11th-hour email to Edwards was the result of outreach from parents who were concerned about the impact of the assembly on classroom time.

We ask: What compels parents to call a School Board member to register alarm about a specific assembly? We wonder whether parents routinely object to pep rallies and sporting events that interrupt the instructional day. What about guest speakers? Holiday celebrations? Theatrical events? Awards ceremonies?

The Cox GSA assembly — which was designed to celebrate “love is love” after a gay student who was bullied attempted suicide — was directly related to preserving the sanctity of the classroom experience for all students.

Nationwide, LGBTQ teens are at higher risk for bullying and harassment, including verbal and physical assault, and nowhere is such marginalization more conspicuous, even systematized, than in our schools.

Human Rights Watch recently conducted a study on the treatment of gay and lesbian youth in Alabama, Pennsylvania, South Dakota, Texas and Utah and found that “almost all of the students interviewed reported encountering verbal harassment in their school environment, even in the most LGBT-friendly schools.”

Studies conducted by the Gay, Lesbian, and Straight Education Network found that 32 percent of LGBTQ students did not go to school at least one day because of feeling unsafe, 44 percent had experienced physical harassment, 22 percent had experienced stronger violence (61 percent never reported it), and 31 percent said the school had made no attempt to respond to those students who had reported attacks.

These statistics reveal the atmosphere of intimidation that predisposes gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender youth to a suicide rate that is four times higher than that of straight youth.

Virginia has no law prohibiting bullying based on sexual orientation or gender identity in schools (nor does it provide legal protections for LGBTQ teachers and administrators).

We condemn the fact that Manning has received threats. We also wish that “What really happened with the Gay-Straight Alliance,” her Dec. 10 Pilot column, had acknowledged the hostility that LGBTQ students face daily.

We are eager to learn the specific strategies that the School Board will employ to clarify its policies — and, more importantly, to ensure the safety and well-being of LGBTQ students in Virginia Beach classrooms.
 

As I told one school board directly, from my dealings with the Virginia Beach School Board that stretch back more than 20 years, I have very little confidence in its willingness to do the right thing for LGBT students.   I am still waiting to be proven wrong.  As for the parents who complained, I suspect that many or all are Christofascists who view any effort to stem their mistreatment and abuse of others as an "attack on their religious freedom."  I'm sorry, but the public schools should stand firm against bully based on toxic religious beliefs.  Religious freedom rights and the right to attend school free from harassment belong to everyone, not just the falsely pious "godly Christian" crowd.  

Coming Out Remains a Daunting Challenge

Earlier in the month I wrote about a decision by the Virginia Beach school board to cancel a gay-straight alliance assembly at Cox High School.  The event has now purportedly rescheduled and I had an unhappy telephone call with one school board member who did not appreciate my "assume the worse until proven otherwise" attitude given my many years of activism within that school division. The call ended with me telling the board member that I would wait to be proven wrong.  During the shit storm of negative local, national and international news coverage that the school board created for itself (something that the board has an amazing talent to do), The Virginian Pilot ran a guest column by  New York resident Grace Bonney, founder of DesignSponge and author of “In the Company of Women.” What made the column so striking is that I know Grace and her parents. She attended school and swam for years on the neighborhood swim team with my children for years. While taking the Virginia Beach School Board to task, Grace also explained the torment that so many LGBT teens still experience.  Here are highlights from her excellent piece: 

IN 1994, I was an eighth-grader at Lynnhaven Middle School. It was that year that I would have my first, but not last, experience with homophobia.

I fell in love with my best friend, who happened to be a girl, like me. At an age when I should have felt free to ask questions and be curious about who I was, I was shut down quickly and swiftly by students who figured out the nature of my relationship before I had time to understand it myself.

Their bullying took the form of notes at first, passed in front of me and left in my locker. Then they found it funny to cough and whisper “dyke” when my friend and I walked the hallway.

Discussions of these complicated feelings didn’t go well at home. And Lynnhaven Middle had no Gay-Straight Alliance or LGBTQ+ club for me to turn to. So instead, I spoke to no one. I became someone who spoke up less and doubted myself more. I was afraid of being singled out. To be noticed felt like being caught. It was then that I realized that the spaces I once thought were welcoming and safe were not.

Rumors of my sexuality followed me into high school at First Colonial, where I spent most of my freshman year convincing people that I wasn’t “that girl” and that no — I didn’t have crushes on all my female friends. I kept my head down, worked hard and, when college rolled around, I got as far away from Virginia Beach as I could.

It wasn’t until I turned 30 that I faced the truth about my sexuality. I was afraid of not being accepted and loved for who I really was, and I was afraid for my physical safety if I lived openly and honestly. On a daily basis, I was reminded that those fears were still justified in most places in the United States.

I’ve worked hard to overcome the damage done as the result of living in a community and school system that wasn’t more outwardly accepting and supportive of LGBTQ+ students. But as much as it pains me to admit, there is still a part of me that has internalized that homophobia and thinks I should be a little quieter and a little less open, loud and proud about who I am.

But that voice — that self-hatred and self-doubt — is exactly the voice we have to stop the next generation of children from hearing.

Most people assume that because more people from the LGBTQ+ community live openly and are depicted on TV and movie screens that things are better — safer, even. But openly LGBTQ+ students are still the victims of bullying on a daily basis, both online and off, especially in spaces like schools that should be safe havens. And according to The Trevor Project, each episode of LGBT victimization, such as physical or verbal harassment or abuse, increases the likelihood of self-harming behavior by 2.5 times on average.

So when I heard that Cox High School had postponed its very first gay pride assembly, I was confused and heartbroken. The school said officials had decided (one day before the event was scheduled) to be “more inclusive.” If Cox does not see the heartbreaking irony in asking students who are routinely excluded to make their event more inclusive (especially when it never excluded any students or required them to attend), they are missing a much bigger point.

In addition, School Board member-elect Victoria Manning told The Pilot that “this is a controversial subject, and I do not believe it is appropriate to hold a gay pride event during instructional time.”

By suggesting that LGBTQ+ pride is controversial, Manning is sending the message that students who were born gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, intersex or asexual are somehow inherently problematic. I for one am tired of seeing LGBTQ+ people, especially students, asked to take a seat, be quiet and wait while the rest of the world gets more comfortable with our very existence.

No person, student or otherwise, should ever feel that their voice isn’t worth hearing and supporting. No person should ever feel their identity is controversial.

As an alumna of this school system, I expect and demand better from the people who are shaping the next generation of students in our hometown. And as someone who knows what it feels like to put someone else’s comfort ahead of my own for years, I can tell you that the results can lead to permanent damage.

Ironically, Grace and I were struggling with similar feelings and fears in what we both seeming felt to be isolation, consumed with fear of discovery.  It took me many more years than Grace to come to terms with my sexuality as I finally came out in mid-life.in late 2001.   What is so disturbing is that people like school board member elect Victoria Manning continue to act as if LGBT individuals are controversial as they prostitute themselves to Christofascists who strive to unconstitutionally impose their toxic religious beliefs on all.  Religious belief has ZERO place in the public schools. ZERO!  I continue to wait to see if my worse fears about the Virginia Beach School Board were justified or not.