Trust me, we're handling it just fine

Gay and transgender school kids have long been the target of bullies. Many of these kids feel unsafe going to school and so drop out. Many others commit suicide, including three in the Anoka-Hennepin School District in Minnesota over the last year. Which means an anti-bullying policy can be seen as an anti-suicide policy.

Also for a long time, anti-gay groups have opposed anti-bullying policies for schools. The Safe Schools bill has been held up in the Michigan Senate for many years. The Anoka-Hennepin School Board claims they take bullying seriously but has refused to implement anti-bullying policies.

That leads to the question: When does opposition to suicide prevention equal murder?

The failure to implement such a policy has the full backing of Focus on the Family. They claim the issue is being hijacked by homosexual activists who are politicizing and sexualizing the issue. These activists, claims FotF, want gay-themed curricula which is sexually graphic and full of anti-religion stereotypes. This should not to be confused with anti-gay stereotypes, which are apparently highly desired in school curricula. FotF portrays gays as full of abject misery.

FotF partner Alliance Defense Fund has a Model Anti-Bullying Policy they are pushing on schools. GLSEN -- Gay, Lesbian, Straight Education Network -- has the takedown on why this model policy won't actually do anything to protect gay kids. There are four major points to the rebuttal.

* Enumeration -- ADF wants policies that don't specifically say that gay kids (and other groups) are covered. GLSEN finds that when enumeration is left out the weakened policy is no more effective at stopping bullying than not having a policy at all. Much of that is because when gay kids are not mentioned administrators and teachers are reluctant to enforce anti-bullying policies because they are afraid parents will complain that straight Fundie kids are deprived of their free speech. In their reasoning for leaving out enumeration, ADF plays Oppression Olympics -- gays don't have it as bad as other groups of kids who are bullied, so shut up. That clearly misses the point that all bullying is bad.

* No training -- the ADF policy doesn't say how school administrators and teachers are to learn what bullying is, how to identify it, and how to effectively stop it. No training equals useless policy.

* Careful limits on the policy -- state the policy is in effect on school property and school busses. Which means all a bully has to do is wait until his target has left school grounds before attacking.

* Overemphasis on free speech -- The last line of the model policy states:

This policy shall not be interpreted to infringe upon the First Amendment rights of students, and is not intended to prohibit expression of religious, philosophical, or political views, provided that such expression does not cause an actual, material disruption of the work of the school. (emphasis added)

A Fundie church kid can torment a gay kid in the cafeteria and in the halls with threats of hellfire and brimstone as long as the work of the school is not disrupted.

Put another way, the ADF policy is designed to make sure Fundie kids are allowed to create hostile environments for gay kids while giving school officials a way of saying, "See! We're handling the bullying problem!"