Protection or discrimination?
The Student Protection Act, a measure seeking to ban the promotion or encouragement of homosexuality in public schools, has made it on November’s state voting ballot, touching off a good amount of controversy and posturing from both sides of the issue.
If passed, the initiative would establish a law that prohibits presentation in any of Oregon’s public schools promoting, encouraging or sanctioning homosexuality or bisexuality to students.
The Oregon Citizens Alliance learned July 31 that it had received the 66,786 required signatures to see the measure gain a spot on the ballot. “We are elated to get this measure on the ballot,” OCA representative Lon Mabon said in a recent press release. The OCA sees the act as a way to protect students from what it calls “destructive lifestyles.”
“The measure simply says that public money and facilities may no longer be used to teach children that a dangerous and destructive lifestyle is merely an alternative to healthy lives and families,” Mabon said.
The measure defines “public schools” as all public elementary, middle and high schools along with community colleges, state colleges and universities and all state and local institutions that provide education for patients or inmates. However, only K-12 public schools and community colleges could be sanctioned for noncompliance. The penalty for noncompliance would be the withholding of state dollars.
Representatives from other groups said they believe that the purpose of the measure is discriminatory.
“The intent of this act is to discriminate against homosexuals and bi-sexuals,” said Kathryn Firestone, president of the Oregon Parent Teachers Association. “The initiative says that homosexuality and bisexuality are not necessary in the instruction of public schools, but these are not parts of the curriculum now.”
Firestone said she is also concerned with health issues, censorship and the effect it will have on teachers.
“This act brings up questions of what you can teach about AIDS,” she said. “Fifty percent of all AIDS cases are under 25 years old — kids need to know that information.”
Should the act pass, others believe that First Amendment rights would be in jeopardy.
“This is not only an issue of discrimination on its face, but it also impacts the faculty’s right to speak freely in the classroom,” said Hosea Ortal, director of affirmative action and diversity at Lane Community College. Although the Student Protection Act would mostly target K-12 graders, the impact on the state’s community colleges is at this point still uncertain.
“This legislation may or may not affect Lane Community College, but I suspect it would affect courses like Human Sexual Behavior, or Cultural Competency and Community Service,” Ortal said.
Concerns of censorship also arise when looking at the act’s educational implications, Firestone said.
“Are we not going to allow authors like Plato and Alice Walker because the authors were homosexual?”
If Oregon voters pass the act, teachers may also be put in jeopardy of termination for not cooperating with the regulation, according to Firestone.
“This piece of legislation would put teachers at risk who are sought out by students for counsel,” she said. “Teachers would not be allowed to refer students [who are questioning their sexuality] or else they might get fired.”
The Oregon PTA has an estimated 27,000 members for 270 schools and communities throughout the state, and is making the defeat of the initiative a top priority. Mabon, who could not be reached for personal comment, responded in his press release to the PTA’s stand.
“The leadership of the PTA say they want to protect all children, but they advocate the validation of a very unhealthy lifestyle to these same children, one that continues to be viewed by God as a sexual sin,” he said. “It is obvious that the leadership of the PTA has been compromised by pro-homosexual activists.”