Here is Joe Quigley's
statement on the School Board vote. (After
teaching at Northwest Classen High School for many
years, Joe was fired earlier this year. A judge
reinstated Joe - agreeing that his firing was due at
least in part to his advocacy on behalf of GLBT
students. Unfortunately, the OKC School Board refused
to allow Joe to return to NW Classen, so he is no
longer able to monitor the situation regarding
possible anti-GLBT repression there. Joe is currently
teaching at US Grant High School.)
“Horning said the rules were
waived because it was a sensitive issue with
‘nothing to profit us by extending the
debate on the policy beyond tonight.’”
(The Oklahoman 12/15/09)
Although it took 12 years, at least half a dozen
superintendents, changes in School Board members,
a bevy of reprimands, a court case prompted by
actions that resulted from some opposition,
multiple appearances before the Board by many
people, at least one connected death, possibly
two, some rather strange behavior on the part of
administrators, including “Family”
members, and some of the most far-fetched
arguments in opposition, finally what the Board
has been told has sunk in. Even though they now
see they are ahead of the curve, it is a position
the OKCPS District could have been in for many
years now. But it has happened.
Sitting in the auditorium during the meeting and
the discussion it was an odd experience listening
as the district’s in-house legal counsel
answered questions by repeating much of what was
said over the years as if it were newly
discovered, and to hear Mr. Horning reading from
the GLSEN reports that had been ignored by the
Board throughout the years. There were times I
could remember who had made the original
statements and when.
Looking forward, GLBT students no longer have to
be victims with no recourse. They can now report
harassment and bullying, and district personnel
have to respond properly. Personal prejudices are
finally to be left at the school house door.
Looking back, there are some students whose lives
would have been better and their school
experience more welcoming if the Board had seen
the importance of being ahead of the curve years
ago.
There were two letters from a superintendent in
2003 and 2004 stating clearly that these students
were covered by these policies; the words
“sexual orientation” appeared on the
Board web site in 2006, only to be removed within
hours; and, there were many unanswered question
over the last three years as to who directed that
action and how legal was it.
Sadly, the board continually bent to “local
norms” and threw these students to the
wolves for political reasons and personal
considerations forgetting their commitment is to
all students, even ones they do not like.
But now the protections are there along with the
process to address infractions. The GLBT students
have received long overdue protection. Their
school experiences have a better chance now to be
positive.
And as Ms Stewart would say, “That’s a
good thing”.
VICTORY!
FINALLY, after a twelve-year
effort on the part of Oklahoma City's GLBT Community
- an effort spearheaded by Joe
Quigley - the OKC School
Board voted 6-2 at tonight's - December 14th - public
Board meeting to add the words "sexual
orientation" and "gender identity" to
the OKCPS
district anti-bullying policy.
CONGRATULATIONS
TO JOE AND EVERYONE ELSE WHO CONTRIBUTED TO THIS
EFFORT!
UPDATE:
and THANK YOU to school board member Phil Horning for
saying "I'll die before I vote no" as quoted on NewsOK.com!
Joe
Quigley has promised a statement which I hope to be
able to post later today!
OKLAHOMA REPUBLICAN PARTY
PLATFORM
The Oklahoma Republican Party held its
state convention on April 18th. At that time it
adopted the platform recommended by the platform
committee, with a few additions.
The final platform, as adopted, may be
viewed on the website of the Central Oklahoma
Stonewall Democrats:
Since then, I have heard a report that,
before the vote, a proposal was made to adopt an
alternative platform which condensed the Party
positions to a brief single-page statement of around
10 sentences. This proposal was reportedly rejected
because the word "God" was not present in
any of the sentences.
Before the convention, I gained access
to the platform committee's report and posted an
entry about it on my blog, The Morality
War. Here is that entry:
OK
GOP platform
The Oklahoma Republican Party holds its state convention
this weekend - one of the events that is scheduled to
take place is a vote on the state party's platform.
I have seen an advance copy of a draft of the
proposed platform - officially the "Report of
the Oklahoma Republican Party Platform Committee 2009"
- for the party that is supposed to stand
for smaller government: it is 29 pages long! I
suppose that should be considered an improvement over
the inches-thick monstrosity the party adopted
several years ago.
If anyone is laboring under the illusion that the OK
GOP does not want to micro-manage the lives
of individual Oklahomans every bit as much as - if
not more than - the Democrats - this document goes a
long way toward smashing that idea.
The document also makes it very clear what the
motivation for that micro-management is: Religion. It
should come as no surprise that the chairs of the
platform committee are well-known theocrats: Randy
Brogdon and Kevin Calvey.
Here are some highlights:
As Republicans
we believe:
1. Our rights of life, liberty, and property are
natural rights granted to us by God and protected
by the Constitution.
4. God is the Author and Creator of life and that
all human life, both born and unborn, should be
protected.
5. In traditional marriage consisting of one man
and one woman.
I. FAMILY
Preamble:
Traditional marriage, consisting of one man and
one woman, is designed to provide for each family
member’s physical, emotional, financial,
spiritual, and social well-being. Both parents
are needed to support and encourage happiness,
health, and a good education for their children,
creating the next generation of citizens who are
constructive members of society. Multi-generational
families foster mutual respect and cooperation
while providing support for extended family
members and forming enduring relationships. We
believe God is the Author and Creator of human
life and that each individual should be treated
with dignity and compassion. We insist that any
candidate receiving money and/or support from the
Republican Party shall affirm and promote the Pro-Life
concept.
" . . . each
individual should be treated with dignity and
compassion." Does that include Gays and Lesbians?
2. We believe in
the sanctity and value of human life from
conception through natural death. We oppose
abortion (including the use of RU-486 or other
abortion-inducing drugs), partial-birth abortion,
infanticide, euthanasia, mercy killings,
embryonic stem-cell research, cloning,
distribution of cloned parts, and the funding of
such by the government. We believe that human
embryos created by Invitro-Fertilization (IVF)
are fully human and if not wanted by the genetic
parents, should be preserved until adoption. We
support a Constitutional Amendment protecting
innocent human life.
D. Elderly and Vulnerable
1. We support the origin and sanctity of life as
an inalienable right from God alone, and as being
defined in the Constitution of the United States.
This definition of life begins with conception
and ends at natural death due to the failure of
the body to survive it’s environment. We
support the protection of those who cannot defend
themselves including the unborn, the disabled,
and the elderly.
E. Religious Freedom
1. Our Founding Fathers based our Constitution,
Declaration of Independence, Bill of Rights, and
early laws on the Bible and on traditional Judeo-Christian
ethics and values. We believe these documents are
the basis for law, order, and behavior, allowing
individuals, including government workers and
officials, the freedom to involve God in all
activities according to their conscience.
Please explain to me
how individualism, Capitalism and the right to pursue
happiness have anything to do with "traditional
Judeo-Christian ethics and values". To assert
that they do is an out-and-out lie.
F. General
1. We oppose the promotion of homosexuality, the
elimination of laws against sodomy, and the
granting of minority protection or special status
to any person based upon sexual preference or
lifestyle choices.
2. We believe that homosexuality is not a genetic
trait but a chosen lifestyle.
Anyone
who opposes the elimination of sodomy laws cannot
claim to support the principle of individual rights.
We call for
individuals, families, churches, and private
organizations to take responsibility in meeting
the needs of the citizens of the community.
Oh my, this does
sound suspiciously like Obama's "community
organizing" idea. In other words, you want
everyone to meddle in everyone else's lives - that is,
to be their brother's keeper (now there's
a traditional Judeo-Christian value).
We encourage
rigorous enforcement of all anti-pornography laws.
So much for freedom
of speech and press.
II. EDUCATION
Preamble:
We acknowledge our dependence upon Almighty God
and ask His blessings upon our students and their
parents, teachers and nation. It is the right and
responsibility of parents to direct their
children’s upbringing and education whether
public, private, charter, or home school, without
interference, regulation, or penalty from the
government.
The primary goal of public schools should be to
teach proficiency in the basic subjects of
phonicsbased reading, written and oral
communication, mathematics, sciences, traditional
history, including our founding documents, the
Godly heritage of our nation, and critical
thinking skills.
I'd watch out for
those "critical thinking skills" if I were
you. They can turn around and bite you.
The traditional
family unit, consisting of a (husband) man, (wife)
woman and child(ren), is the foundation of our
social structure. The Oklahoma Department of
Education and various Boards of Regents should
uphold and teach this definition of traditional
family at all levels of public school and higher
education.
The Ten Commandments should be posted in all
public schools as a means of moral guidance along
with our national motto “In God We
Trust” and the Bill of Rights.
How is this going to
do anything but confuse those who are developing
their "critical thinking skills" when they
see how much the Bill of Rights clashes with the Ten
Commandments? Hmm?
Public schools
shall not prohibit the Judeo-Christian worldview
upon which our country was founded. Public
schools shall be prohibited from promoting other
worldviews such as, but not limited to, secular
Humanism, New Age philosophy, deep ecology,
reincarnation,psychotherapy, channeling,
transcendental meditation, altered states of
consciousness or any occult practice.
Oh really? I suppose
that includes Objectivism and the works of Ayn Rand?
We believe that
the scientific evidence supporting Intelligent
Design and biblical creation should be included
in the Oklahoma public school curricula, and
where any evolution theory is taught, that both
should receive equal funding, class time, and
material. Teachers should have the freedom to
cover creation science without fear of
intimidation or reprimand.
Why does this not
surprise me?
Any mandated sex
education shall hold to the following guidelines:
a. Neither homosexual nor extramarital sexual
activity shall be presented as safe, nor shall
they be presented as morally or socially
acceptable behaviors.
b. HIV shall be presented as incurable and fatal.
c. Abstinence or lifetime fidelity shall be
presented as the only safe sexual practice.
9. We oppose the portrayal of homosexual or
promiscuous behavior in a positive light in
public schools.
A. Crime and Punishment
1. We believe that the final solution to all
crime is a change of heart and support the
utilization of Christian faith-based and
privately-financed programs to reduce recidivism
and for the treatment of drug offenders as an
alternative to prison.
I guess prisoners
don't deserve any religious freedom.
IV. FEDERAL
Preamble:
The Constitution of the United States is the
supreme law of the land and should be interpreted
according to the original intent of the founding
fathers. We call for reaffirmation of our God-given
rights enumerated in the first ten amendments,
the Bill of Rights. Our founding fathers based
the Declaration of Independence, our Constitution,
Bill of Rights, and early laws on traditional
Judeo-Christian Bible, ethics and values. We
believe that these documents are the basis for
law, order, and
behavior, allowing individuals, including
government officials, the freedom to involve God
in all activities according to their consciences.
D. Constitutional Issues
1. We affirm our right under the First Amendment
of the United States Constitution to exercise our
freedom of speech including religious speech. We
believe the First Amendment’s Establishment
Clause was intended to prevent a state-sponsored
or preferred religion, not to separate God from
our government or to remove religion from public
life.
Hmmm . . . they don't
want "state-sponsored or preferred religion".
But how do they feel about laws that promote the
views of a specific religion?
The whole document begins with this statement:
"We
believe in limited government, individual liberty,
and personal moral responsibility."
This is
pure hypocrisy: anyone who
genuinely believed that individuals were responsible
for their own moral judgement would not
do everything they could to prevent individuals from exercising
their own moral judgement. Yet
this proposed platform does just exactly that.
And I damn them for it.
I have just one thing to say to the Republicans of
Oklahoma: Marilyn Musgrave. Don't think it can't
happen here.
My new website
www.RobAbiera.com
Celebrating GayOKC.com's 10th
Anniversary!
10 years of
History
In October 1998, Matthew
Shepard was murdered in Laramie, Wyoming.
In October 2008, 3 openly-Gay
candidates have been elected to public office in
Oklahoma.
One of those candidates, Jim Roth, was re-elected
to the same office, and was then appointed by the
governor to a statewide office.
AND the Democratic candidate for
Vice-President, Joe Biden, addressed the annual
dinner of the major national GLBT Rights group, the
Human Rights Campaign.
AND President Bush visited Oklahoma
City and attended a fundraiser held at the home of a
Gay Republican.
The GayOKC.com
Page One Archive
pageone.gayokc.com
10
years of Oklahoma City's Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and
Transgendered History as it was originally reported
right here on the front page of GayOKC.com!
What
made the headlines on the front page over the years?
Want to see what GayOKC.com has looked like over the
years? Now you can!
The Joe Quigley Archive
quigley.gayokc.com
Though
there have been some who have thought of GayOKC.com
as being NW Classen High School teacher Joe Quigley's
personal website at times, that, of course, has never
been true. It is true that GayOKC.com did
provide Mr. Quigley with a sorely needed outlet for
crucial information about Oklahoma City's GLBT
students. Joe's relationship with GayOKC.com began
with a 50 page manuscript about conditions in the
Oklahoma City school system, which was serialized in
five installments over five consecutive days in
December, 2000, under the title, "Joe Quigley,
teacher." I consider the posting of that series
one of GayOKC.com's finest hours.
The State of Our Community
GayOKC.com's groundbreaking town hall
event!
Click
here to Search GayOKC.com
Virtually
every page created for this site in the 10 years
since its inception remains online and has been
indexed for searching. And with the addition of the
new Page One Archive, that means over 2000 pages of
Oklahoma City's GLBT history now online and at your
convenience!
THANK YOU!
To
everybody who has supported GayOKC.com over the past
10 years!
Thank
you to Carolyn Smith, Joe Quigley, James Nimmo, Sean
Winders, the Oklahoma Gay and Lesbian Political
Caucus, the Cimarron Alliance Foundation, and
everyone else who provided news and information,
bought advertising, helped spread the word about
GayOKC.com or provided any kind of support in any way
- including moral support!
Speaking
of which, THANK YOU especially to all the users who
visited GayOKC.com over the years looking for news,
information, and the occasional conversation! You
were the ones who proved to me that it could work and
was worth doing! I only wish I'd had the resources to
make GayOKC.com the website it really could have been.
Support GayOKC.com
If
you would like to show your support for GayOKC.com, I
would like to talk to you about a sponsorship. If you
think that what GayOKC.com has done for our community
these past 10 years is of real value, and you think
that keeping these pages online as a historical
document is a value to you as well as to our
community, I invite you to consider a sponsorship as
an expression of that value. Your investment in
GayOKC.com is also an investment in our community.
Please
email me - Rob Abiera, editor and publisher of GayOKC.com
- at rabiera@gayokc.com.
You
can also make a donation through PayPal!
"Today,
the conflict has reached its ultimate climax; the
choice is clear-cut: either a new morality of
rational self-interest, with its consequences of
freedom, justice, progress and man's happiness on
earth--or the primordial morality of altruism, with
its consequences of slavery, brute force, stagnant
terror and sacrificial furnaces." - Ayn Rand, For
The New Intellectual
THANKS
FOR VISITING!
