Posted on 10/19/2011 4:33:43 AM PDT by IbJensen
HARTFORD, October 18, 2011 (LifeSiteNews.coom) - Several students at a Hartford high school expressed horror and left the auditorium when two male members of a city-funded school play shared a passionate kiss onstage on Friday. School officials said they opted against informing parents about the event ahead of time, saying that the students needed exposure to homosexuality, and hailed the “chaotic” reaction as a victory for raising the gay issue.
The kiss occurred during Hartford Public High School’s production of “Zanna, Don’t!,” a play depicting a world in which homosexuality is normative and heterosexuals take up the role of “outcasts.”
The Hartford Courant reported that “screams and loud voices” and sounds of disgust came from the audience during the display of affection, while “dozens” of mostly male students left the auditorium. While some trickled back in, officials had to prevent many from leaving the school building.
School officials had told students that homosexual displays of affection would be featured in the play, and many asked to be excused. One school official cited by The Courant, nursing academy principal David Chambers, said that he had considered sending an opt-out letter to parents before changing his mind. The school reportedly received a number of phone calls from parents following the incident.
The play, available to students free of charge, was a joint effort between Connecticut gay youth group True Colors and a local youth leadership program, and was funded in part by the city of Hartford.
Chambers said that students needed to learn empathy towards homosexuals and exposure to things that would make them uncomfortable. “Our kids are not there yet,” he said. Chambers also suggested that the reaction of disgust was a good sign, indicating a release of students’ inner conflict about homosexuality.
“Even though it’s kind of chaotic, kind of wild and crazy, I see it as very successful,” he said, according to The Courant. “Our kids never deal with this, they keep it inside, and that’s that nervous energy. That’s why they walked out.”
Adam Johnson, principal of Hartford High’s Law and Government Academy, agreed. “This is as important of a topic to discuss as anything in math, anything in social studies,” Johnson said. “I’m completely glad that we did it.”
The Family Institute of Connecticut (FIC) condemned the scandal, and called for a protest of the school’s decision, calling it “an outrageous attack on parental rights.”
FIC notes that a bill introduced earlier this year by Republican Sen. Kevin Witkos, which would have mandated that parents be allowed to opt out their children from sexuality instruction in schools, was never given a public hearing. “We will fight for it again next year and every year until it is passed,” said the group.
Same-sex “marriage” was imposed on Connecticut by the state’s Supreme Court in 2008, three years after granting “all-but-marriage” civil unions for homosexual couples.
Hartford Public High School: 860-695-1300
Hartford Public Schools 860-695-8000
Dr. Christina Kishimoto, Superintendent of Schools superintendent@hartfordschools.org
Great post!
Have you ever looked at any of the Barna surveys of the worldview of Christians? I remember years back one of them revealed that of a given sample of children of Baptist parents who were educated in government schools, 80%-90% graduated with a secular humanist worldview. It was pretty shocking, but even more shocking, most of my Christian friends didn’t seem to be too concerned about the implications for their own children & grandchildren.
Yes, I have. They are very discouraging.
And...I too have the same reaction when I speak to others about our corrupt godless socialist schools. Their eyes glaze over, or they simply can **not** understand what I am saying.
But....One thing is for certain. I have eliminated my contact with socialist school teachers down to the bare minimum. They are either evil or stupid.
Frankly, I don’t need to see some guy and his girlfriend doing a groping full-blown makeout session in my face either. It’s almost as if a kiss got completely devalued from when I was a kid, where it actually meant something, now it doesn’t mean all that much even with regards to heterosexual relationships, anyways, that’s one of my pet peeves, which, I know it is old fashioned, but I am one obnoxious traditionalist at times.
Well, I personally don’t always find it amusing when a guy and his girlfriend have to do it in the middle of the hallway, not to mention obstruct my view. Either way, a kiss doesn’t seem to hold the kind of value which it used to regarding relationships.
Someone ought to say, “Surgeon General’s Warning: Practicing Self Control, restraint, or even abstinence on sexual contact that is oral or anal greatly reduces serious risks to your health.”
I wonder why it’s always men who get disgusted at male homosexuality and not women. Logically it should be the other way round because the more male homosexuals there are the more women there are for the remaining heterosexual males while there’s less choice for the women. Instead straight guys get off to lesbians kissing while some straight gals like me find two guys kissing to be “hot”. Just goes to show there’s no logic in sex.
I agree with you. Noticeable displays of affection in public are mainly about getting attention, and have little to do with real involvement between the parties.
You aren’t being old fashioned at all.. I agree. A stolen kiss between a girl and a boy at a Homecoming Dance is cute to me. A full groping event is crass. You want to yell, “Get a room”. Any sort of sexual behavior has become more public IMHO. It has been devalued.
I think the public displays are a result of the people’s really being bored with each other and with physical interaction in general. Nowadays, young people see it all over from early childhood, they’re constantly told that there’s nothing more important or interesting in life ... and then they find that it’s really pretty much a drag, especially if you’re involved with immature and self-centered partners (as how could you not be, given their age and culture?).
So the only thing that’s the least exciting is making a scene in public (or on Youtube, etc.). It’s all about getting a reaction from observers.
In the case at my son’s Homecoming Dance... I think it was a way to get a reaction. From my understanding, the “couple” found it amusing that another kid threw up. I am glad that I have taught/still teaching my children that hand holding is fine, a smooch is okay... anything past that is private and not for public viewing. Decorum...
I’ve told my children that a fraternal greeting, as they say in church, is in order between unmarried persons. I’m very sensitive about people’s taking physical liberties.
In the context of a school, any kind of romantic displays are a distraction from what should be the purpose of the institution.
You aren’t being old fashioned at all.. I agree. A stolen kiss between a girl and a boy at a Homecoming Dance is cute to me. A full groping event is crass.
I agree, and with TV and all that jazz being so much about even cohabitation, people of either same or opposite gender associations showing little value, it makes me want to just get shows like “I Love Lucy” or other old fashioned sitcoms on video. Yes, it was way before my time, but the behavior of a married couple on I love Lucy is more modest than plenty of regular unmarried couples. Again, IMO, devaluing things that were once genuine, valued, tokens of affection, is part of the reason why people care less for aberrant sexual behaviors. The interesting correlation is that while people have been making their affection less value, even those practicing homosexuality have gone a similar route, even back during the 1950s, I don’t believe homosexuality, especially male homosexuality was too deviating from the general population in terms of health issues, both mental as well as physical.
The correlation of homosexuality with drug use, relationship violence, suicide, and sexually-transmitted disease has consistently been pretty strong, at least in modern Western societies. Going back to classical times, things are a little different - for one thing, we don't know much about their experience of disease, beyond obvious catastrophic epidemics.
I have a theory that, given their instrumental view of women (they keep house and have babies), men in ancient societies diverted the emotional drama that now characterizes less-successful heterosexual relationships into homosexual interactions.
The correlation of homosexuality with drug use, relationship violence, suicide, and sexually-transmitted disease has consistently been pretty strong, at least in modern Western societies. Going back to classical times, things are a little different - for one thing, we don’t know much about their experience of disease, beyond obvious catastrophic epidemics.
A great deal of STDs weren’t too common before recent times, people associated most of them with fornication or adultery, not totally accurate, but it was their primary assumption during the day. During the late 1960s/early 1970s it started to show that issues like irritable bowel syndrome, shigellosis, gonorrhea, and syphillis were disproportionate. Political Correctness tried to soften up the facts but people still know what MSM means.
I had a male friend in college who I asked this question of, and he replied that the appeal was that the women were so aroused, perhaps he could get involved in the action. Sort of playing into the fantasy of two women wanting him at the same time. Then he laughed and said, “In theory anyway. I don’t really get turned on by that.”
Uh-huh.
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