Posted on 12/16/2004 10:05:07 AM PST by presidio9
Two parents, shocked at frank talk during a gay and lesbian awareness day at Newton North High, were forced off the property after one parent whipped out a video camera and started taping.
``This does not belong in curriculum,'' said Kim Cariani, who said four police officers and the principal told them they would be charged with trespassing if they did not leave.
``It's against my religion. It's morally wrong and forced in a child's face.''
Each year, some students at Newton North forgo classes during To BGLAD: Transgender, Bisexual, Gay and Lesbian Awareness Day with assembly-like sessions including ``Out at the Old Ballgame'' and ``Color Me Queer.'' Students are not required to attend.
Cariani kept her two kids home during the day, but she was curious.
Cariani and another parent, Brian Camenker, were in the audience when adults in a panel discussion talked about being gay. When one man told the students he was attracted to his sister's husband, Cariani said she started to record the ``propaganda, false information and lies.''
The principal demanded Cariani turn over the videotape or leave, Camenker said.
``They took the two of us and pulled us out and gave us one minute to leave and if we came back on the property we would be arrested for trespassing,'' he said.
Tom Mountain, a columnist for the Newton Tab, was also barred from the assembly ``for the safety and security of the children,'' he said he was told.
Newton schools Superintendent Jeff Young said it is a violation of school policy to tape or photograph students without parental permission. Cariani refused to give up the tape, so they were asked to decamp, he said.
The awareness day, held for the past 10 years, is one of several ways the schools highlight diversity, Young said. Students who don't want to go can go to the library or computer lab.
Are you not struck by the irony of that? Is it necessary for schools to "teach" homosexuality?
What would you guess was their goal here?
It's unnecessary to say hello to someone you pass on the street. Should all things unnecessary be illegal?
If I didn't like the teaching method of someone teaching my kids, I couldn't bust into the class room with a video camera.
She didn't "bust into the class room", she attended the public meeting.
I would have to document instances and then present them.
How would you document these instances? I would assume videotaping the teaching session would be a pretty objective way to document for future presentation. Notes can be fudged and disputed, video is much harder to defend against if in fact you had done something wrong.
Perhaps 7-11 needs to do away with their video cameras and rely upon their clerk's description of robbers. After all, I hear on this thread that taking notes is just as effective of a method of acquiring information as a video camera. I guess I learn something new everyday.
Thing that bothers me is that if her tax contribution helps pay for the school and its personnel and curricula, AND has a kid enrolled, I don't see how she's "trespassing."
Is that what happened here?
I think you're missing the point. She wasnt thrown out for being there or disagreeing with it. She was thrown out for videotaping it. Even if her ends were proper, her means were not. She has every right in the world not to agree with this and to lodge a complaint. She just cannot tape it.
Bad example. The courts (and general ethics and morals) dictate that there are certain areas everyone has a right to privacy, the bathroom, changing areas, etc.
The school routinely allows parents to film sports events, plays and presentations on school property without express consent from the participating students.
This was a school event on school property and would easily meet the same criteria as the examples above.
Next time think through your example.
NeverGore
Is that what happened here?
I don't know, if we had a video of the meeting I guess we could find out.
"I gave you the information. Care to answer? Either you are cleverly playing the devil's advocate or you are blind to the homosexual agenda. Care to answer?"
You gave me no information at all. Were you at this program? If not, then you do not know what was presented. I wasn't, and I don't know.
Why?
Why can't she tape it? Because the principal says it's against school policy? Do you think he enforces that for football games, school plays, and holiday choruses?
Why not? If she could take notes, if she could attend, if she could protest, why not tape it?
Was it a private meeting? No.
Was it on private property? No.
Was it during a non-public time? No.
So when is it against the law for a public meeting held on public property during a public time period to be video taped by a person who had every right to be there?
You can videotape a parade down main street, a public high school football game, a hot air balloon festival. So why is it illegal for a parent of a student at a public High School to tape a meeting that is open to parents and students on school ground during a school day?
It isn't.
Well, the relevance is that the people involved in the assembly (both presenters and students) would have known that the taper strongly disapproved of it and would have taken their words (again, students and presenters) and publicized them well beyond the classroom. The connection is that the recorder changes and influences the nature of the event in the way she would if she were in a locker room and she wouldn't if she were recording a play from the back of a room.
I think that blanket statements disregard this reality.
It seems that is was absolutely necessary. I have had some experience with school boards. Notes and the scribblings of a disgruntled parent amount to zero, and can easily be dismissed.
But video evidence is quite something else.
My understanding is that it should be fine to video tape the teacher or presenter, as long as you don't video tape the kids.
Is this correct?
You know that's what happened there. I think another question might be raised:
Why do you continue to obfuscate the issue? Why do you support "gay" agenda issues every chance you get while feigning objectivity and fooling no one?
You wrestle with Mr. Straw Man and never address any of the facts that are brought up, either on this thread or any thread.
Thus confirming our opinion that they have something they are trying to teach to the kids that they want to hide from the public.
Didn't they nail the fisting symposium at Tufts University with a tape, too? These Newton thugs were probably trying to avoid there being any "recorded evidence."
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