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From 2015-20221 the bane of political cartoonists was that, after having executed a great summary of his latest strangeness Trump would come up with another rendering the first cartoon irrelevant and if printed, poorly timed.

Previous to Trump, covering politics meant choosing from many stories and executing a cartoon on the issue chosen. I would pencil in the idea and by lunch had a finished cartoon that I could add to my blog and put on the website for a timed, early morning publication.

When Trump came, by the end of the day I would have multiple sketches and some completed works with perhaps the last one being timed for publication with the hope he would do nothing between the time I went to bed and checked the blog in the morning

I am sure I am not the only cartoonist with a drawer full of once salient commentary reduced to irrelevance as the result of another well-informed pronouncement.

And so it was that after Joe Biden’s inauguration, I decided I would not draw another cartoon of DJT. It may be about him or any of his acolytes, but he was not going to appear.

I mean, he lost, and, as was demanded of Hillary, would just move on being the former president and milking that for all it was worth.

Instead, as more information comes out about the before, during, and after of the January 6, 2021 Insurrection with Trump tweeting his every thought and reaction to a small somewhat off olive, there are multiple daily inspirations for cartoons.

However, as frustrating as it is not to grab the lowest hanging fruit, Trump is no longer president and I will continue in my pledge not to draw him again.

Well, maybe the one future jail picture.

But That’s it.

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    When a person buys rental property, it is an investment in the free-market system that has both success and failure as possible outcomes. Part of the investment is the profit that can be made from the sale of the property. Therefore, the more presentable the property the better the chance of a high return on the investment. Poorly maintained or abandon buildings will not turn a profit equal to the least that could be gotten from the sale of a well-maintained building.

     Renters not only live in a building, but they contribute to its value by their rent payments that increase as is necessary to maintain the value of the property for the most part although absentee landlords, property management companies and greedy owners will raise rents for profit.

     Without the renters, the maintenance of the building declines and along with it its value, and any threat to steady profits is removed by eviction either because of lack of contribution or because of damage caused to the property that could lessen its value.

     That is why the people who have kept a building alive and sellable should be treated as more than just commodities and disposable at that.

     I once lived in a four-plex for 12 years with few rent increases. I had intended to live there for as long as I could, so at points during my residence there I was the only person renting an apartment the building. It was investment property bought by the owner of the management company for his wife who could use the rents to maintain the building to a minimum and have her personal mad money for trips and baubles.

     Empty, the building would have appeared derelict and, perhaps abandoned, and selling it in that condition would not bring in much money. With at least one apartment being used, the building had more value and the other apartments easier to rent.

     My rent stayed at a level that kept me as the guardian of the gate.

     The building I am in now, although maintained, is only done so according to what will keep the building valuable. It is perfectly located to become a premiere apartment building which will take a lot of work as the heating system has been Gerry-rigged from coal to gas and the electric wiring has been upgraded in patches so along with modern electric cords there are still some from when the building was built that have the cloth insolation covering the wires. There are no amenities such as dishwashers. There have been no major improvements to any apartments in the years I have lived here and general maintenance minus any improvement is random.

   It was obvious this was a building waiting for a new buyer who would want to own Boston style and priced property in a city about to rise when the train to Boston begins its regular run.

     Without a word to any resident, many who have lived in the building for many years, in one case 30, the building was sold, and the first notification was the building manager going door to door having tenant sign a paper verifying the rent each paid.

     There was no time to look before the sale so the process would have been calm. Instead, the people in 24 apartments were notified within days of this verification they had 30 days to quit the premises causing them to fan out competing with each other, and others in similar situations where this is happening city-wide, looking for something affordable in a limited market.

     Those who may wish to remain in their apartments during and after the total regut remodeling can do so at twice to three times their present rent.

     The first offer on the building was laughingly low according to the building manager some buyer had to come back with a more acceptable offer. The building was obviously in good enough shape to get the higher price and good enough to make the new owners grandiose plans for the future possible.

     After being told that certain expenses would be covered by the new owners, I requested details and found the cost of physically moving possessions would be covered up to ten miles of my present city, and that we were being played as fools by the financial offer to help cover, not fully cover move in expenses such as first, last and security, and to this end they will give funds equal to twice or monthly rent.

     The classic move for property speculators is to make an offer on a piece of property that exceeds what the owner thinks it’s worth. It could be the most money they will ever have, but when the deal is done and they attempt to use the money to buy something equal to what they sold, they find the big amount is only a down payment on a mortgage and to get what they can afford they must move where they have to not where they might want.

     Twice a month’s rent sounds good until looking at the price of apartments as they are now means that what each tenant gets might cover a month’s rent with something left over to which they can add from their pockets to afford the rest of the security and last month’s rent, basically more than what the new owners are offering.

     Since the sale, the heat that comes from a central boiler, early 20^th Century coal boiler adapted over the years to use natural gas with each apartment having radiators with knobs but not individual thermostat has yet to turn on as it has each year at mid-October and the alley which had been kept clean under old ownership, sends the obvious message that the tenants are as good as gone as it now has trash strewn in the garden and articles of clothing scattered on and around the cement wall that hoods the fence to delineate the apartment building’s land from the parking lot next door.

     The obviously stolen bicycle that appeared one night on the landing outside my backdoor has just been sitting there.

     The seller has profited from the sale and the buyer will begin to make a profit from this building especially as the upgrades will make the building a very attractive target for future purchase at a higher price while those who kept the building sellable and a good del now, and in the future, in spite of the role they played are simply displaced.

     They have a stake in the building. Their investment in it kept it in acceptable condition even if the owners chose to do so at a minimum. But that minimum ws enough.

     If the owners can turn down an offer only to accept the better one that followed, then there is proof that the rents paid by the tenants were effective and this should be acknowledged by more than the 10 dollars you get coming out of jail, the surprise of the sale and a thirty-day quit notice.

     Although the building has three wings in an open square, in finding ways to limit remodeling costs, it was determined that rather than being one building with three wings, the early 20 Century structure technically is four separate buildings of 6 apartments each and not one building with 24, so the new owners can save on the cost of a sprinkler system for fires when they remodel.

     Considering the number of buildings city-wide that are going to be remodeled to greet the money coming from Boston with the train, there are going to be a lot of displaced people whose rents will go up, not by choice but necessity, and who may have to move away from where they live now and where they have roots.

     As this gentrification is not only predictable but has begun, the city should require that any new building or any existing one that is being gentrified must reserve 25% of apartments for low-income renters, or renters already in a building in spite of the gouging the remodeling “justifies” can stay at the rent they are presently paying with a reasonable percentage increase.

     In my building that could be one wing, or those apartments spread thought the building, obviously the least gentrified apartments in the building.

     The city government may want this a Class-A city and will do what it takes to get that feather in their caps but knowing how the plan affects those already here by displacing them, the city that will benefit from driving them out could at least help in the process of relocation either with cash or a real estate group who can help find affordable housing.

     New Bedford has had and still has a tradition of helping its citizens going back to Quaker days, but perhaps that spirit has already been displaced.

     Renters invested in the properties and all we get is the T-shirt for which we had to throw in some coins.

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I once lived in a state where the commitment to a particular version of Christianity was so strong, that just being an adherent to it was enough to win elective office over someone who wasn’t.

This purity test was so strong that once, when one candidate was dealing with issues while the other was floundering through political vacuous platitudes, the only defense the latter had was to accuse the former of being the wrong type of Christian and this was enough to decide the election.

I have always been led to believe by the people themselves who tell me that I must believe it, that deeply held religious beliefs took precedence over all else and this would make them practically inviolable.

So, this Walker/abortion wiggling strikes me as odd.

Perhaps?

Ronna McDaniel, the Republican National Committee (RNC) Chairwoman was thrilled when the Trump Court killed a woman’s right to choose.

“Millions of Americans are celebrating today’s ruling and a pro-life movement that has worked tirelessly for decades.”

Abortions are bad.

With the senate in the balance, however, and with Georgia a deciding vote, pro-life as a principle gives way to votes for Herschel Walker in spite of how greatly he goes against those principles.

When speaking of Herschel Walker’s revealed acceptance of abortion when convenient, McDaniel found a way to skirt the abortion part and just give it all away for votes.

“Georgia could decide the Senate majority, so desperate Democrats and liberal media have turned to anonymous sources and character assassination. This is an attempt to distract from Warnock’s record of failure resulting in rising costs and out of control crime.”

“Herschel Walker will deliver a safer and more prosperous Georgia, and the RNC will continue to invest in the Senate race.”

It is conveniently acceptable now not to be a pure candidate like it is in regular times or where the vote is not as important.

Although he now says,

“I think he’s the most important Senate candidate in the country because he’ll do more to change the Senate just by the sheer presence, by his confidence, by his deep commitment to Christ,”  about Herschel Walker, Newt Gingrich, the former Speaker of the House who is openly proud of his “consistent pro-life voting record throughout his twenty years in Congress” having boasted of this while running for presidential nomination in 2011.

I get confused when a person who claims to be extremely religious, but who has his own less principled skeletons in his closet, touts someone who is a walking source of scandal and the worst example of a Christian to be committed to Christ so people will feel a religious compulsion to vote a certain way.

The party of commitment.

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The news stories and the various legal entanglements and government reports, the physical and mental abuse of inmates, the politicization of the office of sheriff, the involvement with white supremacist groups, the bigotry toward immigrants are overwhelming.

There is just too much to take in.

I have done the favor of summarizing it all.

Remember in November.

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In her attempts to maintain her position as the Queen of Conspiracies and the Right Wing, one of Marjorie Taylor Greene’s trope well-fonts is the Gay Community, all the letters of the Rainbow Alphabet I lose track of.

In her desperation to hold on to the old ways and old-time beliefs that education so easily dispels, her latest attempt at attacking Pete Buttigieg as a Gay man who is attempting to emasculate the highways of Americas because she can find nothing else to find fault with about him. She may feel that this approach is more insidious than jet plane com-trails because it is a more invisible thus subtle approach.

Just for those who need to know, Gay people have had to deal with a lot, and most was having to handle uninformed, personal attacks from people who think their lack of information is sufficient reason to oppress others. As a result, Gay people, having to succeed in both Straight and Gay society have to be able to navigate both knowing how much Gay they can let slip out for safety or the convenience of those nearby.

That means vocabulary on the straight level that is seemingly simply direct communication also contains innuendo and a message to the Gays in the area with the same effect for the Straights as the dog whistle they use to call in Fido.

For those who need the image, it is obvious by the snapping fingers that you have just been read. Without the snap, you got read, but only the Gay people in the vicinity will see that.

MGT claims that Pete’s push for electric vehicles is his was y to emasculate automobiles only so she can take a bow for making a Gay slur and pretend she has done something.

 “Democrats like Pete Buttigieg want to emasculate the way we drive and force all of you to rely on electric vehicles.”

Having heard this stupidity applied to a variety of nonrelated things, Pete did not get upset, but did apply some ice.

“I literally don’t even understand what that means. My sense of manhood is not connected to whether or not my vehicle is fueled by gasoline or whether it’s fueled by electricity.”

“It was a strange thing to say. You know, to be honest, there are other members of Congress that I pay more attention to when I’m thinking about opinions that really matter or ideas that are going to be critical to engage with.”

The power is in the caesura.

Eventually her state will need some infrastructure funds and Marge will have to request them from Pete who will not make an issue while he will still make a point.

The same is and will be so for those Republicans who opposed the infrastructure bill because it had Biden’s name attached just as they had to get Obama’s attached to the ACA so they could attack it through him, and made their pubescent locker room jabs against Buttigieg, but now with hat in hand will ask for the money they originally wanted no one to get.

After calling the bill “President Biden’s multi-trillion dollar socialist wish list”, as the mid-terms approach, Republican Tom Emmer wrote a letter to express his full support for a grant application for an infrastructure project in his district because it is “important to Minnesota as it serves as a critical corridor of commerce” and having  “real safety issues” it could use some help.

His initial concern about the bill, the excuse when disaster relief goes to blue states as well as red ones, was that it was an example of Socialism which, somehow, because “The completion of this project means improved economic opportunities for ethnically underserved communities”, it no longer is.

In spite of his expressed opposition during debates and negative reaction to its passage, he now claims,

“We’ll always answer the call to advocate for real infrastructure improvements in the Sixth District as a part of smart spending practices.”

Alabama’s Tommy Tuberville had criticized the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act last year because the Democrats were “using fuzzy math and IOU’s to hide the real cost.”

Now that the deficit-neutral funds he had misrepresented to present a false and politically based picture to his constituents is there, he wrote to Mayor Pete saying,

“As a former mayor, you understand better than anyone the time and money that goes into applying for highly competitive federal grants like the RAISE Grant.”

If he gets that bridge, he could get re-elected.

Lauren Boebert opposed the bill calling it “wasteful” and “garbage” pledging to “hold these fake republicans accountable,” those RINOs who “just passed this wasteful $1.2 trillion dollar ‘infrastructure’ bill.

Pelosi did not have the votes in her party to pass this garbage.Time to name names and hold these fake republicans accountable. “

She has asked for over $33 million for a rural transportation project. Stressing the importance of the project in improving “the sole paved access route to the South Corridor.”

In her letter she may have said she would “respectfully urge your full and fair consideration of this competitive grant application,” but being the creature she is, she threw a little mud on Pete’s shoes by addi nb mg ng that, even though she is all in favor of investing in rural Colorado,

“Biden’s so-called infrastructure bill was not the right way to do it.”

The socialism theme was further carried by Paul Gosar who accused Biden of promoting “the America Last’s socialist agenda” that was “completely lacking fiscal responsibility” while at the same time writing three requests for three separate projects.

“In rural communities, such as those in the Verde Valley, we understand that often our best solutions are regional in nature. By working together, we improve conditions for all of our residents, businesses, and governmental entities.”

He justified his about face by explaining he is “not obligated to vote for a bill of which he supports 80% of the funding if 20% is horrifically absurd.”

However, once the money, no matter how much is ill gotten gains, is there, his office explained,

“Congressman Gosar is free, and quite willing, to fight for the funding authorized to benefit good projects.”

What should be noted is that while the letters from those who opposed the bill’s passage were vitriolic, the requests for funds come in scented envelopes.

Others with their hands out before the first coin hit the inside of the hat were Republican and NO voters Carlos Giménez (R-FL), Markwayne Mullin (R-OK), Ashley Hinson (R-IA), Andy Barr (R-KY), Rand Paul (R-KY) who sent 10 letters of request, and Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) who sent 9.

Now, I am sure few would blame Mayor Pete if he played hard to get with the funding  and made an equally childish game of it, but Pete went for high road and just left out the finger snap.

“It’s hard not to chuckle. Obviously, it’s good for their districts, which is why it’s probably good for America.”

He is not taking Congressmembers’ opposition to the bill into account when evaluating grant applications.

“We’re not going to be trying to be jerks about it. We’re also not going to be shy about folks knowing who was with us and who was against us. We’re obviously not going to penalize anybody for the shortsightedness of their politicians.”

And he came out on top.

Two snaps in a Z formation.

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I had been to Philadelphia a number of times for a number of reasons. I volunteer at a museum and have seen such documents as the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, and other documents at the National Archives on more than one occasion, and, along with old documents I see regularly at the museum, because of an involvement with transcribing documents for the State of Rhode Island I have seen that state’s copies of both founding documents and the original Royal Charter that established the colony.

A number of the people with me at the reunion I was there for, most who had not been to Philadelphia before, had decided to take a Hop-On/Hop-Off bus tour to see all the historical places while others went on a directed walking tour led by one of the attendees who was very familiar with the city. Rather than go to Independence Hall while whizzing pass many unnoticeable sites on top of an open-top tour bus, or see only those things the voluntary guide was familiar with because he had been told things or had discovered some things on his own, and so, as well-intentioned as he might have been, the tour seemed too controlled so as to be unable to explore and learn according to your own interest but had to be exposed to group things in groups, I chose to walk and see what I would see along the way.

When I arrived and saw the line to get into Independence Hall and, having seen it before with less of a crowd, knowing that I could also watch that Nicholas Gage movie, I walked over to the Museum of the Constitution using my Whaling Museum volunteer ID card to get in free.

I have to be honest. While most of what was on display was new to those viewing them, I walk by a musket from the Revolutionary War anytime I go to the restroom at the Whaling Museum, so to deal with crowds to look at something I could see elsewhere did not attract my interest. The only difference between the New Bedford Musket and the one in Philadelphia is location. 

After viewing the piece of the 
“rude bridge that arched the flood,
    Their flag to April’s breeze unfurled,
Here once the embattled farmers stood,
    And fired the shot heard round the world” 

which may have been a reason for some to stick with the amoeba of tourists flowing by, but having stood on the bridge decades ago, I decided to just walk around the city and see what history I might stumble across.

Among many things, along with Ben Franklin’s printshop and post office, I came upon the marble manhole cover with the engraving noting it covered the privy pit behind the printshop, and wherein lie links to Ben Franklin and his diet.

I walked pass little side street buildings of historic architecture but not on the tourist maps, alleys that looked like sets to some period piece film, exclusive clubs housed in little 18th Century homes, spoke with anyone who spoke to me. and would offer humorous comments to total strangers if I found us both most likely thinking the same thing as we watch the same scene.

I eventually arrived at the point where I had to address two calls, that of nature and that of my thirst.

The previous evening, when looking for something out of the ordinary, one attendee had googled for bars in the area, and one had caught his attention as its name referenced Frank Sinatra and it was described as a bar with art on its walls. As I turned a corner because, judging by the position of the sun, that would most likely lead me back close to my hotel or at least the street it was on, I found myself at that bar’s door and went inside.

It was a small, neighborhood bar. Nothing pretentious about it. There was some beautiful artwork gracing its walls, but the establishment’s ambience kept things in balance so that even if a piece was an original Picasso, it was in a room with a bar in the middle and homemade paper snowflakes from some previous Christmas that one has to assume remain there for some greater reason than laziness drooping from o the ends of strings falling from the ceiling..

I took the stool at one corner of the bar with a number of empty places between myself and the group of people at the other corner both sitting and standing. As people came in those already inside greeted them like Norm just walked into Cheers, and there were various forms of good-byes as people left.

I had apparently stumbled into a corner, neighborhood bar.

I was slowly sipping my Guinness and reviewing the pictures I had taken on my phone when one of the people on the other corner who had been monopolizing the conversation in a somewhat pontificating way backed up an assertion by claiming that he knew what he was talking about because, “I am the oldest person at this corner of the bar.”

I turned toward that corner of the bar, called for his attention and said, “I want to compliment you on your discretion in referencing age,” and returned to my phone which had one of that group approach me, put out his hand to shake mine, thanking me for finally being someone who could put Allen down a peg as he needed it. I was welcomed as the mysterious stranger who appeared out of nowhere, walked in at the right time, said the right thing, and then, just short of being the Lone Ranger riding out of town, l removed myself to a quiet corner of the bar, and as this was intoned by a rather large, festively attired Drag Queen, it became instantly obvious that this was not only a neighborhood Gay bar, but one at which local Gay artists gather. I was welcomed into the group and when they found I was a cartoonist in search of an apartment because of gentrification, they let me know as the Gay artist community they were there to help if I wanted to move to Philadelphia.

I finished my beer, thanked them all for their hospitality and after I walked a few blocks further along, I found myself at a celebration of Coming Out Day in an alley lined on each side with some of the bars from back when Gay bars were in hidden places that are no longer hidden and conversing with total strangers, laughing and joking, like old friends.

I moved on to one bar that looked like it might have some sort of cover charge or exclusive membership. I was not dressed for dancing but rather for schlepping around town not afraid to sweat, and, although I do not normally wear them but did that day because they were comfortable and I had gotten them somewhere on sale for less than $10, I sported a pair of black Crocs and, for sweat, a pair of white athletic socks. The pants were long not short, so my appearance was not that offensive. I asked the bouncer if there was anything keeping me from entering like a cover charge or an exclusive, closed event, and he asked if I knew of anything that would impede my entrance. I pointed to my feet and I confessed I was wearing the offending footwear.  In spite of my being an elder Gay man dressed like my feet had retired to Florida, the bouncer made a fashion exception and let me in.

This bar, friendly like the other bars along the alley, was a respite from the crush in the alley so the conversations were fun, loud, and inclusive of whoever walked in.

Having made my way through the alley and onto the he street to the streety, I turned at the end of the alley and continued walking toward the thumping that hinted there was a dance bar somewhere ahead with its doors open to the warm temps.

One block up and a street over there was another celebration of Coming Out, this time, rather than an alley, it was a street party with the music loud and the crowd huge.

In the alley and now on the street, it was obvious that there were few older people in the alley itself or in the fenced off dance floor. Those were more readily found inside the bars in small groups or alone like me, filtering through a crowd of strangers. I spoke with a few people after finding some excuse to start a conversation, and the older Gay men and women I spoke with were freely socializing as they chose to, knowing those outside were dancing in the alley and street because they could while in our day our dancing was often a form of politics as we showed what we could do whether allowed to or not.

The general attitude as we looked out on our “legacy” was that we had fought for this, so now we could sit inside retired yet communal seeing that the younger people had moved to the next step.

I eventually had to move on and get back to the hotel to meet up with all my fellow tourists for dinner.

As a stranger in a strange city, as has happened so many times in the past, perhaps because of Gaydar, I once again found community in a strange city, and I wanted to share this side of my life with those at the reunion for whom my being Gay was mostly known for equal rights activism and perhaps sexual assumptions while it needed to be seen that no matter how bad things got, and they did once or twice, it could be offset by the community of total stranger/family on a street wide and street long dance floor even at my age.

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Having returned from my trip, real time resumes tomorrow

     If you live long enough, it becomes obvious that life is a series of connections with many only appreciated in retrospect. Some seemingly isolated incident at the time it happened is only revealed as part of a bigger picture only after a sequence of events is completed.

     The principal of the high school at which I taught and was known to be Gay had had a terrible time dealing with any open, positive information about Gay people that I would post in my classroom especially during Gay History month. His was a losing battle often involving losing skirmishes. He needed an ally in his opposition, and what better ally could he want than a member of the Gay community who like a concentration camp capo would be willing to throw her own people under the bus for her advantage.

    The Dean of Instruction who had originally encouraged me to transfer from the middle school to the high school, and who then became the heavy in the 1999 events of my Gay History Month display removal and the reprimand that followed, retired at the end of the 2002-2003 academic year. Taking his place was a former assistant principal from another city high school who had worked with the principal when he too was an assistant there. They were friends, and it was natural for the principal to transfer a friend to his school if a position was available.

     I had heard of this transfer while I was teaching summer school, but beyond the occasional opinions expressed by faculty about all the new fall assignments that we had read of in the daily paper the morning after the Board made the appointments, I knew nothing about her.

     For the first few weeks of school that fall, beyond passing her occasionally in the halls or in the main office where we exchanged polite greetings, I was to know nothing of her, nor have any real conversation with her until in accordance with Paragraph J, a selectively used provision in the faculty handbook that required teachers get permission from the principal for anything they wanted to hang in their classrooms but was actually only applied to positive Gay material, and wanting time to deal with any problems that could result from my request, hoping the superintendent‘s letter would have some effect, I wrote to the principal at the beginning of September for permission for a Gay History Month display.  

      Instead of a reply to my request coming from the principal, though, I received a reply from his friend, the new Dean of Instruction.

    She expressed appreciation for my requesting permission, but she continued, “after checking the various school clubs and organizations on the campus that represent the diverse population of our school, I find no GLBT organization listed. Consequently, since [high school] has no GLBT organization then it follows that no history month display shall be permitted within classrooms or within the building.”

    This response came as a surprise for two reasons: first, there was no provision in paragraph J for a designee, and here the principal for the first time passed his decision on to the new Dean; second, there was never a restriction that a group of students could not be acknowledged as existing on our campus unless there was some sort of a club. This seemed to be another example of the practice of creating policies and procedures after the fact, and then applying them retro-actively when it came to my annual requests.

     I thought it important to speak with the Dean of Instruction, and it did say at the end of her memo to feel free to do so if I had any questions or concerns. Perhaps the principal, having been stopped in the past by those he attempted to use as his scapegoats, and knowing he could not try that trick again with people who had been on campus, had chosen someone new who would not be all that aware of past goings on. The new Dean needed to know what the history of things were as it seemed she had been placed in the middle of something she might not want to be a part of if she knew what the history was.

     So as I was leaving school on the day I got her memo, I headed to the Dean of Instruction‘s office armed with the superintendent‘s letter, the letter that stated in general terms that all school policies applied to all students, and luckily met another teacher on the way who also needed to meet with her. I found the Dean in her office going through boxes of educational material, but when I attempted to speak to her she dismissively told me she had neither the time nor interest to talk at that time. I insisted we talk, as she had invited me to do so without hesitation, and address this new procedure.  

     Not only did she support the no organization/no display decision, but she stated in no uncertain terms, “There are no Gay kids in high school. They waver back and forth and then settle one way or the other later on.”

     There was a later attempt on her part to revise what she said on the assumption I had misunderstood her, and that she had actually said, “I am not aware of any Gay kids on this campus”, but the other teacher who had walked with me to the Dean‘s office to speak with her was standing just outside the door when the Dean made her statement, and had gasped in disbelief and walked away. This teacher held to what she had heard no matter how many times an attempt was made to rewrite the story, or get her to agree she had not heard clearly.

     Before writing the request for permission I had spoken to the attorney in the district‘s legal department, presenting her with a number of documents that showed that every time I had followed the policy of asking for permission for a Gay History Month display there was a predictable pattern where the principal would find, or invent, some technicality or policy to prevent such permission, and that the obstruction had not existed before the request. Policies and procedures seemed to come into existence only after permission was sought, and then were used to deny it. So I immediately contacted the district‘s legal office reminding them of this, and pointing out that this no-information-if-there-was-no-club policy was this year‘s example of policy invention. The attorney agreed that this was a little much, and told me to let the Dean know she needed to call the legal office. I wrote a quick note to the dean with the legal department‘s phone number, and received this reply, “I have given your note to [the principal] since he is my immediate supervisor.

Thank you.”

     There was no such “no club/no display” policy, so I thought the only result of such a phone call would be to allow the display as they were reaching for straws to prevent it.

     However, in a move where appearance was preferable to reality, the principal conceived the idea of having Gay/Straight Alliance on paper, control it for his purposes without actually having a viable one, and in this way control information.

     At an earlier meeting with the Union representative, when allowing a GSA was approached as a possible compromise to the problem of having displays, the principal was in favor of such an idea with the one reservation being that the teacher who would be the sponsor could not be “militant”. The principal feared that allowing the club with a sponsor who was dedicated to the needs of the Gay students would result in a visibility that he would find uncomfortable. What was preferred was someone who, while being the sponsor of the club, would be willing to keep it limited and suppressed.

     To this end, not only did the principal choose two students he assumed were Gay because of outward appearances, but in looking for the kind of person who was willing to suppress the very club to be sponsored, he assigned the duty to the newly arrived Dean of Instruction who was obviously of the opinion that there were no Gay students in school, and who had initially found what she thought was a new and clever way to prevent a display.

     Instead of being a student initiated club proposed and supported by students in accordance with the Equal Access Act that spelled out how non-curriculum clubs were to be established on school campuses, the club became one initiated by the principal and presented as a possibility to two students who had not asked for such a club. The legal procedure so that all such clubs would be treated equally was that students were supposed to propose a club after having found a teacher willing to sponsor it, but here, not only had the principal propose the club, but he chose the sponsor.

     The GSA’s purpose, as would become clear, was not to support the students but to initiate a club that would have the job of constructing a display for Gay History Month that could be controlled by the principal. There would be a club; there could be a display, but the display would be strictly controlled by the person who objected to it.

     Sadly, as the Gay students on campus did not ask the principal‘s chosen students to be the leaders, as nice as they were, there was no guarantee that these were the best two to begin such a club. Their selection by the principal was suspect. They hadn‘t approached the principal; he approached them, and any students chosen by a principal for such an important chore would have been thrilled that they were seen as responsible, but these two students were not aware of the back, smoke filled room shenanigans that were taking place, and this put a lot of pressure unfairly on them.

     The next move was predictable. The as yet to be created club, which had yet to meet, and might not even have any members, was given sole responsibility for any Gay History Month display. Similar month displays for all other groups to which students might belong had no such control as they could be commemorated by any groups of students, individual teacher, or combinations of both.

     An announcement was made within a few days of my conversation with the Dean and the principal‘s phone call to the legal office, “Attention, students: There will be an organizational meeting of the …Student Gay and Lesbian Club in Room 195, Thursday, September 18th, at 2:30 p.m. [the Dean of Instruction] will be the temporary sponsor.”

     More than a few teachers saw a red flag go up with the name of the club being the “Gay and Lesbian Club. The purpose of a GSA was to allow for support in a hostile atmosphere, and with the inclusion of Straight peers, the fear of one‘s sexuality being revealed before that student was ready was eased by the possibility that a student in attendance was one of the straight ones. A student could be assumed Gay or Straight in a GSA, but not so in a Gay and Lesbian Club. Some teachers expressed their suspicion that the club was called this to limit membership so it would remain invisible. Worse, some thought that the intention of the name was to guarantee no membership, and once again the principal could deny a display while still insisting he had tried to support one.

     The school was in the Buckle of the Bible Belt, and the district refused to include Gay students in policies on bullying, harassment, and nondiscrimination, so members could easily become targets for harassment and bullying.

     Further slowing the possibility of decent attendance was scheduling the meeting twenty minutes after school let out, whereas all other clubs met either in the morning when students were arriving, or at lunch when they were already there; not when the students were leaving. The ability to attend such a meeting was dependent on rides and after school job schedules. The time limited attendance.

     Its being held so inconveniently and within an empty building also implied there was something unacceptable or not school related about it. Everything seemed to say either the club was not going to exist because of lack of members, making any acknowledgment of Gay History Month something that just didn‘t work out in spite of the best of intentions, or the membership would be kept controllably small.

     Helping to control the situation further than the principal‘s meddling, and to keep control tight by removing the students‘ right to choose their own sponsor, the appointed sponsor announced to the two students who attended the first meeting that they could only have the club if she were the sponsor per the principal‘s directive which went against the announcement’s original claim that “[the Dean of Instruction] will be the temporary sponsor.”

      Needless to say, as a way to have the club the students complied. However, they had been led to believe by the announcement that they would eventually choose their sponsor. It was, after all from what they could see, a temporary assignment until they had met to organize and choose their own sponsor. As it was to turn out, believing this, they were prepared to approach three teachers they thought supportive enough to ask them to be the sponsor, two of whom were straight.

     The Dean‘s next step was to write a constitution by filling out a generic club constitution form that was meant only to be a guide without any input from the students, which did not take into account the nature and purpose of the club that would have been relevant to a proper constitution. With no chance for discussion the two students were told to sign the constitution at their second after school meeting, and it was then put in a file giving the impression that the school had a legitimate and viable Gay/Straight Alliance.

     Now having a club, the Dean wrote a memo to me stating that only the GSA could erect a Gay History Month display. I, however, could not.

     “Exhibit for GLBT History Month

Interested students will be producing an educational exhibit for GLBT History Month. As the Dean of Instruction, I will supervise this activity. My interest is effectively serving all students, consequently, please note only work from students will be exhibited.

Thank you in advance for your cooperation.”

     No such limits were ever placed on any other display, or any other teacher about any other group. There were no ethnic clubs, but teachers were allowed to post displays during Black History Month. Again, I was the only teacher who received this memo making it very directed.

     Not only did the sponsor not supply any helpful information beyond giving poster board and markers to the students who did show up at one of the meetings wanting to erect a display, she did not allow a student to mention the Young Gay and Lesbian Alliance (YGLA), a local teen support and social group, that might be of interest to the members of the club and a source of information. She would not allow the student to promote this group because it was in the Gay District, which she referred to as the “Adult Entertainment District” as if it were a Red Light District in a larger city. Her implication was that such a place and those who frequented it were inherently indecent, when in reality it was the social area for the Gay Community in a Bible Belt city that still required a Gay Ghetto having bars, a Gay friendly church, and a community center that provided meeting space for various GLBT organizations, educational programs, and other resources important to young GLBT people who needed correct information

     The purpose of a Gay/Straight Alliance was to help reduce the violence that was born of misinformation, and to help the students gain a degree of self-esteem and appreciation of their own worth. To label the Gay District as she did was a furthering of stereotypes and negative attitudes that did not comply with the club‘s purpose.

     Because the sponsor would not let the members of the GSA discuss YGLA during meetings, I once again handed a flyer to the principal that could be put on the community bulletin board. The name, address, and phone number of YGLA, as well as a generic description of its purpose and who might want to attend was printed in plain block lettering on an 81/2” x11” piece of paper. No picture or anything even remotely objectionable was on the flyer. Even if a student wished not to attend, the phone number might be important to know.

     The Dean, again, and not the principal, placed the flyer back in my mailbox as “un-postable” even though it complied with the purpose and restriction of the Community Bulletin Board whose purpose was for posting off campus, non-school related events and organizations relevant to students. I immediately wrote a note to the principal since I had handed the flyer to him just as I had done with anything else for that bulletin board asking, “Is the Dean of Instruction (the sponsor) in charge of bulletin boards?”

      He replied, “On this one she is.”

     The Dean, who had clearly stated that there were no Gay kids in high school, was now in charge of the club that was supposed to be a refuge and source of information and support for them, and had become, at this point, the person in charge of the bulletin board donated by the Gay community for everyone’s use, but which had become by the principals’ decree the only place upon which any Gay related information could appear on campus if it were allowed at all. The principal had changed the purpose of the bulletin board to control Gay information, and he had an ally now who would help him prevent things from being posted. The flyer never went up.

     Fortunately the more enterprising and independent students did go to the meeting place for YGLA and got information. Sadly this was information I had in my classroom, but which I had to bring to YGLA in case the sponsor and principal found some way to forbid the students from coming to my room to get it. I had collected a lot of information over the years, but I did not want any made up complications based on the students‘ coming to my classroom for this information resulting in some trumped up charge of violating the memo about the display because I got directly involved. It might have appeared a bit paranoid, but with all the games I had seen played, and not knowing this friend of the principal all that well, or why she was cooperating with him so tightly, I did not want to be the invented complication that cancelled a display. I did, however, want the kids to learn something, and I had the resources.

     I knew the adults who ran YGLA, so I hung around one of the meetings to help the students find information, and to answer questions about local and national Gay History, telling stories of the old days in various places. They were surprised with the information and the famous people they were finding out about.

     When the students brought their posters to the next GSA meeting, the sponsor immediately censored any poster that specifically mentioned “Gay” or “Lesbian” by replacing the headings with such innocuous titles as “Famous Women”. Instead of setting the display up at eye level, the Dean put the display very low to the ground in a library display window in the main hall. This placement effectively discouraged anyone‘s really noticing or reading the information because to do so required a person to crouch down.

     When October ended and the purpose of the display completed it was quickly removed, and the GSA met only sporadically a few times before it ceased all together when the Dean got more interested in the lunch time chess tournament she had begun. She had done her job well by supplying the principal with the person who would sponsor a GSA, but who would control it and use it to help the principal look good without any reality behind the look.

     The short lived club had been effective for two purposes: a constitution on file could be pointed to as tangible evidence of “support” even if the club never met; and anyone wishing to have a Gay History Month display in their classroom was prevented from doing so as the club was the only entity on campus that could have a display. The GSA was compliant, not “militant”. The dean preferred to have the students come to her office and talk one-on-one rather than hold meetings, which rendered the club invisible on campus. Its name was never heard on the public address system; its presence never part of club activities; its name appeared in no campus publication. Its inclusion in the club section of the yearbook was denied.

     The students and their zeal had not been used to work for them, but for the principal, and the club was used to suppress the very information that club members as well as their peers should have been given. The sponsor continued to be the principal‘s strongest ally in controlling the very people she was supposed to be helping and supporting.

     Thinking that this was a little insulting to my intelligence, and also seeing it as another expression of the attitude that we Gay people are simple but happy, and we can be fooled by crumbs, I continued to have information available in my classroom when it was appropriate and without any fanfare.

     Although he was fixated with anything Gay I might have posted on my classroom doors, the principal seemed blind to the fact that I used my doors as bulletin boards for more than Gay information, posting things related to literature, current events, and the occasional newspaper story that centered on the school, a team, or one of the students. Besides the students who might have checked to see what was posted if they noticed a change, teachers did the same. Education did not have to be only between bells and unswervingly related to the curriculum.

     In my classroom I had ships, maps, bottles of dirt from different parts of the United States, things I had bought driving from Oklahoma to Boston and stopping at every historic place I came upon, action figures of Shakespeare and Poe, and any number of things that by themselves were not part of the curriculum, but could be used to enhance it.

     Sometime in the beginning of that January I had posted some news articles on my classroom‘s front door among which were a few concerning important Gay news items, some being of a local nature. We had a Gay/Straight Alliance, perhaps in name only, but in existence, so there was an official acknowledgement of these students who may have benefited from this information for which they may not have had any other outlet.

     I received a letter from the Dean of Instruction after posting one Gay article among a number of articles about many other non-Gay things directing me to remove the Gay articles and submit them to her for permitted inclusion on the community bulletin board where they belonged. However, since they were news articles and not announcements for activities sponsored by off campus organizations, they were not what the Board was intended for. However, the purpose of the bulletin board was changed, again, so that exclusively for Gay news, it was. None of the other news articles that were posted along with the Gay topic were addressed.

     Her letter said in part:

  “Similarly to how the Constitution states citizens have the right of “freedom from religion”, students have the right of “freedom from” another individual’s personal viewpoint. This is of special concern when the individual is in a position of authority and the students have no choice and are required to be present and subjected to information within a teacher’s room.

As you and I are aware, teachers do not shed their constitutional, including First Amendment, rights when they become teachers or when they enter the school house door. The question for the teacher to ask is whether it is appropriate to express a personal viewpoint while teaching students. It is not that the teacher does not have the “right” to express his personal views. Rather, it is important for the teacher to consider the effect that personal expression may have on the students in the classroom, on his effectiveness as a teacher, and on the parents of students.”  

     The first paragraph contained some of the very arguments we had been advancing to the district so it would make sure that the Gay students had the freedom from the often damaging “personal view points” of others, and could have the opportunity for a good education without having them drop out because others could say what they wanted about them, and doing what they wanted to do to them, while the Gay students could not even get some positive information in school without it being censored, limited, or extremely obscure. I was offended by the idea that making Gay information available was the same as “subjecting” students to it. Did we “subject” students to heterosexuality when we covered works of literature that an author addressed to someone of the opposite sex?

      Not long after this I handed in a pamphlet announcing the creation of an Oklahoma City chapter of Parents and Friends of Lesbians and Gays (PFLAG) for posting on the bulletin board. The Dean chose not to post the pamphlet on the community bulletin board because, even though it gave the day, the place of the meetings, and a contact phone number so people could get more information and find out the actual time of the meeting, it was her judgment that in spite of this and a description of what the purpose of PFLAG was, the pamphlet was just too vague.

     Between the use of the GSA for limiting information, followed by its disappearance, and now this limited free speech zone introduced as the new purpose of the bulletin board donated by the Gay Community to answer the principal‘s expressed desire to have a bulletin board open to all community groups, but now under the total control of someone who had claimed there were no Gay students in high school, it was obvious to me, anyway, that the principal had found a person he could count on for support and obstruction.

     The principal meanwhile had made it known that he was going to retire at the end of the year.

     There was another attempt that spring to get the Board to make the language of the policies on Non-discrimination, Bullying and Harassment, as contained in the Student and Parent Handbook, more in line with the letter we had from the superintendent that stated all policies applied to all students.  Although that letter existed, it was still obvious that there were those who would play around until that ability was taken away from them by specific language. The plea of ignorance of the inclusiveness of the policies was welcomed by some.

     Before the accidental fall which resulted in her pulling her shoulder, and the required extended absence, the former Dean had asked the principal for permission to hang a flyer for the Young Gay and Lesbian Alliance on the Community Bulletin Board. This was a somewhat odd move because, beyond being the sponsor of the Gay Straight Alliance on campus, or at least claiming the title although the actual club had not met at all during the current year, she was the administrator who had the keys to the bulletin board because, as the principal said, she was in charge of it, and knew the policies, there was no reason to have done that. Like all other administrators she could have posted it, or like all sponsors she could have given it to the sponsor of the Student Council who would have done it.

     According to an email to the principal, she felt she could advertise the YGLA meetings now that a local bar had closed. It was only one out of the six bars that had been in the Gay District, or as she had referred to it “the adult entertainment district” when not allowing the mention of YGLA at any school GSA meeting. She had a problem with this bar which could have stemmed from her impression it was the seed that gave birth to that area, It was the first Gay bar established in what would be the Gay District that grew around it, or for any number of personal reasons. But, it was obvious by her action that she did not have a problem with the existence of the other five bars, but only with this one. Its closure did not change the character of the area

     The acting principal, and a Lesbian herself, who was filling in for the principal who was also out because of a fall he took in the football stadium, came to my room to ask about the purpose of the Community Bulletin Board that was presented by the Gay Community in 2002, and whether or not the bulletin board was for such postings like that for YGLA. I explained why the board was purchased, and why, according to what it was intended for, the posting was appropriate.

     While the former Dean was beginning her post accident leave, she sent me a copy of what she intended to hang, and I offered some changes for inclusiveness and clarity that she found acceptable, and I took this as a positive change. I submitted the flyer to the acting principal after it was approved by the former Dean, along with the relevant emails between the dean and myself to show that what I gave the acting principal was done with, and not in spite of the former Dean. I was rather surprised when the same acting principal who seemed originally in favor of posting the flyer, sent me a memo saying the flyer was not going up until the former Dean returned to work. This seemed unnecessary as the former Dean had okayed the flyer as presented. It looked like a stall, if not a passive-aggressive way of applying a pocket veto in such a way as to make it look like the acting principal’s hands were tied in spite of her good intentions. This tactic might have been new to her, but was part of past practices.

      I was not aware of any policy stating that postings were dedicated. If the person consulted about the purpose of the bulletin board and the person making the initial request were in agreement on what was to be posted, a delay was questionable. There was also speculation about whether or not the former Dean would return, or sit out the remainder of the year on medical leave. This further brought the delay into question. If the former Dean‘s absence was on-going for an extended period of time, or she was not allowed to return for the rest of the year by her doctor, students should not have been denied information in this manner, and for an invented practice.

     In the past, discrimination on this campus was often subtle and blamed on circumstances which were offered as beyond one’s control, when in fact those circumstances were of one’s own invention. I requested a copy of the applicable policy on this.

    I passed on my concerns on this to the former Dean who had asked permission for the YGLA flyer in the first place, hoping, since she talked a good game, she would step up and demand it be posted.

     Instead she wrote in an email, “Don’t know what to say to you J.Q. After my injury, it is all I can do to connect the dots effectively and walk normally most of the time. I sure cannot second guess what others do or why they do it. In any event, I am sure [acting and actual principals] only have the best interest of children at heart as do I.”

     She once again folded when she needed to be strong. In this case, as in future ones, at the first sign of opposition she would just fold, only to claim success when others stuck with something and brought about results.

     While this was going on, a flyer for a religious camp was posted all around the building, and not just on the Community Bulletin Board, obviously by someone who saw no problem with doing this as religious posters had always been treated better than others and were not forbidden as others were. Although there were two names of students to contact for further information on them, and their source readily identifiable, the religious flyers were left hanging even after I made their presence known to administration who claimed there needed to be an investigation to find out who had hung them.

     In my documented experience, within moments of an objection or complaint being expressed about anything Gay related that I may have posted in my classroom or on my doors, if an administrator had not removed it first, I was generally given the directive to remove any Gay posting if not immediately, by the end of the day at the very latest. I would then be notified to attend a meeting in the principal‘s office where I would get a lecture on policy and process, with the feeblest of explanations offered why such material was improper.

     The religious posters continued to hang for days.

     When she returned from her medical leave I contacted the former Dean who suggested the delay in posting might have just been a question of someone not being able to find the key to the bulletin board. She offered this even though the acting principal had sent her refusal to hang the flyer through email, and I had forwarded this to the former Dean, and she could have said something at that time. I rearranged all the letters of “it is not going to be posted” and, “we are going to wait until [the former dean] returns”, and found no way to get the sentence, “we don’t have the key” out of it. Not all the letters were there. Also, there were two sets of keys, one held by thee dean, the other by the sponsor of the Student Council.

     Also, after the former Dean had returned to school, I found that the hard copy of the revised YGLA flyer I had placed in her mailbox when I originally submitted a copy of it to the acting principal was back in my own mailbox with a note attached signed by the former Dean informing me that I would have to get it approved by the Principal. There seemed to be a lot of unnecessary repetition.

     Writing an email to inform the acting principal of placing yet another copy of the YGLA flyer in her mailbox for approval, I was still a little confused why the flyer was first denied any posting only to have this changed to the need to await the return of the former Dean from medical leave, and upon her return, why the former Dean would pass it back to me to begin the approval process all over. It would appear that the dean just needed to say the flyer should go up since it had only been put on hold until her return. I wrote to her recounting the chain of events in full, and she replied,

     “Don’t know what to tell you. I just voluntarily work [here] and have to do what I am directed to do just like anyone else. Everything has to go through the couple of people in charge. I asked both of them about it today, but they were somewhat busy. Anyway, check with them again and when they give it to me to post, it will get put up right away.”

   The final response from the acting principal at the end of this dance was that from that point forward no flyers from off campus organizations would be posted on the Community Bulletin Board. In the past the purpose of the bulletin board was modified. In this case it was completely changed.

     Flyers for religious events, groups, and organizations continued to appear sporadically throughout the building, while the one place to which anything for Gay students had been limited was now eliminated. This was reminiscent of those places that banned all clubs to prevent the lawful organizing of Gay/Straight Alliances. It would appear that to prevent the posting of a YGLA flyer a new practice had been instituted by the front office, much as was done in the past in an attempt to find clever ways to prevent positive Gay information.

     Later when the former Dean placed a flyer for the upcoming second Gay Prom on the Community Bulletin Board without asking permission, as she should have done with the YGLA flyer as the GSA sponsor, she was directed to remove it, and she did so without objection other than sending me an email in which she questioned why anyone who was Gay or Lesbian, as our acting principal was, could so freely work against Gay students.

     How ironic was that?

      She obviously forgot or chose to ignore her actions when she first had come to the campus, and, as a Lesbian herself, had supported the actions of the principal in controlling, limiting, preventing, or removing positive Gay information wherever it appeared.

     I placed a few Gay Prom flyers around the building near some Gay friendly teachers‘ classrooms. The acting principal removed one while I was standing near it; some others disappeared over time; and one had the words “fruit” and “homo” scrawled on it. Meanwhile, the religious posters remained up even though they were near some of the Prom posters I had purposely placed by them. 

     Going before the School Board during the community comments section of the agenda   to push for the inclusion of GLBT students in school policies was a recurring practice. In the days before one such meeting I combed through hard-copy documents, emails, and district publications to find all references to the district‘s claim that their policies were inclusive. Why come up with your own words when quoting the district would come to the same thing?

     A teacher from another high school in the city who had been approached by students to form a Gay/Straight Alliance, and who had brought about fifty student to the recent annual AIDS Walk, notified me that she was bringing some students to speak to the Board .This would have been the first time that students, presently in the system, were going before the Board to plead their own case.

     We had been hoping for students to come forward, but in a system where there was no indication that they would be respected and their needs addressed, this had not happened. The most we could do was talk about it and hope some would show up, but we had to be careful not to appear that we had forced any student to speak in public to the Board. As far as anyone knew, our GSA sponsor, the former Dean having now been promoted to assistant principal, still had things on hold, and no one was told if any students from our school would be there also, or if she would even be there herself.

     I was sitting toward the front of the auditorium where Board meetings were held, going over my remarks, when students from my school began to gather near me. This was not out of friendship, but because they needed to sit toward the front as the group was to be recognized for winning a state drama contest. Not having been to a Board meeting before, one of the students asked me if they had to stay for the whole meeting. They were glad to hear that usually, once recognitions were made and awards and certificates given out with the requisite posing for handshake pictures with district leaders who did nothing to help the kids get whatever it was they won, people involved in that section of the agenda would leave before the boring business began.

     There were a lot of recognitions that night after which the Board president called for a few minutes break, and the large crowd left.

     In order to speak to the Board during the Public Comments section of the agenda which came toward the end of the meetings, a person had to fill out a form before the meeting. Each person got three minutes to speak after they were called to the podium.

     At this meeting the actual business items on the agenda were rushed through, and we came to the Public Comments section rather quickly. There were a few people still in the meeting room. Some of them were students.

     When the Public Comments began, the teacher from another school explained how everyday she had to make decisions to either enforce a policy, or ignore the infraction for convenience sake, and how her addressing a problem was made easier by her being able to show the offending students which rule they had violated. Sometimes it was only this concrete reference that made for cooperative students. She likened any choice she may have made to ignore an incident for convenience to the Boards conveniently leaving out Gay students from its policies, as both were basically examples of avoiding responsibility.

     The two students from her high school approached the podium when their names were called, and both spoke from the heart. One spoke of friends who had committed suicide or dropped out before they finished high school because the harassment and negative attitudes were just too much for them. The other spoke as a heterosexual person who was harassed for choosing celibacy until marriage, and saw the value of sexual orientation protection as it cut both ways.

    Then, much to my surprise the next two names called to approach the podium were those of students from my school. I was thrilled, especially since they had been there for a whole other reason, and had apparently stayed. This took courage.

    Neither approached the podium, however.

    Although the now assistant principal and in-name-only sponsor of the Gay/Straight Alliance had reformed it to annoy the person who had gotten the retired principal’s position she had been denied in spite of her desperate attempts to earn it. The re-formed GSA held no meetings nor did it do anything visible on Campus. Its two members would meet with the former dean in her office with no announcement of the meeting. Other GLBT students on campus with whom I was familiar had often asked her to formalize the groups existence, but nothing ever came of it beyond the promise the take the necessary steps to do that, steps that were never taken.

     So, once again, there were two students who, though they were part of something important to their GLBT peers on campus, were getting no guidance or encouragement on how that could be true. They, like the previous two GSA members, were being used by the assistant principal to enhance her standing in the GLBT Community, although the community rejected her non-productive self-promotion seeing it for what it was.

     This was unfair to and abusive of these two students for whom she posed as their best ally while controlling information and activity. There could not be two GSAs on campus, and any group of students who might have wanted a more realistic and effective one, and who then brought their proposal to the principal where told there was already a GSA so they could not have the one they wanted. This not only set up the GSA that existed for failure, but it did not do much for the reputation of the two students who were seen as the assistant principal’s pets and allies in obstructing an active GSA.

     They were being used even as they thought they were trailblazers.

     These were the two students from my school whose names had been called.

    As I was sitting toward the front of the room, I assumed the two students had moved to seats further to the back after the break since they had not returned to the seats they were in before it. Then I figured that once they had received their certificates of recognition, they had simply left as their earlier question implied they might. I was disappointed they had decided against speaking, but I knew from experience, speaking to the Board could be intimidating. Instead of four students from two different schools speaking which could have had some strength, only two from the same school had spoken. This could have been interpreted as inclusive policy language not being such a big deal, as students affected by the policy language saw no need to speak, much the same way a former principal interpreted the lack of student interest in his nominal “Gay Club” as a lack of a problem.

     The next morning I received an email from the former Dean who had been sitting at the back of the auditorium. She claimed that after getting the parent‘s permission the week before,  something that  now, years later, would seem to have been a questionable claim as the parent of one student has become nationally known in recent years for starting a movement of mothers to step in as surrogates for those Gay people whose own mothers refused to be part of  important events in their lives like weddings, after coming to accept her son’s sexual orientation after wrestling with her religious beliefs long after this meeting, she had asked one of the students from our school to speak a few days before the meeting and had asked the other on the night of the meeting as he was there anyway. Both of these students were in the school‘s loosely established GSA.

     According to her email, sitting in the back of the auditorium the former Dean had seen a mid level administrator go down to where the students were still sitting after they had been recognized for their drama award, and after whispering something to the Drama Coach with whom they had been sitting go out into the foyer just before the Public Comments. The Drama Coach then got up to leave and motioned to the two students who had signed up to speak, and the three of them left the auditorium. The other drama students had already left.

     One of the students then came back into the auditorium and informed our GSA sponsor, the former Dean, that they did not have to speak to the whole Board as they had spoken to one of the board members outside. Since no Board member had left the room, it was unsure who they had actually spoken to. Someone calling the students out of the auditorium could have meant someone, for whatever reason, did not want them to speak.

     According to further emails and conversations, the former Dean‘s follow up investigation revealed that the Executive Director of the Learning Community (a middle level administrator, and the person over the high school, the middle school that fed into it, and all the elementary schools that in turn fed into the middle school) had been the one who had sent someone into the auditorium to get the Drama Coach and the students to go out to the foyer where she represented herself as equal to the Board so that speaking to her would be like speaking to them.

     This was somewhat borne out by one defense of the Executive Director offered by another administrator which claimed that the E.D. wanted the two students to know that as this was a public meeting and records were open to the public, the fact that they spoke and what they said would be public knowledge, and they could face negative consequences at school. In this version of the events her intent was portrayed as wanting to protect the students. However,  it also could have been to protect the veneer of the school‘s image as she wanted it perceived: educational and trouble free.

     Either way, this showed that even the Executive Director of the Learning Community was aware conditions in the district were not positive for Gay students. Instead of protecting students from an ongoing atmosphere, she should have been taking steps to end it. She had sat in on a few of my earlier meetings with principals and was very aware of the situation and how things were wrongly handled. She was not new to this whole thing. She was negligent in that, rather than help end negative treatment when she was in a position to do so, she was content to let the conditions continue while protecting students on a case by case basis if she became aware of the need.

     In another defense the students had approached the Executive Director of the Learning Community because it was more convenient for them to talk to her and then leave immediately, rather than wait to speak and leave later. This version had the major problem with it being that they did not leave the auditorium until someone came to get them. Neither had left bthe room before this to have had the opportunity to suggest that option.

     Both versions, however, shared the uncertainty as to whether what the students said was passed on, and if it were, was it presented purely, or was it edited and reworked to suit this administrator.

     When asked directly through email, the Executive Director responded that she had never “prohibited” anyone from speaking to the Board. Up to this point there had been so many dodges to questions, semantic games, and rewordings of things already said, I placed this in the same category of the other district evasions. She had been asked if she prevented the students from speaking, but she professed she had not prohibited them. There was a difference, so the question for all intents and purposes went unanswered. If she were to be accused of prevention she would have offered undeniable proof that she had not prohibited, distracting the Board from the actual charge.

     I sent an email about all of this to as many people as I had in my address book, and this included the superintendent, the president of the Board, and other high up administrators.

     Within the required ten day period after that Board meeting, the superintendent sent out the letters to all those who had spoken as Board policy required. It was evasively vague, and to some extent rather insulting to the two students who had spoken, as in spite of what they told of their experiences in the district and those of friends, the superintendent informed us all,

   “Because it is a priority for the district to provide a safe and secure environment for all students, the policies as written convey the message to students and staff that harassment, bullying or discrimination in any form against ANY student is not and will not be tolerated…harassment, bullying, or discrimination in any form against ANY student is not and will not be tolerated.”

      I wasn‘t all that sure that the two students would have agreed, and when I ran into one of them at a peace event he told me as much.

     For ten years, no matter how we communicated with them, whether emails, hard copy memos and letters, or appearances before the Board, those who advocated for the Gay students always presented facts and studies to back up our assertions. We never relied on the tack that it was true simply because we said so. And, yet, here once again a superintendent in the district was claiming an assertion true merely on the strength that repetition bestowed truth.

     I wrote to the superintendent to ask for the supporting data.

    “In light of our consistently presenting verifiable information over the years to back our assertion that the language as contained in the Student and Parent Handbook is not clearly inclusive, I would respectfully request those studies, surveys and reports that back the statement as contained in your letter dated November 7, 2006 and quoted above, which beyond ignoring our evidence would also seem to have ignored the input of the Committee entrusted to revise the Handbook based on their actual experience as classroom teachers in implementing it in the schools where it applies, and therefore, would logically know more than people in the student-less central office which revisions needed to be made to make your statement as quoted above true.”

     The response was a request from the legal department to forward any data I might have and a list of any cases of harassment, as if every harassed student would have come to me. If I couldn‘t name a case, it wasn‘t happening, again, in spite of what the two students had presented in public meeting. It was stalling by repetition.

     I assured the legal department I would produce the data, but in the meantime would have liked to offer as evidence of a problem the survey that the Board President directed the Superintendent in public session to institute to see if what was being presented by members of the Oklahoma City taxpaying community and patrons of the district were merely isolated instances or symptoms of a greater problem. But, I could not, as that survey‘s being conducted never happened in the two years since the public directive was given in a district whose strong requirements to follow directives I knew only too well through experience.

     I would also have liked to present a transcribed recording of all four students who spoke in public session to the Board on Monday, November 6, 2006 , as testimony to illustrate the need for inclusive language, but I was unable to do that as an administrator by presenting herself as the equivalent of the Board prevented two students from exercising their right to make their comments in public, denying the public‘s right to hear them.

     I would, however, be able to provide for my part at least anecdotal evidence which could be verified by hard copies of documents that were too numerous to reproduce at my own expense, and which, although I would gladly sit and review with legal, would not let out of my possession, that showed that there was an attitude among administrators that translated into actions that were detrimental to the needs, safety and well being of our Gay Students.

     I then referred legal to the many emails which they along with other members of Central Administration had received over the years, among which was a recent one from the last academic year wherein it was recounted how a teacher saw no problem with students’ choosing to use the word “Gay” as a synonym for “stupid” in a very public display during the annual health fair at my school.

     I recommended that the legal department access certain web sites and review the research that had been done, and I reminded them that when the School Climate Survey was suggested on at least one campus in this district, the misrepresentation of the suggestion as a directive as opposed a suggestion for consideration, had the principal warn the teacher about possible termination as a result of the complaints of some local clergy who had been misled. 

     As far as contributions of the Revision Committee of the Student/ Parent Handbook due to obviously important nature of the discussion, I was sure the district had in its possession the file assembled by the chair of the committee which contained all the work, suggestions, and rationale of the Handbook Revision Committee which met at least twice . I was sure these notes and the file were readily accessible to them at headquarters, and were not somehow misplace.

     The superintendent, meanwhile had written in a district related newsletter,

  “Providing the school Children of this district with a safe and nurturing learning environment is a priority of the administration. It is one of our strategic AIMS and Goals and it is also a top concern for the community.

In October the staff released to the Board of education such a plan that is known as the Student Code of Conduct, This plan is based on and utilizes data-driven models, strategies, and tools”.

  The article ended with, “to allow for an environment where children may continue to improve academically, we must all work together to make safety an unwavering priority.”

    It was almost obscenely insensitive to our Gay students considering past events and the questionable activities surrounding the Code of Conduct and the Handbook.    

       After I had questioned the actions of the Executive Director of the Learning Community at the Board meeting where the two students had not spoken, and after I wrote to the superintendent about the insensitivity of her written remarks, I was called to the principal‘s office. I was issued a written reprimand for allegedly violating the district‘s computer use policy by sending emails during my planning period when no students were in the room, and during those times when my students were involved with their administratively mandated interactive computer work to prepare for the End of Instruction Tests when a teacher was totally useless for anything other than nominal supervision.

     Considering that for the last seven years even the legal department said nothing, but had responded to my emails and sent inquiries of their own, I found the timing of this reprimand to be a little too coincidental. The first time this “offense” came to the attention of the principal by way of Executive Director of the Learning Community was two days after the school Board meeting where the students were kept from speaking, and after I had complained about this.

     By contract, if a teacher had committed an offense of which he may not have been aware, the teacher was given a warning with a reprimand issued only if the teacher persisted in the newly disclosed offense. In this case, the first step was skipped.

     My Union Representative was as confused by this step skipping as I was, since I was expected to know a policy that had to be brought to the attention of the principal who was now reprimanding me. Even she, apparently, had not been aware that there was such a policy when she had answered my emails about the morning scanning problems.

     The principal had a list of about seven emails that were sent at times that she alleged violated the newly discovered policy. None of them were personal. They were all related either to the Student and Parent Handbook, or the problems that had occurred at my morning scanning station. She considered the number excessive, and this warranted skipping steps in the contract‘s discipline provisions.

     I grieved this according to the contract because I found it wrong that a teacher was held to policies, and could be punished for violating ones, that even administrators were not aware of, while the administrators just as guilty received no discipline, especially when administrators had ample opportunity to point out any policy violation before jumping to a written reprimand. The timing of it all bothered me. Nothing was ever said until I sent the two post School Board meeting critical emails. I wasn‘t sure, and actually hoped it was the case, that the principal was pressured to do this and would have preferred not to have had to do it. It was just one more instance where when not silenced and refusing to keep his place, the Gay teacher was disciplined for some trumped up reason.

     This was the first step in what would be the following year’s attempt to claim that after 14 years of excellent teaching and involvement in improving education in the district. I had suddenly become incompetent enough to be dismissed, an attempt that was exposed for what it was in a district court, silencing the message, the need for the inclusion of GLBT students in school district policy, by eliminating the messenger.

    Over the two years since she had somewhat started weakly advocating for Gay students, I had been constantly advised by some people to lighten up and be a little more forgiving of those things the Diversity Club sponsor had done that had resulted in slowing Gay progress rather than promoting it when she first transferred to the high school as the Dean of Instruction. The fact that she had changed the name of the Gay/Straight Alliance to the more generic Diversity Club was, to me, evidence that she was still reluctant to take a strong stand to protect GLBT students on campus and that she was still protecting her administrative standing for her own advantage.

    However, her habit of talking a good game with promises of what she was going to do only to either not deliver or find some excuse that conveniently justified her not doing what needed to be done, only to then claim after the fact that it was because of her secret backroom maneuvering that anything was ever accomplished, still annoyed me. So while I was reporting those instances that promoted a Gay-hostile environment, I was cautiously assuming she was properly handling those complaints that she claimed students were bringing her, even though I had to work at being good about thinking positive.

     The former Dean initially back pedaled a bit in her usual fashion when I asked her to supply the number of complaints she had received. I made this request as a result of the attorney‘s request for proof of student complaints, and I let the former Dean know why I was requesting the information. Rather than supply anything to me, she explained that not all harassment and bullying complaints were based on sexual orientation.

     This was a given, so I pressed her once more so I could bring the relevant information with me to my meeting with the attorney. The bigger bomb that she dropped was that even though students brought her complaints, she did not pass these on since the complainant did not want to take any further action.

The mandatory and legal process, as verified through an email from the legal department and known by every employee, was that any complaint brought to a district employee, whether pursued or not by the complainant, had to be passed on to the next level to make sure there was a record of the complaint. It could also add to statistics necessary for decision making, and aid in shaping policy and procedure. If fear was the major reason a complainant chose not to follow through, the complaint could be handled in an anonymous manner for the protection of the student or students. There was a law about this and every employee knew about it.

     As an administrator the former Dean had to have known this. As someone who wanted to be seen as an advocate for the safety of Gay students, her collecting this data and passing it on in the proper way would have been extremely beneficial to the students, and her much sought after reputation. But, while she constantly told whatever audience was interested in listening that the number of complaints showed there was a systemic problem, and that she was beloved enough by students to approached by them, her not passing on these complaints to the next level rendered them practically non-existent.

     This had given the obvious impression to those we constantly pled with to make the language in the handbook more inclusive that we were making things up.

     I saw this as a betrayal of the students she should have been helping, especially as she was the sponsor of the Diversity Club, nee Gay/Straight Alliance, whose responsibility this was. I also saw it as a threat to what we could be about to get.

    Just as she used the “Gay Issue” originally to bolster her position with the old principal for possible personal gain, and then, when that did not pay off, attempted to annoy the person who did get the job by

creating an adversarial relationship between him and me based on the Gay thing, she seemed to enjoy using her title of club sponsor as proof of her advocacy without actually doing anything. It was almost as if she wanted the accolades without wanting to do the work needed to earn them.

     The lack of complaints claimed by the Board president and which initially seemed to be an embarrassment for him, turned out to actually be an embarrassment for those of us who had spoken before the Board basing much of what we had to say on the number of complaints of which, apparently, there was no record. This put all three suggestions for more inclusive language in a very weak position because, as we thought we were speaking truthfully and had made every effort to do so, it now looked as if we had been fabricating evidence to push a false premise.

     I spent the next few days making copies of my suggestions for the policy language in the Handbook; highlighting the contradictions and the resolutions for them. I also copied the two letters from both 2003 and 2004 preparing to defend my suggestions in case at the final Handbook Committee meeting there was opposition to any of the suggestions for new language to the policies on Nondiscrimination, Bullying, and Harassment. I even rewrote the Handbook language incorporating each of the three suggestions so the committee would see how each would read.

     I was nervous, but ready. But, as in the past, the other members of the committee were new to this, so if their hesitation resulted in waiting until next year, whereas it would have been one year for them, for me it would have been wait-number-nine. 

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