But I Thought Discrimination Was Over

The Justice Department is stepping in to defend a gay high school student who was bullied for being effeminate.

What's this? Gay kids being bullied? Why, that's impossible? I mean, didn't those lawyers defending California's Proposition 8 just say that there really is no more discrimination of the LGBT community? Didn't Ellen, and Will & Grace and Brokeback Mountain change all that for us?

Ahem......[sarcasm font]

The Justice Department's Civil Rights Division has asked a judge for permission to intervene in the 15-year-old student's lawsuit against Mohawk Central School District. The case hinges on Title IX, the section of the federal civil rights law that bans discrimination on the basis of gender. The Obama administration is claiming that Title IX also covers discrimination based on gender stereotypes.

Jacob, from Mohawk, New York, says he was harassed even before he came out at as gay last year. His classmates at Gregory B. Jarvis Junior/Senior High School told him to get a sex change and threw food at him; he was threatened at knifepoint, and been told by a teacher--yes, a teacher-- to "hate himself every day until he changed." He was pushed down a flight of stairs. His father, Robbie Sullivan--who does not share his son's last name--has visited his son's principal multiple times per week to talk about the ongoing incidents, but to no avail, and so, with the backing of the New York Civil Liberties Union, he filed suit against the school district in August.

Yeah, no discrimination there.