Louisiana Legislators Shelve Anti-bullying Bill Because It Protects LGBTQ Students

Apparently, Louisiana Legislators and the governor aren't too concerned about bullying; of LGBTQ students, or of anyone, for, once again, civil and gay rights activists failed to win approval for a strong anti-gay bullying law for the state's public school system.

Pat Smith

Democratic Representative Pat Smith believed her bill, House Bill 407, was vital to the safety to LGBTQ youth in schools, and cited evidence of current, and continued, bullying, including a recent suicide by a Point Coupee teenager who had complained to adults many times about being mistreated by her classmates. After being bullied, and telling people about, and realizing that nothing was being done to protect her, last month, seventeen-year old Tesa Middlebrook was found hanging from the bleachers of the school football stadium.

Opponents, lead by the conservative ironically named Louisiana Family Forum, along with aides to Governor Jindal, argued that the measure went too far by listing perceived or actual characteristics that should not subject a student to bullying.

After the committee bought that tactic, and then voted 10-5 to remove those key changes, including sexual orientation, Pat Smith shelved her own bill rather than try to work with a watered down version that really did nothing to protect LGBTQ students.

Current Louisiana law requires local school boards to write policies that prohibit "harassment, intimidation and bullying." It defines those terms as, "any intentional gesture or written, verbal or physical act that a reasonable person under the circumstances should know will have the effective of harming a student or damaging his property or placing a student in reasonable fear of harm."

Sounds good, but Pat Smith proposed some additions, but the most pertinent passage extended the definition to acts "a reasonable person under the circumstances would perceive as being motivated by an actually or perceived characteristic, including but not limited to race, color, ancestry, national origin, religion, exceptionalities, physical disability, intellectual disability, developmental disability, mental illness or emotional health disorder, language ability, sexual orientation, physical characteristics, gender identity, gender expression, political ideas or affiliations, socioeconomic status or association with others identified by such characteristics."

You know, bullying a kid because you 'think' he or she is gay.

Smith said the current definitions are too vague, and that many teachers and school administrators aren't well trained to recognize bullying, with some behaviors dismissed as "teasing." Worse, she said, some school employees choose not to protect certain students because of their own personal beliefs.

Jeff Thompson

Republican Representative Jeff Thompson was the one who proposed stripping the wording from the bill, saying, "It's the action, not the motive, that constitutes bullying."

Um, Jeff? You cannot have the "action" of bullying without a "motive". Not one single act of bullying has been done "just because;" there's always a motive, be it that the victim is gay, or perceived to be. Or the victim is fat or tall or skinny or Black or Latino, or any other characteristic that a bully deems as different, and there intolerable.

Jumping on the delusional bandwagon is Louisiana Family Forum President Gene Mills--he says he's an ordained minister--who told lawmakers, that the bill "introduces sexual politics" into the classroom and would discriminate against religious expression. 

Gene Mills

"You could make a criminal bully out of a child who holds an orthodox view of Christianity," he said.

Let me set this queer for you, you're a bigot who hides his hatred behind religion. Any person who says "I am against gay people because the Bible says so" is not a bully; they're decidedly and assuredly misinformed, but they aren't a bully. It's when they use their religion as hate speech, or use their religion to justify taunts and shoves and threats and physical or verbal abuse, that it becomes bullying.

Not one single person, anywhere, is saying you cannot have your religious beliefs about homosexuality. They are simply asking that you not berate, abuse, beat, taunt, tease, harass or harm anyone based on those beliefs.

Asshat.

Bobby Jindal

And let's toss Republican asshat governor, Bobby Jindal into the mix. He believes the list of characteristics in Smith's bill creates winners and losers--whatever that means because Jindal couldn't say. He's just a typical GOP goosestepper spewing words as thought hey have meaning, when, in fact,m they are meaningless.

Jindal, later, evaded answering any question's about Pat Smith's bill by saying he "supports a bill ... to protect children." 

Yet he was unable to cite the bill he supported that protected children.

In other words, if you're a public school student in Louisiana, and you are ":dsifferent' from the norm, for any reason, perceived or real, you can be victimized and bullied and harassed and, well, tortured to the point of suicide.

But remember, if it's done in the name of God, it's okay.

And remember, the governor wants to protect you, he just doesn't know how.

Or can't remember.

source