• Registered: 05-03-2009
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Topic: Alabama fails epically

Alabama School Bars Lesbian Student From Attending Prom With Her Girlfriend

RUSSELLVILLE, AL – The American Civil Liberties Union today demanded that Franklin County School System officials reverse its decision that a lesbian student can’t attend the school prom with her girlfriend.  Cynthia Stewart, a junior at Tharptown High School, approached the ACLU for assistance after school officials denied her request for the upcoming March 25 prom.

"I can't believe my school is doing all of this just to keep me from bringing my girlfriend to the prom," said Stewart, a 17-year-old student who, as a member of the prom planning committee, has personally raised over $200 for the prom and created the theme her classmates chose for the dance. "All I want is to be able to be myself and go to my prom with the person I love, just like any other student wants to do."

Stewart's aunt and guardian, Kathy Baker, approached ACLU of Alabama board member and local attorney Henry F. Sherrod III last week for assistance after the school announced it was cancelling the prom.  Baker had approached the school board to appeal the principal's earlier decision that Stewart could not bring her girlfriend to the dance, but her plea on behalf of her niece was turned down.  Some teachers told classes last Thursday that prom was being canceled altogether as a way to avoid having to let Cynthia bring her date.  Finally, at least one teacher made statements to students Monday indicating that the prom is back on, but there has still been no reversal on the decision that Stewart can’t bring her girlfriend to the event.

"It's just sad to see this school twisting itself in so many different directions to avoid its constitutional obligations to one student," said Sherrod.  "Cynthia doesn't just deserve to be able to take her girlfriend with her to the prom like any other student – she has a federally-protected right to do so."

In today's letter to Franklin County School System officials, the ACLU cited cases both in Alabama state court as well as federal court guaranteeing students' First Amendment right to bring same-sex dates to school dances.  In addition to illegally canceling the prom, the ACLU said that Tharptown High School's principal further violated Stewart's First Amendment rights by requiring her to remove a sticker she was wearing at school that read, "I'm a Lesbian."  Stewart said that when she told the principal she had a First Amendment right to wear the sticker, he replied, "You don't have that much freedom of speech at school."

"Federal law makes it absolutely clear that Franklin County School System doesn't have any right to discriminate against lesbian, gay, and bisexual students who want to bring same-sex dates to school dances," said Christine P. Sun, Senior Counsel with the ACLU national Lesbian Gay Bisexual Transgender Project, who represents Stewart along with Sherrod.  "We hope that our telling the school about its legal obligations towards its students will make it think again about treating Cynthia Stewart like a second-class citizen."

The ACLU has given the school district until November 20 to respond to its letter.

Additional information, including a copy of the ACLU's demand letter, is available at http://www.aclu.org/lgbt-rights/russell … rimination.

Put a ChodaMonster in your Anus!

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  • Registered: 05-03-2009
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Re: Alabama fails epically

That's pretty standard of the Deep South, though I can't imagine that it'll stand up to constitutional scrutiny.

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  • Registered: 05-03-2009
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Re: Alabama fails epically

Updated: Lesbian couple to attend Alabama high school prom -- if date passes muster

THARPTOWN, Ala. -- A northwest Alabama school district reversed itself and won't bar a high school student from bringing her girlfriend to the prom after the principal initially said the lesbian couple wouldn't be permitted.

Cynthia Stewart, 17, told the TimesDaily, a Florence newspaper, that she asked to bring her girlfriend to the prom at Tharptown High School in Franklin County but was refused permission by the principal.

"All I want is to be able to be myself and go to my prom with the person I love, just like any other student wants to do," said Stewart, who is on the committee planning the dance scheduled for March.

Stewart sought help from the American Civil Liberties Union, and school officials on Tuesday said they had reconsidered.

The school reviews all potential prom dates who, like Stewart's girlfriend, live outside the regular attendance district. Assistant Superintendent Donald Borden said that process hasn't begun but would include the young woman.

"If her date passes, she comes," he said. The checks screen out troublemakers and students with documented behavioral problems.

ACLU attorney Hank Sherrod III said Stewart's girlfriend "is a teenager with no problems that would keep her from being able to attend the prom."

"We're not asking for special treatment. We just want to be treated like everyone else," he said.

Stewart said she hoped that raising the issue would change the way some people think about the gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender community. She said there are other students at Tharptown High School who are gay.

"I'm not just doing this for me; I'm trying to help other kids in my situation," Stewart said.

Kathy Baker, who is Stewart's aunt and legal guardian, appealed the principal's initial refusal to the school board last month. Sherrod said allowing Stewart to bring the date of her choice to the prom was the correct decision.

"This issue is going to be confronting a lot of conservative school districts more and more as this generation accepts people for who they are," Sherrod said. "There is case law that makes right and wrong very clear."

Put a ChodaMonster in your Anus!

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  • Registered: 05-03-2009
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Re: Alabama fails epically

You could drop the entire population of the Deep South into Saudi Arabia, and the only way they'd realize that they were there is that cousin marriage would be slightly less prevalent.

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  • Registered: 05-03-2009
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Re: Alabama fails epically

They'd kill all the Saudi natives becuase weren't speaking English "like good Americans".

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  • Registered: 01-06-2010
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Re: Alabama fails epically

You guys really are some hypocrites aren't you? Standing up and claiming to give a damn about people's rights and then in the very same posts going off about how much you hate an entire region of the country, that in all odds you've never been to (though I have to admit Alabama sucks, primarily due to a legacy of corrupt government, federal acts supported by the north after the civil war, and a great deal of poverty, and I'd list it as the worst state in the country in my personal opinion, but my point stands.) and grouping an entire population in with a handful of bigots. You do know that the girls in question (and clearly a large number of supportive classmates) ARE from that area too right? They're the exact same people you're aiming your own bigoted hypocritical comments at.

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  • Registered: 05-03-2009
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Re: Alabama fails epically

Hyperbole for hyperbole's sense. We have a member from Georgia who we sometimes make fun of with the usual redneck stereotypes, but who himself despises Southern rednecks more than any of us ever could...because he lives among them. So, of course that kind of remark doesn't equate to advocacy of actual discriminatory state policy based on regional residence (which would be incredibly stupid, since people don't choose the regions that they're born into and raised in), and no, there's not really much hypocrisy. wink

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  • Registered: 09-19-2010
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Re: Alabama fails epically

I could understand barring stickers if it were a school that had uniforms or maybe a very specific dress code, but if it's your normal place where you can have all kinds of t-shirts with all kinds of strange phrases on it, I think she's probably being unfairly singled out.

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