h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

New Code for English Schools.

It has emerged today that in an attempt to diffuse the row growing over the repealing of "Section 28", forbiding schools to promote homosexuality, the Goverment is drawing up plans to legally force schools to teach children that marriage is the "proper" relationship.

But what about children from single parent families? Surely this new measure will make those children feel inadequate. This is why the Cabinet is now split on the issue.

They really have no idea how to handle it do they? They are also worried about the reactions of those in the armed forces who were ostracised and *removed* If that particular can of worms is opened too much it will cost the government(sorry...the taxpayer) millions!
shazzPRME
PS..was that you Veggie??!!

Given Tony Blair's pathological fear of being seen to stand for anything specific, I'm sure that the ban on gays in the UK military would have stayed if it hadn't been challenged in the European courts. I suspect that it's going to take more appeals to Europe to rid us of the last pieces of homophobic legislation in UK law.
You're either for bigotry or you're against it - on that issue, there's no "Third Way".
Will someone please pass on that information to Mr. Blair?

Sorry, it was I that posted that News Journal. Hypoman's a bit ill at the moment

The government seem to be trying to pacify people, and upsetting more. It seems that when they say marriage, they don't specify whether it's a hetro or homo marriage, but as far I know the British Government still don't recognise a homosexual marriage.

They seem to have really got this one mixed up.

UK law definitely don't recognise homosexual marriage - but something that does receive official recognition is "common-law" marriage. A heterosexual couple are regarded as "married" for many legal purposes once they've lived together for a certain length of time (I think it's two years) even if they haven't actually been through a wedding ceremony. So where does THAT fit into the Rev. Blair's sermonising? Like Shazz said, this is one very large can of worms that's being opened here.

Yes! At least where I am going they have a far more open mind about just about everything
shazzPRME

As of now secondary school teachers are advised not to answer or provoke any inquiry into the subject of same - sex relations, and doing so has (so far) landed them jail time and/or suspension / removal from their teaching position. Education is a state matter in the U.S., so I'm only speaking of California. Furthermore, there has been a new proposition by congressman Knight preserving the 'sanctity' of marriage. Which sounds harmless enough at first, but what they're trying to do is make it illegal to give medical / etc. benefits to same - sex couples, whom are not allowed to get married in all but two states in the U.S., (last time I checked), Hawaii and Vermont, and who's marriage would NOT be recognised if the new proposition were to go through.

And this state's supposed to be known it's liberalism.

A step back? *nods*

-Frustrated Fenny
(And blame my grammar on that same educational system!)

It IS shocking to hear that about California. What must the laws be like in the Southern Bible Belt!? I truly dread to think...

I think they need to be very careful about what they preach to children. I can just imagine
a) how I would have felt and
b) the hell my teachers would've had to go through
if they had tried to teach me that single parent families were the wrong way, coming from one myself.
They should probably try to present the various options in as much of an unbiased way as they can, or not present them at all.
Children can be very cruel, and not only does it open the way to them feeling inadequate, it also gives an opportunity for "my family's better than yours: your parents never married, you were a mistake"

I think clause 28 is very much a topic of conversation.
I do not have a problem with people who decied to be gay or sorry should i say are gay!
but do they really have to have it discussed in school?????????????????????????????
I think if a child of mine asked what is gay or homosexual I would tell them why do they have to go in to great detail at school ??????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????
???????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????
Boy george was on the telly promoting gay people but i could see no wronge !!!!!!!!!!!!!!
but why teach it in schools he said he knew he was gay at 5 so what is the problem?????????????????????????????????????????????????????????

The problem is that teachers have their hands tied when it comes to acting in the case of homophobia nd gay bashing in schools. Any child who is slightly quiet, intorverted or artistic rather than sports orientated can fall foul of this schoolboy homophobes.

If people where educated to realise that gay people are as diverse as straight people, with the same mixture of attributes it may go some way to stem the prejudice that many have been forced to suffer from an early age.

Not all parents take the attitude you would take and anwser questions about homosexuality in an objective way. A lot of them carry their own prejudices and hate. If there is no other source of information given to people than subjective prejudices we are doing nothing to aliviate the situation. It is not a matter of teaching kids everything there is to know about being gay, it is as much about teaching tolerance. But unfortunately at present there is no place for an objective well balanced forum to educate against these prejudices.

BTW since January 1999 the UK government has been undertaking a review of the sexual offences act. Did you know for example that two men in Britain found kissing in public may still be cahrged and could face a 5 year jail term. Some of this act dats back to Napolionic times and is in major need of an overhaul. Redefinition and reassesment of what is permittable. Equality is at stake and the European Union states that people should not be desciminated against on many levels including sexual orientation.

This is also a major undertaking for when Human Rights enter Common Law in October. They need to sort this mess out before then or we will have hugely contradicting laws.

Also, going into depth isn't the problem. The problem is that teachers can't present a balanced view, deal with homophobic bullying and I believe should a teacher be told they are obliged to notify the police, school authorities and guardians. Hardly fair now, is it? We were positively advised AGAINST telling teachers at my school. They can't afford to be put into that position of trust which they must then break. Such are the times...

So things aren't that bad in California... . While they can't teach homosexuality in elementary or junior high school (first 8 or 9 years of instruction) and marriage isn't legal, throughout junior high and high school I've had openly gay friends and it wasn't a problem... and, well, now it's a UC school. I need not say more. I don't know if it's just the advantage of my attending rather liberal schools or the general trend, seeing as San Diego is the 'conservative' part of the state.

There's currently (that I know of) no legislation such as that mentioned... there was the case of a teacher telling his students he was gay and being removed. I don't think he went into detail or anything, he simply said he liked people of the same sex. He wasn't removed due to any laws, just lots of parental nagging.

I do think that was totally wronge as he was just being truthful. They teach about different religions at school I do not think it makes children more careing towards each other. If children are brought up by parents who shout the odds about gay people or religion then the children just learn it as well.

But at least they've got a slight chance of a better influence.

If a child *does* accuse another child of being "gay", then at least the teacher can reasure the bullied child that it isn't really an insult.
Or something.

Yeah... but that might cause problems in of itself. This may seem odd, but to me gay is an insult as well as a description. The same word has three entries in my vocab tables with different meanings depending on the situation. It would be very hard to fight the mob on this so it might be better to simply allow the word to 'evolve' away from its previous connatations through language development.

Sure it should be allowed to evolve away. But teachers should have the power to bring people up on it if they so choose.

True...

The biggest problem is the word 'promote' in Clause 28.

Some people see it as being an open invitation for the gay community to say 'Hey, gay is best', however many people see it as a hindrance to any mention or acceptance that homosexulaity and homophobia can exist as schools. Thaat is where the problem lies, and where it leads to gay kids having to face problems from abusers and bullies with no support in 'any' form to fall back on and trust.

I don't think it is a problem we are going to solve!!!!!!