This definitely falls into the category of “shit that I thought everyone should understand and didn’t have to be said out loud.”
LGBTQ+ Pride flags removed from classrooms at Madison City Schools
Faculty members and students in the Madison City School district (MCS) are speaking out after teachers were told to take down their LGBTQ+ Pride flags.
At the end of the school day on Friday, teachers in some of the schools were instructed by the superintendent to remove the Pride flag from their classrooms.
Students tell News 19 that seeing the flag let them know that the school was a safe haven for them. The school, they said, was one of the few places where they could be themselves. One student said that they were confused by MCS’s actions to remove the flag from the schools regardless of the reasons given.
“By taking the flag down, they inadvertently made a stance on their opinions on gay rights,” the student said. “Even if they say it is just policy, they’ve [put] themselves on the side that they believe in, and that side is homophobia.”
The superintendent of Madison City Schools released a statement, suggesting that the flag represented a political stance by a teacher:
We have recently responded to inappropriate display of flags and symbols in classrooms representing personal viewpoints of teachers and staff unrelated to the class curriculum.
As school administrators, we must maintain a position of neutrality on political issues and not impose a teacher’s personal views and beliefs on our students through such displays in the classroom. For that reason, flags and banners other than the American or Alabama state flag, or other flags appropriate to the curriculum in a particular class, are not to be displayed in our schools by faculty and staff. Allowing teachers and staff to display flags on school grounds with respect to political, religious, or cultural issues may create an environment of exclusion for some students who hold different viewpoints on sexuality, religion, or politics.
This is true regardless of the political viewpoint expressed.
For every teacher allowed to display flags in the classroom to express a personal viewpoint in favor of a certain political or cultural position, the district could be faced with a teacher who would express an opposing viewpoint with equal vigor. Such displays, on either side, are not in the interests of providing an open and welcoming environment for all.
All Madison City Schools classrooms must be welcoming to students regardless of their religious affiliation, or political or sexual orientation. All Madison City Schools classrooms must be presented as safe places for all students.
Of course we recognize that faculty and staff hold varying viewpoints on such issues. While we expect all faculty and staff to exhibit appropriate professional neutrality within the context of the school and classroom environment, we also recognize each person’s freedom of speech and expression in their personal lives and in their personal expression exercised away from school. Madison City Schools has always celebrated diversity and they will continue to do so.
DR. ED NICHOLS, SUPERINTENDENT OF MADISON CITY
This is the correct position.
The personal political beliefs of teachers do not belong in the classroom.
Alabama is still a Red state. Even Madison. What if a teacher had a bunch of pro life decorations? Do you think the students would defend that? Or would they complain that the teacher’s political statement was threatening them?
That’s what neutrality is important.
As for that one kid’s statement. If by homophobia he means I take the position: “I don’t care who you fuck but keep it in your bedroom, you don’t need to fly a flag that says you love dick.” Then yes, I’m on the side of homophobia.
I aggressively hate what Pride has metastasized into.
I don’t really care about your sexually. Although I do reserve the right to judge your behavior, e.g., the wing of gay culture that is spreading monkeypox like wildfire through absolute libertine sexual irresponsibility.
But Pride openly celebrates a person’s sexual desires over personality as identity politics. You’re proud, not because you accomplished anything, but because you like to fuck other people of the same sex.
I reject that.
Pride went overboard and now it’s being pushed back in Madison, Alabama.
It was pushed back in Florida.
It will be pushed back in other Red states.
It deserves to be.
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