Tag: civil rights

Just Say No to Government Bullies

by David T. Bruce

Schools across the United States have adopted anti-bullying programs, and many school districts have reported varying degrees of success in minimizing bullying in their schools. Virtually all of us have been witness to, victims of or perpetrators of bullying. And even if all schools have not found success implementing programs that curb bullying, at least awareness about bullying has been raised across the nation. For those students who may look or behave differently than their peers, there is support. This is a good thing.

However . . .

erIf a student happens to be gay or lesbian (or even perceived as such), that student is still more likely to be bullied than another student, with almost two thirds of students expressing concern for their safety in school as a result of their sexual orientation. And three fourths of teens in the LGBT community have acknowledged being bullied as a result of their sexual orientation, with little or no intervention from teachers or school districts. And while the verbal and physical bullying cited in these reports is most obvious, perhaps the most prevalent bullying is of an indirect nature.

Indirect bullying – a more covert type of bullying that often goes unseen and includes excluding people from social groups – not only prevails in our schools but in our society as well, and if we are going to eradicate bullying in our schools, we have to eliminate bullying in our society as well, starting with our government leaders.

A civil rights battle is currently being waged throughout the United States, as state governments wrestle with the social, ethical and religious implications associated with allowing LGBT couples to wed. While some government leaders have opted to bring down the barriers that prevent couples marrying regardless of sexual orientation, others choose to discriminate against gay and lesbian couples, thereby excluding them from a particular social group. To be blunt: this is bullying.

Most recently Utah Governor Gary Herbert has announced that he will not recognize same-sex marriages recently married in the state, even thought the U.S. Constitution affords gay couples equal protection under the law. This is not the example we should be setting for those students whom we are telling that bullying is unacceptable. How can we hope that bullying will be eliminated from schools and that students will grow to see the worth in all people, while a governor indirectly bullies a group of people because they do not fit his social, ethical and religious schema? There are enough bullies on the playground. We don’t need them in our government.