Reaction grows to gay student's expulsion

[kweerwolf]

The news that his boyfriend, Jason Johnson, was expelled from University of the Cumberlands was still sinking in when Zac Dreyer sat at a computer to spread the news.

"He is being asked to leave the university because he is gay," Dreyer wrote Thursday on the Web site MySpace.com, the same site school officials used to confront Johnson. "Help get the story out there so that all the gays and lesbians at the university will no longer have to live in secrecy, in fear of having their dreams crushed in front of them."

Within a few hours, friends and students at the small Baptist college in Williamsburg were commenting in blogs about Johnson's expulsion. The buzz grew over the weekend, and by yesterday the issue drew reaction from legislators in Frankfort and on gay advocacy organizations' Web sites nationwide.

Johnson, a sophomore majoring in theater arts, was expelled from the university Thursday because he declared online that he is gay. In a statement released last week, the university's president, Jim Taylor said students are held to a "higher standard" and that "students know the rules before they come to this institution."

http://www.kentucky.com/mld/kentucky/news/state/14313621.htm?source=syn

I have to admit to having mixed feelings on this. On the one hand, discrimination such as this is morally reprehensible. But on the other hand, what the hell did the kid expect when he enrolled in a school run by an organized hate group like the Baptists?

[Trillo]

1. Why is any school of any level so preoccupied with students' sex lives?

I remember having a history teacher at a community college, and at least several times she remarked that studies have shown that college students are thinking of sex at least 20 times an hour.

It would seem that administrators (teachers) are also thinking about sex. Get the hell out of peoples sex lives you perverts.

[ET Awful]

2. he's a major in Theater Arts

and they were surprised that he was gay?

No, I'm not trying to stereotype, but . . . in my experience gay men aren't exactly uncommon in theater.

Frickin' bassackwards school.

[rpannier]

3. Sadly...I agree with you.

The school is run by Baptists. It's an anti-Gay school, that has anti-Gay policies.
I think the school sucks for doing this.

[WestSeattle2]

4. Have to agree with your mixed feelings....

Suppose a sane and rational kid enrolled in Falwell's Liberty University. After a short while, administrators discover the kid is sane and rational, unlike all the rest of their charges. They expel the sane kid.

Well, what did the sane kid expect when he enrolled in an insane asylum? Acceptance? Love?

Now in all seriousness, you have to chuckle that the kid in this story is majoring in Theatre Arts. I mean, come on! Who woulda thunk it? Gay AND into Theatre Arts? GET OUT! :rofl:

Thank the good Lord that the Baptists had the cerebral wherewithal to wrap their investigative powers around this one. Those baptists are BRAINIACKS! :applause:

[TechBear_Seattle]

5. The kid might not have had a choice on schools

I think it very safe to say that most young people who go to a school like the Cumberlands were raised in very religious, very conservative families. He was (until the manure hit the spreader) probably not out to his family, and I expect no more than three or four of his fellow students had a clue as to his being gay.

With that kind of background, he was likely told, "You will go to my alma mater, a conservative, God-fearing Christian school, or you will get no financial support from us" or something along those lines. If he had refused, he would have had to explain why he refused or be pestered and prayed over until he offered a reasonable explanation. I doubt very much he wanted a family like that to know about his personal life, so the easiest course of action was to shut up, get out of the house and enjoy what freedom he could get. I would not at all be surprised that he really wanted to study math or geology or history, but chose Theater to make sure he had what gay friends he could find at the school.

(And yes, I've known a few people who were in exactly the same situation. Dated one for a while, even.)

[triakis36]

6. "higher standard"? "rules"?

That's just BS and they know it. What's to keep anyone from saying hazel eyes is the "religious" standard..and that anyone caught not conforming will be expelled!?

[Occulus]

9. Their standards are not not NOT higher than mine, or anyone else's

and they are, in fact, one HELL of a lot lower.

Which is why I don't practice religion in general, at all, period.

Because I have higher standards for behavior than they do.

[mzteris]

7. if the Baptists keep kicking out

the gay kids - where will all their organists and choir directors come from???

I say this not so tongue in cheek having grown up in S. Baptist Churches. The vast majority - looking back - of the choir directors and/or organists in those churches were gay men. Closeted gay men, sure, - maybe even in denial gay men - but still - gay as could be.

[TechBear_Seattle]

8. Indeed

For almost two years, I attended a conservative Episcopal church in central California and sang in the choir. The choir director was an energetic woman with a passion for music, her husband was the organist and one of the swishiest men I have ever met. We are talking so flaming, he could serve as an emergency beacon should the lighthouse torch go out. Gayer than a tree full of monkeys on laughing gas. You get the picture. I still wonder if his wife and three kids had a clue.

[BR_Parkway]

10. So, what's next? Virginity testing? According to their published

rules:

"Any student who engages in or promotes sexual behavior not consistent with Christian principles (including sex outside marriage and homosexuality) may be suspended or asked to withdraw."

The kid probably made a bad choice of where he went to school, or possibly just came out after trying hard to fit into the expectations placed on him to conform as he came to grips with his own sexuality.

I think the kid should sue the hell out of them for discrimination - according to their policies, the only defense they'll have is to put every student on the stand and hope they're all virgins.

While I do understand they have the right to set the rules (as long as no government funding involved) about who can or can't go - they do need to apply those rules evenly across the board - straight sexually active non marrieds need to be expelled also, not just the gay ones.

And the whole idea that the school might have been monitoring these myspace websites to spy on the kids just creeps me out. The article never really got into how the school came to know what he had posted, I wish they had covered that more.

[xchrom]

12. that's what i wondered when this news first came out.

so are they peering into the parked cars and bedrooms of all the students who go there -- reading love letters etc?

cause there are some unmarried kids having it off gauranteed.

[10nessean]

11. THIS IS MY ALMA MATER!

I cannot believe this!  When I attended in the 80s, this kind
of thing would never have happened. It was a relatively
progressive institution.  I had heard rumors that a fundie
faction had begun to take over and were tying it more closely
to the Kentucky Baptist Convention...it seems that the rumors
were sadly true.  

I've had a Cumberland College mug (the name was changed to The
University of the Cumberlands only in the past few years) on
my desk at work for years which I have used as a pencil
holder.  I was always proud to say that I went to Cumberland.

The mug is now in the garbage.  Apparently, the Cumberland
that I knew and loved is gone.