Jeff, one of the best things about the way in which my life flirts with religion is how it has made me (maybe surprisingly) more open-minded. The church I play at is amazing at preaching acceptance. It encourages curiosity and even scepticism about manmade faith systems, but also that people should be free to personalize their spirituality, whatever the denomination may be. My church is unique in that way (sometimes I wonder if my minister even believes in God, ahaha). This is fairly common in the United Church (but not all). For example, my mom's church just particpated in a community event hosted by Ajax which featured Christianity, Judaism, and Islam at an informative who's who social. How awesome is that? I think a lot of this background information to help support what I'm going to say, in terms of what inspires my stance on these issues.
The church I work at in particular has helped me to realize that you don't have to be religious to be good (d'uh), and that the best religions promote goodness. I don't believe in infecting my beliefs in others, but I do believe -- especially as a teacher, and I know you do too -- in creating a classroom that is safe and also inclusive of all students, their families, and their beliefs. Every student must be respected. Every religion should be respected, in my opinion. *BUT* I think a safe environment requires you to promote the first of those two ideas more heavily. No one can argue a strong stance on basic physical and emotional wellbeing. Because of this, you could justify permitting the knife to be brought to school (locked up of course) to the parents who don't believe in homosexuality in stating that the first does not directly harm anybody. The knife would be put away safely and no students would be affected, physically or religiously. On the other hand, to ignore or shun matters of sexual orientation is to ostracize or overlook an entire group of people who have a right to express themselves as much as the anti-gay family does (yes, does, for me).
I think that the solution is in the way the movie is put together. It would be best if it showed how being bullied about orientation makes the kids feel -- it shouldn't say whether being gay is okay or not. Hopefully that impartiality on the movie's part would teach the anti-gay kids to keep those opinions to themselves on the grounds of compassion, the same way kids have to keep their mouths shut about ugly kids, fat kids, poor kids, religious kids etc. whatever might be a reason to bully other kids. I hate saying it, but I feel that anti-gays have rights to their feelings as well. Hopefully exposure and experience allows them to see what is right, but nobody can tell anyone what to think. The model that I am toying with encourages behaviour that respects differences so that all can work together to the necessary degree, with the emphasis on the students' abilities to realize their beliefs through how they act, not how they tell others to. If the parents don't buy into that, then maybe public school (or a different school) isn't for them.
The church I work at in particular has helped me to realize that you don't have to be religious to be good (d'uh), and that the best religions promote goodness. I don't believe in infecting my beliefs in others, but I do believe -- especially as a teacher, and I know you do too -- in creating a classroom that is safe and also inclusive of all students, their families, and their beliefs. Every student must be respected. Every religion should be respected, in my opinion. *BUT* I think a safe environment requires you to promote the first of those two ideas more heavily. No one can argue a strong stance on basic physical and emotional wellbeing. Because of this, you could justify permitting the knife to be brought to school (locked up of course) to the parents who don't believe in homosexuality in stating that the first does not directly harm anybody. The knife would be put away safely and no students would be affected, physically or religiously. On the other hand, to ignore or shun matters of sexual orientation is to ostracize or overlook an entire group of people who have a right to express themselves as much as the anti-gay family does (yes, does, for me).
I think that the solution is in the way the movie is put together. It would be best if it showed how being bullied about orientation makes the kids feel -- it shouldn't say whether being gay is okay or not. Hopefully that impartiality on the movie's part would teach the anti-gay kids to keep those opinions to themselves on the grounds of compassion, the same way kids have to keep their mouths shut about ugly kids, fat kids, poor kids, religious kids etc. whatever might be a reason to bully other kids. I hate saying it, but I feel that anti-gays have rights to their feelings as well. Hopefully exposure and experience allows them to see what is right, but nobody can tell anyone what to think. The model that I am toying with encourages behaviour that respects differences so that all can work together to the necessary degree, with the emphasis on the students' abilities to realize their beliefs through how they act, not how they tell others to. If the parents don't buy into that, then maybe public school (or a different school) isn't for them.
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