Parents Clash over Gay Curriculum Proposal
A bill by Mark Leno would require textbooks to include gay history and portray it “in a positive light”
After a lesbian student at Jesse Bethel High School in Vallejo joined with the American Civil Liberties Union in 2008 to accuse the local school district of discrimination, district officials agreed as part of a settlement to show films and assign homework depicting same-sex families, beginning in elementary school.
But one night last November, more than a dozen parents, rallied by community religious leaders, attacked the school board, asserting that their rights were being violated because they had no control over whether their children received such lessons.
“No one should take my right to tell me what can be shown to my child,” Cookie Gordon, a mother of two, told the board.
The clash was one of several related controversies at Bay Area schools. Polls show that the public’s stance against same-sex marriage is softening, and education about gay issues has