NOVEMBER 7, 1997 Gay People's Chronicle
9
SPEAK OUT
A history lesson is being taught today, in Utah courts
by Kevin Jennings
I was a high school history teacher for ten years and, as they say, "You can take a teacher out of the classroom, but you can't take the classroom out of the teacher." So please indulge me as I engage in a little history lesson.
The history I am reminded of today is that of a woman who took a stand for her Constitutional rights in a place and time when doing so could cost you everything even your life.
The place was Montgomery, Alabama, and the time was 1954. That year, a woman named Rosa Parks was asked to give up her seat on a bus because of the color of her skin. She was not the first to face this demand; thousands upon thousands of African-Americans had lived for decades with the humiliation of being expected to give up their Constitutional rights simply because of the bigotry of others. They did so because the cost of saying no was too high.
But on that day in 1954, Rosa Parks did say no-no to the idea that her freedom should be constrained by the bigotry of others, no to the idea that she was not entitled to Constitutional protections because she was black, and no to the fear that had enslaved her community for so long. By saying no, she changed the course of our nation's history, and helped bring segregation to an end.
On October 21, in Salt Lake City, Utah, an outstanding teacher-Wendy Weaver—was asked to give up her freedom of speech and her livelihood because of other people's bigotry. She has been told by school authorities in Spanish Fork that her two decades of service to her students don't matter, that her right to freedom of speech is irrelevant, that she must lie and dissemble and besilent because others do not believe she has any Constitutional rights-because she is a lesbian. In response, she has given a simple answer: No.
Like the African-Americans of Rosa Parks' day, lesbians and gay men of the nineties— especially those of us who work in schools-have often had to put up with unconstitutional restrictions on our rights of free speech because of fear-fear that we would lose our jobs, fear that we and our families would suffer, fear that we would be punished for doing the most basic thing: telling the truth about our lives.
This has always been the unwritten contract between our employers and us: If you keep your mouth shut, maybe we'll let you have a job. If you sacrifice your Constitutional rights, we'll let you earn enough money to have a place to live and to feed your families. If you accept second-class citizenship, we won't hurt you.
What has happened to Wendy Weaver isn't
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new. Thousands oflesbians and gays live by these rules every day. But school authorities in Spanish Fork, Utah had the temerity to put these rules in writing and demand that Weaver sign away her Constitutional rights if she wished to keep her job. And she has said no.
I believe today will mark a turning point in our history, and that the name Wendy Weaver may someday be mentioned in the same breath as that of Rosa Parks. Just as Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat, Wendy Weaver has refused to give up her seat a seat at the table of our Constitution and the rights it promises to all Americans. Weaver has put the question squarely before
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Weaver has given her answer: No. I am confident that the courts, the people of Utah, and my fellow Americans will agree with her. After all, that's what the Founding Fathers would have had us do. That is the lesson of our history. Class dismissed.
✓
Kevin Jennings is the executive director of GLSEN, the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network.
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