A high-school girl, Rebekah Rice, was disciplined and subsequently teased and ridiculed by classmates for having used the expression, “That’s so gay.” For those who haven’t had teenagers in the past decade or so, “That’s so gay” does not have anything to do with sexual preference. It means approximately, “That’s uncool.”
Her parents sued the school system for not protecting her from the “merciless teasing” she had to endure, the judge ruled against them, saying:
“All of us have probably felt at some time that we were unfairly punished by a callous teacher, or picked on and teased by boorish and uncaring bullies,” the judge wrote in a 20-page ruling. “Unfortunately, this is part of what teenagers endure in becoming adults.”
This seemed strange to me since, many times in the past few years, I’ve read about people having been disciplined, jailed and expelled for being merely “insensitive” to another student. Rice’s treatment seemed to go way past insensitivity, but the judge just told her to suck it up. There must be more to this, I figured.
Sure enough. There is. She is a Mormon. Fair game. Crazy Christian sects get no protection, the Sonoma County judicial system seems to have said. Too bad Rebekah wasn’t being mercilessly teased for wearing a hijab in school. People would be in jail by now and the school system would be ponying up big bucks in defamation lawsuit awards.
