Groundspark

Debra Chasnoff was on the Laura Ingraham show on May 19th where she debated Brad Dacus of the Pacific Justice Institute about the Alameda School District’s plan to include sexual orientation non-discrimination in their anti-bullying programs.

Chasnoff stated, “Anti-gay harassment is increasingly contributing to some of the worst cases of bullying and of mental health problems in schools. I just want to say really really clearly, I applaud the school district in Alameda for taking pro-active action because in the last month alone there have been two children…who hung themselves in their own closets at home because of suffering from anti-gay bullying that the schools were doing nothing about.”

In response to Vallejo Unified’s settlement of a lawsuit about anti-LGBT harassment, the Angie Coiro show is going to be talking about safe schools litigation tonight. On the show from 6:30-6:50ish will be Lance from Straightlaced, who filed his own lawsuit. He will be talking about his own experiences as well as Straightlaced.

You can listen live at http://www.green960.com/pages/tgs.html.

News from around the world that directly connects to the issues GroundSpark works on in our Respect for All Project!

This week is a special news roundup featuring the latest blog post from Kate Kendell, Executive Director of the National Center for Lesbian Rights, regarding yet another tragic suicide of a young person due to bullying.
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Straightlaced director Debra Chasnoff and producer Sue Chen were interviewed by the San Francisco Chronicle this week about the film and the upcoming East Bay premiere in Oakland.

Read on for the article or click here to visit the Chronicle’s website.

Director Debra Chasnoff (left) and Producer Sue Chen (right)

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News from around the world that directly connects to the issues GroundSpark works on in our Respect for All Project!

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Our perspective on the recent spate of suicides committed by young people as a result of bullying is featured on the Huffington Post and on Facing History, Facing Today. In this article we discuss why these tragedies are occurring, and what schools can do to become part of the solution.

This week another young life was silently lost in our nation’s schools. Eleven year-old Carl Joseph Walker-Hoover killed himself after enduring months of anti-gay bullying at his school in Springfield, Massachusetts.

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Our op ed got published in the Huffington Post about the Eric Mohat suicide, Matthew Shepard and Straightlaced.

Here’s a link to the page on the Huffington Post, or you can read it below:

On Wednesday, 250 educators and students from Laramie, Wyoming opened the 10th Matthew Shepard Symposium for Social Justice by watching the film Straightlaced? How Gender’s Got Us All Tied Up. Before the screening, a reporter asked me how today’s climate has changed since Matthew’s brutal murder in 1998. “It’s deceptive,” I said. “We see gay characters on TV regularly now, but after spending five years interviewing teenagers about their experiences with gender-based stereotypes, I’ve learned that popular culture doesn’t necessarily translate into school climates improving around this issue.”

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