02/19/2008
TN House Committee Kills Homophobic Campfield School Bill
A bill proposed by state Rep. Stacey Campfield that would have prohibited any discussion of homosexuality in elementary middle schools today was killed when a motion that the bill be sent to the State Department of Education was approved by a voice vote.
The Knoxville News reports: "Campfield said the ban is needed to leave parents in charge of what their children learn about sexuality. The legislators has heard reports from parents of homosexuality discussions being conducted in schools - one in Knox County and one in Sevier County - though he declined to name them, saying the reports were not verified."
Before the vote occurred, several speakers representing the Tennessee Education Association, the American Civil Liberties Union and the state Department of Education spoke out against it:
"Basically, they said it is not needed and puts the Legislature in the business of dictating school curriculum - decisions best left to the State Board of Education. Hedy Weinberg of the ACLU also said the measure 'a clear attack on one community, the lesbian and gay community.'"
House subcommittee kills Campfield bill banning homosexual discussion [knoxville news]
Sphere: Related ContentPosted 5:15 PM EST by Andy in Education, News, Tennessee | Permalink
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except that some parents are completely void of any idea of how to parent their children. if they don't have the guts to talk to their kids about shutting the fuck up on the subway they won't have the guts to tell their kids about boys liking other boys sometimes.
Posted by: ian | Feb 19, 2008 5:27:29 PM
Just from the looks of Campfield, I'd bet he's a self hating closet case!
Posted by: Bojo | Feb 19, 2008 5:33:56 PM
Now we'll send 100 leather daddies in assless chaps to the local highs schools to teach impressionable teens about the gag reflex.
Yeah, right. Whatever.
Campfield is a bigoted anti-gay asshat and it looks like even Tennessee knows it.
Posted by: FASTLAD | Feb 19, 2008 5:36:30 PM
i've attached a link to an exchange of communication between rep. campfield & a college student. you will see that not only is campfield a total tool, but that he's barely literate as well.
http://web.utk.edu/~jfish/Campfield%20Letters.pdf
Posted by: alguien | Feb 19, 2008 5:53:34 PM
Oh, I think we've seen what happens when parents are left in charge of educating their children in regards to sexuality. Particularly in Tennessee, the educational system should be taking that responsibility away from the incompetent parents.
Posted by: Iko | Feb 19, 2008 6:24:55 PM
As a Tennessean, I am ecstatic to see this bigoted, utterly useless bill wither and die on the vine. The Tennessee Equality Project deserves a lot of the credit in getting the word out and rallying the troops. Happy day!
Posted by: Brian 5 | Feb 19, 2008 6:34:45 PM
I give her two years max before she makes the cover of her local paper for being arrested in a bathroom stall or park or for soliciting a male prostitute or trying to pick up an under-aged boy online.
Posted by: Zeke | Feb 19, 2008 7:02:10 PM
Hahaha. What a failure Stacey Campfield is as a public official! He's accomplished nothing in his position and the quick defeat of this invalid and obscenely outdated proposal has just drawn attention to his empty career.
Posted by: MATT S | Feb 19, 2008 8:05:09 PM
Zeke, you may be right! Me thinks he does protest to much. He also wanted the state of Tennessee to issue death certificates to aborted babies. Now we all know that I am anti-abortion, but death certificates are a little much! Campfield is really out there! He was cordial in his response to my email though. However, he is out there none the less!!!!
Posted by: RB | Feb 19, 2008 8:37:30 PM
Tough talk from a man named "Stacy."
Posted by: KC | Feb 20, 2008 2:10:23 AM
Tough talk from a man named "Stacy."
Posted by: KC | Feb 20, 2008 2:11:11 AM
This guy spends alot of time thinking about homo sex. Probably more than me, and that's saying something!
Posted by: JJ | Feb 20, 2008 9:04:16 AM
I phoned Rep. Canfield's office last week to inform them of the hate crime murder of a gay teen in Southern California and to make the connection for them--since they weren't about to make it themselves--between that violence and the hostile environment in schools that Canfield's bill would encourage. It was a somewhat frustrating conversation. For starters, they were astonished that someone was calling all the way from California, and it never occurred to them that the word "ignore" (which is what they want to do about homosexuality) is the root of the word "ignorance," or that some of their students are already LGBT. Glad to see the bill failed.
Posted by: Andy G. | Feb 20, 2008 9:32:14 AM
Oops! Campfield--sorry. Insufficient caffeination is to blame.
Posted by: Andy G. | Feb 20, 2008 9:35:24 AM
Interestingly, the TN GOP leadership apparently have no use for Campfield either, going so far as to tacitly support primary challenges in 2006 and again this year. There's a nascent grassroots effort to get rid of him here in TN. Completely useless legislator(not one of the 40 bills he's sponsored has passed in 4 years) but does constant constituent work, so the voters of his district think he's "one of them," honest, etc. He's been able to frame the debate against his challengers as a machine ganging up on a little guy like him.
He even rebounded from the revelation during the 2006 campaign that he rented a room in his house to a convicted sex offender.
How is it that some guys are just Teflon no matter how badly they fuck up?
Posted by: Clay | Apr 25, 2008 3:28:35 PM