Women's Rights Employment Law Blog

Dignity For All Students Act "authorizes the commissioner of education to establish policies and procedures affording all students in public schools an environment free of harassment and discrimination based on actual or perceived race, national origin, ethnic group, religion, disability, sexual orientation, gender or sex."

Such texts by no means sound anti-democratic. Quite the contrary, they sound just as healthy for students—the future citizens—as anything ever can be. Anti-discriminatory legislations in the 21st century should not spring surprises for the oldest democracy in the world.

And yet, someone sees red at this. Mayor Bloomberg has an issue with the proposal, and that’s the reason why despite having been passed in the Assembly for over three years now, it stands rejected as a force (the Mayor had in fact gone ahead to exercise his veto power in order to stall it). On the other hand, the Empire State Pride Agenda has called for people’s active participation in favoring the proposed law.

What’s at stake?
Researches indicate that a large number of people who engage in high-risk behaviors like drug use, alcohol abuse, and suicide have been drop-out students who were harassed and stigmatized owing to hostile school atmosphere. The DASA bill is crucial at this juncture to check that students do not fall victims to discriminations at their early years in manners that may continue to haunt their perception in a long run.

The GLSEN’s National Climate Survey reveals the following significant findings:

90% of students attending public schools in New York report hearing homophobic remarks frequently or often in their schools.

64.8% of New York students reported feeling unsafe at their schools based on their sexual orientation and 29.7% based on their gender identity/ expression.

31.4% of students in New York report missing one or more days of school in the past month because they felt unsafe.

Students who did not have (or did not know of) a policy protecting them from violence and harassment were nearly 40% more likely to skip school than those who did.

Hostile school environments for students have resulted in Post Traumatic Stress Disorder for students. In fact, according to another study conducted at the University of Minnesota, 160,000 youth skip school each day out of fear of being harassed. Likewise, the National Institute of Justice mentions that the primary reason why students bring weapons to school is for protection against bullies.

Similarly, a survey that was conducted for the Massachusetts Governor’s Commission on Gay and Lesbian Youth had found that homosexual students, or those perceived to be gay, have a 20% higher high school dropout rate, contend with a 50% risk of being rejected by their families, while 42% of participants in the survey stated that they were homeless or had been “thrown away” by their families.

Interestingly, the aforesaid Commission was recently abolished (only last month) much to the dismay of the LGBT activists, after its 14 year run as the country’s first such commission to focus on harassments faced by gay and lesbian youths.

What’s politics got to do with safe space?

Everything. Students who face discrimination owing to their sexual orientations are more likely to grow up either suppressing this knowledge much to the delight of the conservatives, or in cognizance of their limitations to express themselves in defiance of state power wrath—much like the tradition has been for the LGBT communities in this country since the Stonewall revolution was oppressed.

Senator Thomas K. Duane (D WFP Manhattan) who first introduced DASA is entirely clueless about the reasons behind Senate Republicans’ opposition to it. Although DASA has received full support of Senate Democrats, not one Senate Republican has sponsored the bill. “I can only guess at the reasons why my Republican colleagues do not want to see this bill pass. Is it the fact that it offers protection from harassment for students based on their gender identity and expression? Until we have a floor debate and vote, I’ll never really know.”

One never knows what’s with the Republicans’ minds, considering that it’s already past thousands of years since human civilization was supposed to have established itself firmly, and also considering that the leader of Republicans apparently heads the most glorified civilization of the present era—and yet these people still practice such pre-history reactionary theories.

Not losing all hopes, we tried to dig little bit further. And here is what appears to be the case: a populist reactionary dismissal of progressive stances by citing the all powerful dollar.

Republican Daniel L. Hooker (R-127th Assembly district) blames it on his interest to save the tax money (after all, a war on Iran sounds inevitable). Let’s not waste the local school tax dollars that we have, he says, for “things like the jazz band and the girls basketball team and into teaching five year old kindergartners about sexuality”. Hooker, also a military reservist, emphatically stresses while discussing the Dignity for All Students Act.

Black musicians, women players, and LGBT communities. Political attacks of such direct nature smacking of racism, and sexism are rare. And have the conservatives stopped from declaring the minority groups as illegal too? Look back at Mayor Bloomberg whose administration says an attempt to protect students from discriminations is actually illegal. “DASA is an illegal bill”. This is an unedited official quote.

So who are we trying to convince about the bill, again?