Discrimination is Not a Choice: No on VTommi Avicolli-Meccabyline‚ Oct. 30‚ 2008A little over ten years ago, the San Francisco School Board stopped allowing the local Boy Scouts to use free meeting space in the schools because it had a stated policy of discrimination against our LGBT community. Two years ago, the School Board voted to phase out JROTC, the military recruitment program that targets students as young as 14. Under state mandate, it removed P.E. credit for the program, which has led to a great reduction in the number of students who want to take JROTC. The phase-out effort was led by Mark Sanchez, an out gay man who is president of the School Board. His reasoning was simple: JROTC is a program of a homophobic military. Instructors who teach in the JROTC program cannot be out of the closet. LGBT JROTC graduates are denied enlistment at a higher grade, eligibility for scholarships, and nomination to military academies. LGBT students have no choice: They must remain in the closet or face discrimination. |