Girl Taken Out Of Christian School; Told She's Too Boylike

[Jana814]

I had that happen to me in first grade back in 1983-84 and this was in public school in Delaware. Only my first grade teacher usually called kids who didn't go to church or at least Sunday school (and I was one of them) unclean and sinful.

That's also insane. How was the teacher able to get away w/ saying that.

[ILoveJellybeans]

:wtf: I would be fit to be tied. i was fit to be tied when i found out that my niece's teacher called her a heathen and told her she need to go to church. Full public school. She was 7yrs old :pull-hair:

Seriously?????? That's horrible.

How can a three year old be a lesbian. No three year old is anything, they are three.

[Chowder Head]

That's also insane. How was the teacher able to get away w/ saying that.

[TMS]

This little girl reminded me a lot of myself when I was a kid. I would have been kicked out of that school too! When I was her age, I actually *wanted* to be a boy - the reason being that I simply loved doing "boy things" - it wasn't really a gender identity thing. As someone else mentioned, it just seemed that boys got to do the cool stuff, play with the cool toys, and wear the most comfortable clothes. I hated long hair and my mom let me wear mine in a pixie cut. I refused to wear dresses and instead wore jeans and tee shirts. I played outside all the time. I climbed trees, rode bikes, played ball - and yes, played in the mud (my parents even have a pic of me at about age 7, with two of my male friends playing in a mud puddle in front of our house - and having a blast). My best friends were boys. I remember getting invited to a girl's birthday party in 2nd grade and it was horrible. The girls sat around playing with Barbies while I sat on the couch watching the clock until my mom would come pick me up. People who didn't know me thought I was a boy and I didn't care. When I reached puberty something happened (hormones?? lol) and no longer wanted to be a boy. I am perfectly happy being a woman, wife, and mother today. However, I am thankful my parents just let me be "me" when I was a kid and never worried about it!

This kid's grandparents are awesome!

[EmmieJ]

I'm sorry that her grandparents still enrolled her in that school when five years ago (when she was only 3), teachers were already warning the grandmother about the child's supposed lesbianism. That would have turned me off to the school completely to begin with.

However, glad they finally saw the light - although it sure took them a long time. Their granddaughter was bullied by the teachers and yet they kept her in the school? *shaking my head*

Anyway, at least now she's in a different and hopefully more civil and accepting environment.

Amazing that the school administrators, teachers and many of the parents who are probably in full agreement, consider themselves good christians.

[Trynn]

Meh, I had a teacher make fun of my Tourette's syndrome and my parents didn't care.

And they still wonder what it was about seventh day Adventist schools that I HATED.

[2xx1xy1JD]

Seriously?????? That's horrible.

How can a three year old be a lesbian. No three year old is anything, they are three.

WTF?????

Someone has issues here, and it ain't this child. Who even thinks about a question like that with a child of THREE?

[Ralar]

Seriously?????? That's horrible.

How can a three year old be a lesbian. No three year old is anything, they are three.

I just read an article about a woman in Oregon who murdered her 4-year-old son because she thought he was gay.

Her son was going to be gay, she wrote in a FB message to her boyfriend, using a slur. “He walks and talks like it. Ugh.â€

http://www.oregonlive.com/tigard/index.ssf/2014/03/jessica_dutro_murder_trial_mot.html

[Hane]

So sad that these people think there's only one way to be a girl.

Back in the mid -1970s, I substitute-taught at a middle school. Many of the kids had medium-length layered haircuts and wore straight-leg jeans, plaid flannel shirts with tees, and athletic shoes, regardless of their sex. Lots of them looked completely androgynous. I swear, there were more than a few I couldn't definitively identify as male or female. BUT NO ONE'S HEAD EXPLODED.

Why is this such a big damn deal to that school? IIRC, they have no skirts-only uniform policy or hair-length requirements for girls.

[NjoyingNsanity]

My grandparents raised me too, and I'm going to go out on a limb here and assume that these grandparents thought the way mine did and and figured a Christian school would be safer. I think my grandparent thought they had failed at raising my dad, and they were going to do things very differently with me. They looked into the at that time (early 1980's) only Christian school in our hometown. When they told my grandmother that for me to attend she would have to give up wearing pants, even in her own home she told them where they could stick their legalistic, self-righteous views, and promptly enrolled me in public school.

There are now roughly half a dozen religious schools in the area ran by various churches, and most of them are scary strict, and outrageously expensive. When one of them first opened I thought about using their pre-school for my son. It was close to my work and my dad's house, so the location would have been convenient. It was over a hundred dollars a week. They did not provide meals, you had to pack everyday. They had a whole list of things you weren't allowed to pack. You had to buy all your child's books and classroom supplies. You couldn't just go to Wal-mart and buy a pack of crayons either. You had to buy them from the school, and they wanted over five dollars for a ten crayon box of the big kindergarten crayons. You had to buy the worksheets and art project they would be doing in class as well. Your kid would be punished if they came to class without all the "approved" supplies. The dress code was so strict they even had rules about what brands of shoes the kids could wear, no name brands, no cartoon characters, only certain colors allowed. Boys could wear blue, brown, black, dark green, dark red and orange. Girls could wear pink white, purple or anything pastel. They measured the length of your kid's hair. Boys hair could be no longer than above their ears, and a buzz cut was preferred. Girl's hair had to be at least four inches past their shoulders. If the crazy rules, and nickle and dimed to death policies hadn't sent me running for the door, working mothers and single moms were turned away as living immoral lives not in line with the school's Christian values.

[FloraKitty35]

That's also insane. How was the teacher able to get away w/ saying that.

She had tenure and would have screamed racial discrimination along with that, too. Also, several of the parents thought that it was a good thing. Her sister (who I didn't have) taught 2nd grade at the same school was an even bigger fundie whack job.

[Flossie]

NjoyingNsanity said, when referring to a religion-based pre-school she checked out:

If the crazy rules, and nickel and dimed to death policies hadn't sent me running for the door, working mothers and single moms were turned away as living immoral lives not in line with the school's Christian values.

I think your child is better off not having to attend such a place. It sounds like a terrible scam, but at least they were only scamming wealthy people who presumably agreed with the pre-school's 'values'.

[nerdbox]

The school my 10 and 6 yrold boys attend teaches a fundie curriculum and has a strict dress code in place, but the part of town its in is mostly lower class and at least 75% of students are there through vouchers, including mine. There is no cafeteria, students must brown-bag, gym is held off-campus at a local high school, no bus service, prek-8th grade with only 96 students. I was sold on the class sizes, and my boys, despite their special needs, are regulars on the honor board.

My oldest son has hair to die for: straight golden blonde and very thick. He likes to wear it long, it is almost to his bottom now. School dress code mandates boys hair be above the tips of the ears and off the collar, so he wears it in a bun (more like a half assed pony tail) at school. He gets his gender questioned often, but because he is so easy going and never gets pressed over the mistake, he is rarely ever harassed. Most push back he experiences comes from the jealous girls in his class; they challenge him by saying their hair is way longer (its so not) but are the first to jump all over him if he has his hair down, like "Imma tell if you dont put your hair up! You gonna get in tttrrrooouuubbbblllleeee!" Besides not liking to get dirty, he is an average boy; nothing about him is effeminate.

I've never considered the school kicking him out. This article has me kinda worried now.

[moodygirl86]

The school my 10 and 6 yrold boys attend teaches a fundie curriculum and has a strict dress code in place, but the part of town its in is mostly lower class and at least 75% of students are there through vouchers, including mine. There is no cafeteria, students must brown-bag, gym is held off-campus at a local high school, no bus service, prek-8th grade with only 96 students. I was sold on the class sizes, and my boys, despite their special needs, are regulars on the honor board.

My oldest son has hair to die for: straight golden blonde and very thick. He likes to wear it long, it is almost to his bottom now. School dress code mandates boys hair be above the tips of the ears and off the collar, so he wears it in a bun (more like a half assed pony tail) at school. He gets his gender questioned often, but because he is so easy going and never gets pressed over the mistake, he is rarely ever harassed. Most push back he experiences comes from the jealous girls in his class; they challenge him by saying their hair is way longer (its so not) but are the first to jump all over him if he has his hair down, like "Imma tell if you dont put your hair up! You gonna get in tttrrrooouuubbbblllleeee!" Besides not liking to get dirty, he is an average boy; nothing about him is effeminate.

I've never considered the school kicking him out. This article has me kinda worried now.

Your son sounds like he can handle himself, but if he gets any major trouble off the staff, tell them Jesus had long hair.

[Marian the Librarian]

From the Spokane Spokesman-Review article about Sunnie (bolding mine):

Sunnie’s troubles at Timberlake began in pre-kindergarten after she cut her hair to donate it to a program that provides wigs for cancer patients, Doris Thompson said. Around then, she started wanting boys’ clothes.

“A teacher told me I was the parent and I needed to control her, and if she didn’t obey I needed to take her in the bathroom and whip her butt,†Thompson said.

Rather than just dismiss the teacher’s concerns, she asked the family doctor for advice. “He said, ‘Leave that child alone!’ †she said.

Afterward, Thompson said, the teacher told her: “You need to find a Christian doctor.â€

Yeah, that's just the kind of Christian school all little kids should attend. "Whip their butts" if they don't conform, and find a Christian doctor, because they're ever so much more qualified to recommend corporal punishment, don'tcha know.

It's no bloody wonder Jesus wept.

One million blessings and all good thoughts to those great-grandparents, for loving and accepting that little girl just as she is, and for protecting her from those utter morons.

spokesman.com/stories/2014/mar/30/christian-school-pressured-tomboy-not-to-come-back/