Hawaii Parents Protest School's Plan to Show Pro-Homosexual Video to Kids
by Jim Brown
June 3, 2005
(AgapePress) - Today, a high school in Hawaii plans to show students a video that promotes homosexuality as normal and natural, a decision made despite the fact that several parents have raised objections to school administrators over the film's content and message.
Officials at King Kekaulike High School on the island of Maui say they intend to show the film It's Elementary as a way to teach tolerance toward homosexuals. However, several parents are opposed to the school's plan to show the film in isolation, saying it not only legitimizes homosexual lifestyles but also denies that ex-homosexuals exist.
In addition to proceeding with plans to show the controversial film, the school administrators also ignored a simple request from parents that another video called I Do Exist be shown to supplement It's Elementary. Featured in I Do Exist is a man who, as a teen, was interviewed for the other film but who has since left the homosexual lifestyle.
Estelle Wilkerson is a member of the group of concerned parents who raised objections over the school's planned showing of the pro-homosexual film. "We expressed our opinion," she says. "We offered another option. We even offered to come up with a committee that could be at the schools to supervise and help, like a security team of parents, just so that this harassment that, as you say, is happening on campus will stop, if in fact it is -- at least to the extent that they are making it seem [so that] it warrants this film."
However, since the school appears to have swept the parents concerns aside and is proceeding with the showing of It's Elementary to the students. Wilkerson admits that she and the other parents in the group are "feeling a little frustrated." The reason, she notes, is because, "when we're at the meetings, they express how wonderful it is for parents to be [involved] and how much they appreciate our presence and our concern," she says. However, the Maui mom adds, "Obviously, our opinion and what we have to say is unimportant, because we're still having this film."
The protesting parents feel the film scheduled for screening at King Kekaulike High School is both one-sided and outdated, since it features a homosexual teen who is now an adult and no longer involved in homosexual activity and also ignores the existence of former homosexuals like him. The parents group is concerned that by showing It's Elementary without the balancing perspective of a documentary like I Do Exist, the school will be presenting students with an incomplete and decidedly one-sided view of homosexuality.
Jim Brown, a regular contributor to AgapePress, is a reporter for American Family Radio News, which can be heard online.
