Is it Right for Private or Religious Schools to Kick Out Gay Students?

During the past year there have been many news items that involve gay students getting kicked out of school for being gay. Most of these schools that have done this are usually private or religious based. The most recent news item involves a young man attending a bishop school, and he got expelled because of his sexual orientation. His school found out his sexual orientation through myspace.com, and said that they expelled him because their school goes by higher moral standards then regular society. Is this school discriminating? Or just advocating their freedom of speech?

If this school were a public school they probably would get reprimanded for an uncalled for act like kicking out a student. However private schools take advantage at the fact that they believe they can set up there own rules on how students should behave morally and have justification for them. The truth of the matter is that any school that kicks out a student for their sexual orientation is discrimination. It would be the same thing if the school were to kick out a student for being black, or being another religion like Jewish or Atheist.
Schools have no say in which the students choose to be, that is just no their place. Schools are supposed to be an institution that educates, motivates, encourages, and teach understanding and equality. Students should be able to feel safe in a school environment and not harassed on who they are no matter what kind of school it is. There are many students that attend a school that is religiously based and is not of that religion. However, these students usually don’t get expelled for it.
So in the case of the gay student getting kicked out of school was it the school’s right to do so? The school may have thought they had the right to do a tasteless act but in a democratic society it is discrimination and a form of hatred. The concept of free speech is different from hate speech. This young student who was a honors student now has to start over just because he displayed who he was publicly.
It is sad to think that even in the year 2006 so much discrimination against sexual orientation is still happening, but one thing is for sure these generations of students aren’t going to tolerate it. People of all creeds including gays and lesbians should be able to be who they are in public and not get consequences for it. Hopefully this teen will win his case if he decides to take this to court. As for the school, maybe students at that campus will advocate that their school is being biased against homosexuals and protest. For that matter if any discrimination of any kind happens on any campus students should rally together because in great numbers they usually have the upper hand especially when the students are in the right of things. Only time will tell if things like homophobia or racism will ever disappear in our society, but when there is a lot of ignorance in our world things like that seem impossible.