to regret giving my dd a gay packed lunch?

[pointydog]

Dd1 (12) was off on a fun school trip today with a mix of kids from high school.

I suggested a few things for her packed lunch this morning and she went off happily with a peanut butter sandwich, a fruitus bar, a kitkat, some dried apricots, a tub of home-made muesli and a bag of chipsticks.

The tuff kids laughed at her lunch - snorting particularly loudly at the apricots - and called it gay.

I feel like the mum in About A Boy.

when kids say gay it's the same as when mners call things poncey or wanky, or even wnaky if you're a fish. it does not mean the apricots are homosexual. the same as nice ham is not homosexual and storage baskets are not masturabtory.

LG..there will always be prejudices against homosexuals, just like there are with certain other groups of society...you will never eradicate prejudice completely...alot of it is to do with religious beliefs.

As far as I have experienced almost every secondary school is taking homophobic bullying (including the use of the word gay as an insult) extremely seriously, i.e. at the same level as racist bullying.
My tack is to challenge the person using the insult by asking them if the thing hey are calling gay is having sexual intercourse with other things of it's own gender. E.g. "Really, Simon's shoes are gay? Have you seen Simon's shoes having sexual intercourse with other shoes of the same sex? That's strange." Kids usually dumbfounded and shut up. If a kid calls another kid gay as an insult I would usually take the same line, get the offending kid out of class, ask him if he understands what gay means, ask if they have ever seen said child actually having sex with someone of the same sex (answer always no). Then ask the offending kid if they are gay themselves (always a defensive "no"),finish the conversation with: "Good, then you never ever have to concern yourself about whether someone else is gay ever again in your life do you?" Shuts them up.

I have yet to be able to overcome the view from large groups of boys that "black men can't be gay." I even did a whole lesson on this issue (Stephen K Amos' programme Batty Man, is really good), but was met with the smart reply that Justin Fashanu was adopted by white people and they "made him gay."

had this with DS last year. called something gay to mean lame or stupid. i explained what gay meant, and that to use it is an insult made him look very silly. have picked his friends up on it. and their use of other words i find inappropriate / offensive.

far better than throwing your hands up in the air and saying there is no point as there will always be prejudice. i think a zero tolerance policy on things like this is better

appreciate language changes and develops, but does not mean that a word describing sexuality should become synonymous with lame/silly or whatever.

It's not the same as saying something is poncey or wanky, those are about something you choose, not something that people intrinsically are. It's more like saying something is spastic. Which I also wouldn't tolerate as an insult.

It may be true that some people will always be homophobic, and maybe racist, sexist, disablist, and so on. But I don't tolerate such attitudes among my friends (I don't have friends with these attitudes), or at work (would challenge people) or among my children or visiting children.

Why do parents collude with children using this term in a derogatory way? I always challenge it, being gay is not being a second class citizen or in any way 'worse' than anyone or anything else.

If everyone including schools and parents challenged this it would do some awareness raising and emphasise that being different is not wrong. But that would take some thought and some effort wouldn't so let's not bother.

I'm very cross about this.

bullying

PS I only saw page one and went into ranty mood, sorry blame the menopause.

It's what I think though and I'm so glad other people find it objectionable too.

I do not think 'gay' being used as a synonym for 'naff' is acceptable, and I won't have it used like that in our house, because I don't want DD to feel that there is anything wrong with being gay, because what if she is gay? I don't want my baby feeling bad about herself, or feeling that if she comes out to us it would be a big thing that would change/strain our relationship. For several people I know, 'how will I tell my parents?' and the worry about disappointing them or letting them down by being gay has been a really traumatic and distancing thing. And I think in many cases these views on parental attitudes are deduced from throwaway comments, and things like letting 'gay = naff' go uncorrected.

Yes, there will always be prejudiced people but then there will always be ignorant people. I'd like to hope I can do my bit to avoid DD growing up to be ignorant.

Agree BoM, never allowed any of that crap here and been very glad as ds1 (9) told me a while back he thinks he is gay

gay is not an insult it's just a definition of sexual behaviour

I have worked in a secondary school and the word "gay" is used as an insult frequently.

I don't care how many times people say "oh nowadays it just means lame, dorky, naff etc" you can tell it doesn't just mean that - it means lame, dorky, naff and homosexual. It is usually followed up by other references to gay practices.

When I'd would intervene and tell the child saying this to pack it in, I'd get:

"There's nothing wrong with being gay, miss. I wasn't being nasty," in a sanctimonious tone.

The next step for me is to point out that of course there is nothing wrong with being gay, but they were using the word as an insult. This then makes it look as if I am agreeing with them that the person they are picking on is gay, which if they were unhappy about being called that, is far from helpful. And all this is while a lesson is trying to take place.

I think some kids have learned that they are not allowed to express homophobia, but they still have homophobia, so they have found a way of insulting people which is very difficult to put a stop to.

BS..why do you think that is?...because when i was at school no one was ever called gay....it seems to have got worse

'gay' seems to be the insult du jour round our way as well.
I think it's awful and have told my boys if they ever utter gay as an insult they'll be grounded for life...

I think at best it's a lazy term and at worst, it's offensive. It's reminiscent of the level of wit used in the execreble 'Two Pints of Lager and a Packet of Crisps' depicting lowly educated characters and the 'comedy' of the dead end situation they've found themselves in.

At the core of it, is homophobia. No child who feels straight (and you know from an early age) wants to be called gay so it becomes an easy form of abuse. I'd rather Oscar Wilde than a dullard.

maybe it's more a boy thing then...i went to an all girls school.

'gay" is one of the few banned words in my house. And before someone say it's no use banning it because they will still use it out of the house - I know they will, but I want them to know that it is unacceptable, and that some people are prepared to make a stand about it.

For the record, some of the other banned words are'spazz' "crip' and 'slag'. I bet people don't say it's no use trying to stop children using those words because they are just part of their everyday vocabulary and their meanings have changed!

"BS..why do you think that is?...because when i was at school no one was ever called gay....it seems to have got worse " - well I don't know how old you are DP, probably older than me (most people are) but as I said, homophobia used to be acceptable and if you said someone was gay, or lesbian, the teacher would presume you were insulting them badly, and been down on you like a ton of bricks.

Now if the teacher presumes someone is being insulted by being called gay or lesbian, that teacher implicitly looks homophobic. therefore "gay" has been allowed to grow into a catch-all insult kids can get away with.

Do you allow it in the context of homosexuality, seeker?

eg in the sentence "John Barrowman is gay." < sob at writing that >

Might I suggest that no-one engages with daft punk on this subject - it's a bit of a blind spot with her.

I went to an all girls school too and we never used it. My cousins and brothers of friends didn't use it either. At a certain age, 13/14yrs of age,(?)a child surely becomes more culturally aware and realises that a raft of the coolest musicians, writers, artists & designers are gay and they seem to be having a lot of fun. Is it an inverted envy of creative energy or is that taking it too far? In my schooldays, Rupert Everett was swooned over by girls and boys alike, even the straight ones