A Los Angeles teenager has been thrust into the centre of a media circus after classmates controversially voted for him to receive the signal honour of being crowned as his high school "prom queen".Click through for the whole article.
Sergio Garcia, 18, said he felt "invincible" when he won the contest, which saw him handed a tiara and invited to kick-start proceedings at last Saturday's event by dancing with the male pupil who had been voted "king" by the school's student body.
"At one time, prom may have been a big popularity contest where the best looking guy and girl were crowned. But things have changed," Mr Garcia told reporters...
...The decision by students at Fairfax High School in West Hollywood to choose Mr Garcia over his eight female rivals has drawn praise and outrage in equal measure.
Supporters of gay rights said that his story proved that young Americans took a progressive view on contentious issues like gay marriage, on which California's Supreme Court confirmed a ban this week.
"This indicates where society is at right now," said Virginia Uribe, who runs Fairfax High's support group for gay and lesbian students. "Gender bending is just kind of in."
Many inhabitants of Middle America criticised the move and reacted angrily to the flurry of subsequent newspaper and TV news reports.
"It's just sickening," read a typical comment on the USA Today website.
"When I was in high school, the prom Queen was the prettiest girl in the freekin' school and the King was the captain of the football team. That's the way it should be. This school should have police tape around it: 'Crime Scene'."
Anyone else thinking of the prom in Mean Girls?
2 comments:
"When I was in high school, the prom Queen was the prettiest girl in the freekin' school and the King was the captain of the football team. That's the way it should be."
Some competition that would be! I never cease to be amazed how many people really think it's a good thing for crap like that to be perpetuated.
A "crime scene"?? I still find it difficult to get my head around how people can have such a strong reaction against this kind of thing, every now and again I think, 'hey, society's changing, we're becoming more accepting' and then there's something like the comments that are written in response to this. I don't understand how this could possibly offend someone to the point of saying it should not be lawful.
I work with youth and have recently become aware of many schools in my area not allowing people to take same-sex partners to their formals and balls, or having vastly different policies for different-sex partners than same-sex ones. I guess when intolerance is so systemic it makes it hard for people to see the harm it causes; for straight and queer people alike.
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