Talking Point #3

"Gayness, Multicultural Education, and Community"
Dennis Carlson

"The commonsence perspective on language is that words refer to or stand for things, so that it does not really matter what you call these things."
Carlson disagrees with this and feels that words represent things.  He thinks that the commonsenced person does not see all the meaning in words.

"Early in this century, the dismissal of gay teachers was legitimated as a way of keeping young people from being exposed to improper role models, lechery, and child molestation."
The fact that this used to happen in this country bothered me.  How can you assume that a gay person would do something like this just because they are gay?  Those people were horrible to think that way and stereotype all gays.

"For example, it is now estimated that up to one-third of all adolescent suicide victims are gay...."
The fact that some many young gay kids are committing suicide is eye opening.  I feel like these kids do not feel welcomed where they live and they may not be able to connect with anyone.  I also think that bullying could also be a reason for why these young kids are committing suicide.  They need to be treated fairly like everyone else. 

I found Carlson's document a little hard to read at times, but what i took away from it is that all people including gays have to be treated equally.  I feel like there is a problem with this in American today.  Young people need to learn about gay people at an early age and need to understand that there is nothing wrong with it.  This issue needs to be discussed in classrooms all over the U.S in order to try and fix the problem.  The fact that these people are looked at in bad terms by some people is wrong.  Their sexuality does not have anything to do with them being a good or bad person.