A California school district recently adopted a new tolerance curriculum which includes a book, “And Tango makes Three”. The story — about gay penguins, is geared towards Kindergartners. The curriculum is being billed as age appropriate and claims to teach tolerance about human differences and helps to thwart bullying. The curriculum changes in every grade to correlate with grade level, eventually challenging what children may consider the “normal” family. Every few years the “Gay Penguin” debate resurfaces as parents and school administrators struggle for authority over whether this instruction can be mandated by school officials or if parents have the right to a) know about it and b) opt their children out of it if they deem the material to be inappropriate.

The additional controversy taking place in California is that parents aren’t able to opt their children out leaving parents to challenge the school district with threats of law suits.

According to World Net Daily, the parents claim the California school district is violating federal law, under the following regulations:

Under the regulation, parents must be notified and given an opportunity to opt-out, if the evaluation addresses topics such as:

* Political affiliations or beliefs of the student or the student’s parent;

* sex behavior or attitudes;

* religious practices, affiliations, or beliefs of the student or student’s parent, etc.

In the past, debates have centered around this “opt out” policy which allows parents the option — to have their children pulled out of controversial subjects, especially in earlier grade levels.

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Recently I stumbled upon a parenting debate about whether or not parents would take their children to “Gay Day” at Disney World. Although “Gay Day” isn’t an officially sponsored event, it is an organized one. In case you’re not familiar with it, one day out of the year gay couples, with or without children, go to Disney World to experience the park as the majority.

What caught my eye was the following comment on pregnancy.org:

So now you understand why there is a need for “gay day”…’cause every other day is “hetero day” at Disney World (and everywhere else), and it’s tough to have everything catered to another group’s interests. Doesn’t feel so good when you don’t see your family and your own family values widely represented, does it?

That statement seemed so ridiculous to me. Why does anyone’s and everyone’s interests have to be widely represented anyway? My question has nothing to do with whether or not I “agree” with the “gay lifestyle”. I couldn’t care less about that.

For some reason, this reminds me of the times when I’ve been in the minority. At one of my past jobs, I went looking for a daycare for my older son who was about 3 years old at the time. Lucky for me, there was a Montessori across the street. How convenient was that? So, I made an appointment to take a tour and given that the company was located smack dab in the middle of “Korean Town”, all the children and staff were Korean. I’m not exaggerating. There was not one other ethnicity represented besides Korean.

I kept an open mind looking at Korean lesson plans on the teacher’s desks and when I received an awkward outsider reception from the Administrator. As convenient as it might have been, I decided against sending him there. I didn’t want my son to feel like the odd kid out if I didn’t have to. I also saw no reason to submerge into a culture at 3 years old that he would likely not appreciate or understand. Granted, kids are resilient and he would have adapted, and probably learned some interesting differences, but I would have preferred a more diverse group. It had nothing to do with hate or racism or prejudice, but of cultural comfort. That is why a Korean Montessori exists to begin with — in order to find that comfort and simpatico and preserve a unique culture.

My point being, the commenters accusing those who don’t want to go to “Gay Day” as hateful and ignorant, aren’t they contradicting themselves when they point out that gay couples don’t want to have to always conform to the interests of straight people and the majority?

Human nature dictates that people like to be around people like them, even those who are the most accepting and tolerant people in the world.

I have to wonder if the people accusing others of being hateful have made a point to live in an area outside their own race and common interests? I’m sure the answer is no.