People they come together/people they fall apart
Two graduation stories.
So there’s this kid named Thomas Benya. He’s a Native American. At his graduation from high school last week, he chose to wear a braided bolo tie beneath his gown.
This was intended as a subtle tribute to his heritage. Seems appropriate and tasteful enough to me: In no way intrudes on anyone else’s graduation experience (like say, a public prayer would), and makes a quiet statement.
Well, administrators at his school didn’t see it that way. They denied him his diploma on a dress-code violation.
Ah, but there’s good news tonight. Via DED Space:
Someone painted God Hates Fags on the school rock at Howell High School, and a graduating student, Shayla Kamiliar, got her friends together to paint over the hate graffiti. They spray-painted the rock, then wrote Love all over a number of pieces of school property. They have been accused of vandalism (which is, of course, what they perpetrated, in the form of civil disobedience), suspended from class, and barred from the graduation ceremony.
That, of course, is not the heartwarming bit. You want to know the heartwarming bit?
More than two hundred students protested the punishment, and one of the parents decided to put together a backyard ceremony for the group’s three graduating seniors. That ceremony has now been moved to a football field. A teacher will address the three graduates and their friends, the valedictorian will come by and give his speech again, and the superintendent is making sure the grads have caps and gowns.
Nothing can stop us now/Cause we are all made of stars….
