Of course homosexuality is a right. You're allowed to express yourself however you choose to underneath the basic rights given to use by the Constitution. This might also leave you to believe that homosexuality is a choice... But let me make this clear. It's not. Honestly, who would CHOOSE to be persecuted? The American Psychological Association (APA) asserts that sexual orientation is not a choice. Don't take my word for it... Take theirs.
http://www.apa.org/helpcenter/sexual-orientation.aspx
Third Heading "Is Sexual Orientation a Choice?"
"No, human beings cannot choose to be either gay or straight. For most people, sexual orientation emerges in early adolescence without any prior sexual experience. Although we can choose whether to act on our feelings, psychologists do not consider sexual orientation to be a conscious choice that can be voluntarily changed."

Actually, go ahead and read the entire page. Especially about how homosexuality isn't a mental illness or emotional problem. Oh and how important it is for people like you to stop spreading negative stigmas about homosexuality; it only creates prejudice.

By the moment you said "Atheist", you have exposed yourself as one of those fundementalist, fanatic american christians who happen to be racistic, homophobic, and mostly also chauvinistic. And in fact believes in the existance of a supernatural, omnimpotent cosmic being who cares for nothing but with whom his neighbour sleeps with. Not someone whom's opinion should be taken very seriously.

Now seriously, if you claim Homosexuality is perversion, would you mind to find an objective, reasonable explonation WHY? It does not hurt anyone. It causes no damage.
And no, explonations such as "God created men and women" etc, "It's not natural", "It's gross" and the rest of this kind, don't count as a reasonable explonation. [Theology-based explonations cannot be taken as a statement, since the existance of god has to be proven first to make them reliable.]

I think oral sex is gross. But obviously, it isn't a preversion. I also think that wearing high-heeled shoes is unnatural (It even harms your health). Yet it isn't a preversion. I think.

I applaud...loved your comment

But the school's administration and school board DID insist on having a straights-only prom or none at all. That's the crux of the matter.

We are all different. You say Constance shouldn't do something(go to prom with her chosen date) because she might make someone uncomfortable....hhhhmmm. well personally I'm tired of everyone catering to everyone that got a problem with little trivial things like who a teen takes to prom. Who cares who she takes to prom. In this country we do NOT have the right to infringe upon someone else's rights because we don't agree with their choices.
I don't care if you are gay, straight, black, white, Asian whatever I'm sure that everyone does something, wears something, or says something that someone else doesn't like or agree with, you cant always please everyone. So we all need to just be tolerant of everyone else, because the day will come when its YOU someone singles out because they don't like your lifestyle, the way you cut your hair, your religion, or other beliefs.Then and only then do some people understand.
In my opinion the school has not shown just bad taste they CANCELED senior prom for an entire class, they put a big target on this girls back. I thought school systems were run by educated adults?
Amanda~ PA
PS: Any educated person will not judge the entire state on the opinion and bad judgment of a few.

I'm so over bigots hiding behind this "don't ask, don't tell" bullshit. We've already seen how effective that is. I don't care if you are a homophobe, just have the stones to admit it already. I am sick and tired of hearing "I have no problem with the gays, I just don't want to hear about it" or, "as long as they keep their bizarre sexual habits to themselves." Because that, my friend, is the definition of tolerance. You are not tolerating the gay population if you're blissfully unaware we exist. You. Are. A. Bigot. Own it. Quit pussy-footing around the issue and being subversive about it.

Newsflash; there are plenty of homosexual individuals out there who think homosexuality IS a choice, and that you can "help who you love," some of us even believe *gasp!* that sexuality is a fluid distinction. If that makes you uncomfortable about who YOU sleep with, that is really really not my problem, but let's make a deal, I'll tolerate your sexual insecurity and frustration if you just come clean about how INtolerant you are of my lifestyle. It's a choice I have every right to, and my right to privacy makes what happens in my bedroom between two consenting adults none of your damn business.

And to my allies out there- STOP letting them get away with this. This is exactly what causes the sorts of problems Constance is having, and good for her for not hiding her light under a bushel.

"I don't think Candace should be shoving her lifestyle down the school's throat."

She isn't "shoving" anything. She wants to take her date to the prom. That's it. Everyone else gets to take their date to the prom without comment from the administration.

Let me just repeat that: Everyone else gets to take their date to the prom without comment from the administration.

I bet there are plenty of other couples who make people uncomfortable, for any number of reasons. Yet no one suggests that they should be banned from the event. Perhaps Jews or Catholics should also be excluded? How about couples who are not dating within their religion? I bet a nice WASP boy taking a Jewish girl to the prom would make a ton of people squirm, but they would be allowed to go. How about someone who wears a totally tasteless dress? How about someone who wears a hot pink tux?

Apparently your standard for the prom is "if it creeps me out, it should be banned." Yet, who gets to choose what counts as creepy and why?

People tolerate other people's lifestyle choices daily simply by living a community. They don't have to "accept" another lifestyle, in the sense that they don't have to like it. *You don't have to like it.* Really. It's OK if you think it's wrong. Just like it's OK if you think my religion is wrong, or my hairstyle, or the fact that I'm dating a much younger partner, or anything about my lifestyle. AND I still get to carry on having that religion, that hairstyle, that partner, etc.

Abraham Lincoln said that a house divided against itself cannot stand. Once again in our time, our country is a house deeply divided. I hope that you will look to ways to heal the divisions rather than making them wider.

I hear what your saying but you present a weak argument. Choosing to be naked at a prom and what that imposes upon others is not a comprable counter to this girls person or content of character.

Your comments about "having no problem with homosexuality" is the common cover for bigotry.You stated that your belief is that "people should keep their private affairs behind closed doors and not flaunted for everyone to see."

So its safe to assert that your oppinion is that, if this very same teen or anyone else raised the issue that, PDA ( or plain and simple their living existence, since sexuality isn't a condition rather a state,until people start speaking in terms of homosexuals... but I digress) between a man and women needs to be kept "behind closed doors and not flaunted" to where it was distracting and made others uncomfortable. You'd be on the line or blog's decreeing that "This isn't what Thomas Jefferson had in mind when the US Constitution was being drafted"?

The great thing about our constitution is that it was created as a living document...so that it could grow with the change of the people and nation over time....

your a sheep and a bigot...GO CANDACE AND ALL OTHERS STILL FIGHTING FOR THEIR RIGHTS TO BE SEEN AS HUMAN!!!!!

What if seeing a bi-racial couple makes me uncomfortable? Should we ban bi-racial couples from attending prom?? What if Asian people make me uncomfortable? Should we ban Asian people from attending prom?? What if the color blue makes me uncomfortable? Should we ban all blue clothing??

Just because something makes some people uncomfortable doesn't give anyone the right to ban it.

"If the people of her high school aren't comfortable with her lifestyle why should they be forced to accept it??" They don't have to accept it, but they could tolerate it. They don't have to agree with her lifestyle, but they should allow her to live it in the open. It isn't fair to force someone to live their life in secret because other people may or may not feel "uncomfortable." Such ideas harken back to the Holocaust when Jews (and gays and the disabled) were forced to live in secret or be persecuted. If you don't want to see a gay couple dance, look the other way. How would you feel if you couldn't be seen in public at all with your significant other?

The constitution is there to protect the little guys, and that IS what the founding fathers were planning. The GLBTetc. community needs to rely on it as well as their rallying icons (flags, parades, t-shirts) in order to get the rights they deserve because they often times blend into society and, as the minority, have to make themselves visible/heard and be forceful in demanding the rights they deserve. Funnily enough, the rainbow flag was borrowed from the Black Civil Liberties Movement. They had to have marches and flags in order to get their rights too, although they didn't need t-shirts - they wore their plight on their skin. They wouldn't have gotten and the GLBTetc. community will not get their rights if they do not "shove [it] ... down... throat[s]."

Just because Constance knew of the rule before she asked permission, (a) at least she asked instead of just doing it - pretty mature, and (b) by asking she started a course of action that would bring GLBTetc. issues to light and get some basic rights for all GLBTetc. people. Life, liberty, and the pursuit of HAPPINESS!

And, btw, it IS illegal to be nude in public.

Don't knock all of the south on this one story. Some of us down here are sexually and religiously liberated.