Bill Sponsor Honored by Pro-Homosexual Group

Special Report - November 29, 2007
State Representative Rick Glazier (D-Cumberland), the primary sponsor of the pro-homosexual “Bullying Bill,” was recently honored by a statewide pro-homosexual lobbying organization for his efforts during the 2007 Legislative Session on this legislation. According to the Equality North Carolina website, Glazier received the “2007 Award for Legislative Leadership” from Equality North Carolina, a self-described “statewide advocacy organization that works to secure equal rights and justice for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender North Carolinians.” A story on the Equality North Carolina website highlighting the group’s recent “Equality Conference” reads, “We had a number of elected officials and candidates on hand as speakers, including House Speaker Joe Hackney who presented our very first award for legislative leadership to Rep. Rick Glazier for his groundbreaking work on our anti-bullying bill.”

North Carolina Family Policy Council vice president and director of government relations, John Rustin, commented, “If ever there was any doubt that House Bill 1366, the ‘Bullying Bill,’ was about securing special legal status for alternative sexual behaviors, that doubt should now be gone.” Rustin added, “HB 1366 is not about requiring local school boards to adopt anti-bullying and harassment policies, because the State Board of Education established that directive in 2004 and those policies are already in place. HB 1366 is about forcing the public schools of North Carolina to promote and affirm homosexuality, bisexuality, cross dressing and other harmful and immoral sexual behaviors. The interests behind this bill have finally admitted to that.”

The "Bullying Bill," HB 1366—School Violence Prevention Act, sought to require local school systems across North Carolina to adopt policies to prohibit bullying and harassment in public schools, despite the fact that the State Board of Education has had a similar policy in place since 2004. The primary difference between HB 1366 and the State Board policy is that HB 1366 would require every local school system in the state to add “sexual orientation” and “gender identity or expression” as protected classifications in these local policies. As a result, HB 1366 would affirm and legally legitimize homosexuality, bisexuality, cross dressing and other "alternative" sexual behaviors in our public schools and would assure these topics would be discussed with school children on a regular basis.

While HB 1366 passed the House during the 2007 Legislative Session with the controversial “sexual orientation” and “gender identity or expression” language intact, the section of the bill containing these terms was removed by the State Senate before it approved the bill and sent it back to the House. Upon receipt of the amended HB 1366 by the House, Rep. Glazier made a motion that the bill be removed from the House floor and sent to the House Judiciary 1 Committee, presumably to keep the bill alive for the 2008 session and to provide an opportunity to reinsert “sexual orientation” and “gender identity or expression” into the bill next year.

Copyright © 2007. North Carolina Family Policy Council. All rights reserved.