Debate over school annual continues

By having gay couples in this year’s Clovis High School yearbook I believe yearbook staff members Jessie Hardison and Maggie Chavez have tried to bring the city of Clovis into the 21st Century.

The fact that some residents and business owners are threatening to pull advertising and support for the schools shows just how behind the times we still are.

Would these same anti-gay residents complain if the yearbook published pictures of black couples or interracial couples? Perhaps 40 years ago those types of pictures would have been greeted with the same response, but we have made great strides in breaking racial barriers and embracing the civil rights movement. Today we don’t think twice when we see couples different from ourselves in public or in print so why should gay couples be treated any differently?

We raise our children to be fair, non-judgmental, independent thinkers, and to be the leaders of tomorrow and when two students display those characteristics we look down our noses at them and tell them they’re wrong.

I don’t believe it is Hardison and Chavez who are wrong. I believe it is the community members who are casting stones at two strong leaders.

I applaud the students and yearbook supervisor’s monumental decision to allow the pictures to be published.

Gwyn Del Toro

Clovis