Anti-Gay Teacher's Students Allege Classroom Homophobia

A New Jersey high school teacher who compared being gay to cancer in Facebook posts and said that she teaches anti-gay messages was not exaggerating: A student demonstrating outside the school before an Oct. 18 school board meeting told the media that Viki Knox taught her students during class time that being gay is a "sin" that "breeds like cancer," sentiments identical to the ones she posted online.

The controversial Facebook posts have brought the issues of school safety, faith-based prejudice, and free speech to a boiling point in Union Township, NJ. Crowds on both sides of the issue gathered outside the school before the school board meeting, with students carrying signs reading "No Hate in Our State" while supporters of Knox, many of them older, held up signs with slogans such as "Viki Has A Right" and "Don't Bully Viki."

The fracas began with Facebook postings by Knox that were critical of a display put up at the school in honor of GLBT history month. The exhibit "consisted of the names and photos of famous LGBT Americans, including Harvey Milk, Chaz Bono and actor Neil Patrick Harris, with a banner, 'Lesbian Gay Bi and Transgender History Month,' " according to an Oct. 13 media release from Garden State Equality, a New Jersey equality advocacy group.

Knox posted complaints about the exhibit at her Facebook page, and called gays "perverted." A lawyer, former judge, and former township council member named John Paragano circulated screen shots of the remarks, supplying them to local newspaper the Star-Ledger and to Garden State Equality.

The offensive remarks and the heated responses they generated were later taken down, but the screen shot shows the exchanges, in which Knox suggests that homosexuality is the work of an evil spirit "that has existed from the beginning of creation." Knox also implies that homosexuality is a contagious condition, saying that being gay is a state of "sin" that "breeds like cancer."

"Union is not South Orange/Maplewood where one out of four families consist of two Mommies or daddies," the Facebook tirade read. "Why parade your unnatural immoral behaviors before the rest of us?

"I/we do not have to accept anything, anyone, any behavior or any choices!" the posting continued. "I do not have to tolerate anything others wish to do."

The posting went on to state, "That's what I teach and preach."

But preaching--as well as the teaching of anti-gay sentiment while in the classroom and on the taxpayer tab--is not the purview of public school employees, Garden State Equality said.

Knox serves as "the faculty adviser to the high school's student prayer group, The Seekers Fellowship, the local chapter of a nationwide organization," noted the Star-Ledger.

The idea that homosexuality is a "choice" is widely embraced by anti-gay evangelicals. Some also believe that gays are not born with the innate characteristic of experiencing romantic and sexual attraction to members of the same gender, but rather "turn" gay due to demonic possession. In some cases, gays have been subject to "exorcisms" intended to purge evil spirits and "cure" them.

Paragano suggested that such language did not belong in the state's school system.

"Hateful public comments from a teacher cannot be tolerated," Paragano declared. "She has a right to say it. But she does not have a right to keep her job after saying it."

Garden State Equality also suggested that Knox continuing in her job as an educator would be inappropriate, and cited New Jersey's new anti-bullying law, reputed to be the toughest in the nation. The GLBT advocacy group pointed out that the law bans cyber-bullying, and suggested that a teacher who modeled such behavior did not belong in the public school system.

"It's hard to believe that anyone would oppose an exhibit of photos of famous LGBT people in history," said Garden State Equality head Steve Goldstein. "That's tantamount to wanting to erase the very existence of LGBT people--an erasure with horrible overtones that would run counter to the diversity of our state and nation."

In California, just such an impulse to eradicate gay history seemed to be at work recently, as foes of newly enacted legislation mandating schools to include the contributions of GLBT Americans in the curriculum. An effort to put a ballot question before voters that would rescind that law officially failed as of Oct. 12.

There is no similar law in New Jersey, but GLTB leaders see the state's much-praised anti-bullying law as a model. The law was passed in the wake of a Rutgers University student, Tyler Clementi, leaping to his death from the George Washington Bridge last year, following an alleged incident of cyber-spying in which his roommate used a webcam to peek in on Clementi's intimate encounter with another man.

Goldstein noted that while the law is firm and comprehensive in protecting students from bullying, it also allows for disagreement and freedom of speech.

"This situation, at least as it stands now, does not present a violation of that law," Goldstein noted. "But this situation also calls for the school to look at the big picture as to the appropriateness of having Ms. Knox--if she did write these posts--teach our youth."

Safe Schools Vs. Free Speech?

The ACLU was quick to weight in and defend Knox's free speech rights.

"Although we do not agree with the sentiments expressed on Ms. Knox's personal Facebook page, her comments are protected by the First Amendment," ACLU Legal Director Ed Barocas stated. "The ACLU believes that the response to offensive speech is not the restriction of speech, but more speech."

But Garden State Equality suggested that there were limits, as well as proper times and places, for language that attacks minorities.

"Teachers are supposed to be role models for our children, not hatemongers," Goldstein told the Star-Ledger. "I don't see how this teacher could possibly be effective in implementing the state's new anti-bullying law, designed precisely to teach children that bullying, including cyber-bullying, is unacceptable."

The Gay, Straight, Lesbian Education Network (GLSEN) tracks anti-gay bullying and harassment in the schools, and reports that an overwhelming number of GLBT youth have been subjected to verbal harassment based on their real or perceived sexual orientation or gender identity. More than half have also endured some form of physical abuse.

The abuse does not always come from fellow students. In some cases, teachers and school staff are the perpetrators. One Minnesota school district, Anoka-Hennepin, which lies in Congresswoman Michele Bachmann's district, settled out of court following instances in which two teachers teamed up to torment a young heterosexual student with anti-gay jibes and taunts.

Anoka-Hennepin also has seen a high number of youth suicides over the last several years and faces two lawsuits from gay students and former students who say that school personnel did little or nothing to protect them from anti-gay abuse. Critics point to the district's so-called "neutrality policy," which some say leaves staff unsure about how, or whether, they are allowed to intervene in episodes of anti-gay bullying, even when harassment takes place right in front of them.

Anti-gay activists oppose efforts to counter bullying, and say that anti-bullying laws and programs are a guise under which gays seek to "infiltrate" the schools and "recruit" the young.

No medical evidence exists to support the theory that gays are "recruited" or "converted" from people who otherwise would be straight. Rather, mounting scientific evidence suggests that human sexuality is innate and unchangeable, and mental health experts caution that faith-based efforts to "convert" gays and make them heterosexual only shame and emotionally scar gay people who go through so-called "reparative therapy," putting them at risk of significant psychological harm.

Among Knox's supporters at the Oct. 18 demonstration was anti-gay activist Len Deo, who heads up a group called the New Jersey Family Policy Council. Deo told the Star-Ledger in a video posted on Oct. 19 that a personal Facebook page should not be viewed as a public forum, and Knox should not be punished for having put her views up at the social networking site.

"You choose you you're going to accept to be friends, right?" Deo said. "So in light of that, it's a different situation than if she's in front of a classroom and as a teacher then starts to say what she believes in."

But students from Knox's classroom allegedly claimed that Knox had done just that: Stood before her class and dispensed her anti-gay beliefs.

"I had my friend come up to me after we were speaking about the whole situation," Union Township high School junior Samantha Abreu told the Star-Ledger, "and she told me that she had a class [with Knox]... and once [Knox] actually said that being gay is a sin and it spreads like cancer. So she has said it to students inside the classroom before."

But others had only words of praise for the embattled teacher. One of Knox's students said that he "loved" Knox and viewed her as a "spiritual mother."

"Yeah, I want her back. Hell yeah, I want her back. I love Ms. Knox," said William Anderson, a sophomore. "I mean... she's a very open and well versed teacher, Ms. Knox. I love her very much. I think of her as a spiritual mother."

But for Abreu, there was a lack of a mothering sentiment where the anti-gay teacher was concerned.

"I wouldn't want her back at all," Abreu said. "Because knowing that she's there, you never know what she's saying to the students, and she's gonna continue the hate."

Garden State Equality leader Goldstein said that Knox was speaking not just as a private citizen, but also as a teacher when she made the Facebook remarks, as well as any similar anti-gay comments she may have made while on the job.

"The teacher no longer has the ability to teach fairly in our school," Goldstein said. "She's gotta go."

New Jersey's outspoken governor, Chris Christie, said during an interview at local radio station 770 WABC that such remarks were a poor "example... to be setting for folks [like teachers] who have such an important and influential position in our society," the Star-Ledger reported on Oct. 19.

Christie, who is highly regarded in conservative circles, went on to say that Knox's anti-gay gay comments were "disturbing."

The governor has said that he wants to overhaul the state's educational system and look into doing away with tenure for schoolteachers.

"I would like to see an examination of how that teacher conducts herself in the classroom," Christie told the media.

The Human Rights Campaign, which has gathered more than 75,000 signatures on a petition calling for disciplinary action in the case, praised Christie for giving voice to his concerns.

"We applaud Governor Christie for doing the right thing and speaking out against the anti-LGBT vitriol this teacher chose to bring into the classroom," Joe Solmonese, the group's president, said in an Oct. 19 press release.

"Governor Christie's denouncement sends a very strong message that intentionally and publicly spreading malicious rhetoric and falsehoods about LGBT Americans is unacceptable and cannot go ignored," Solmonese continued. "Now, Union Township school officials must take action that adequately addresses the severity of Ms. Knox's behavior."

"The Union Township School Board has opened an investigation into Knox's behavior, but has yet to reach a decision," the release said. "In the meantime, Knox is on leave from her position at Union High School."

Knox's husband, Gene Knox, was interviewed along with Viki Knox by New York news station WCBS-TV, the Associated Press reported on Oct. 19. Gene Knox told the media that his wife, like everyone else, was "entitled to an opinion."

Gene Knox cast the situation according to a dichotomy that has hardened in the minds of many anti-gay people of faith, telling a local radio station, "They can persecute her but they can't prosecute her."

Viki Knox did not comment, having reportedly been advised not to do so. Viki Knox has obtained legal representation, media reports said.