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Articles Dante Alighieri Arthur Dent Jesus Jones Thomas Paine Other Authors Contact Us! Letter to the Editor Dante Alighieri Arthur Dent Jesus Jones Thomas Paine	Confused? Dante Alighieri It's that time of year again, kids: Homecoming. Once again, we are caught up in that rich fall mix of football fervor, school spirit, and speculation as to who will compose this year's homecoming court. What a fine example of a high school tradition. This year, however, the festivities are shrouded in controversy over a little thing called "gender." As per usual, slips were delivered to every class so that the student populous could nominate people for homecoming court - a prince and princess from each class. They were filled out, turned in, and counted. Amongst the nominations from the senior class was something out of the ordinary. A group of seniors, their exact number unknown, decided to step away from the conventional by nominating Tim Chase for Princess and Rheanna (Joey) Keefe-Powers for Prince, reversing the standard gender roles. These two did not end up on the ballot, prompting the question "coincidence or conspiracy?" One of our readers emailed us an article entitled "Dammit, Zammit!" in which he thrashed the students in Leadership, accusing the Senior Class President of refusing to allow the pair to run because they were in the "wrong category." He then demanded that their supposed actions against Rheanna and Tim be brought to light. Rather than simply publish it, we decided to do some digging. Our results: there was no conspiracy. Tim and Rheanna simply didn't have the votes. The slips with their names were counted and, in the end, weren't enough for either of them to be on the ballot. Case closed. End of story. The end of the story perhaps, but hardly the end of the issue. This whole situation raises a question of "what if?" If Tim or Rheanna had gotten enough votes, what would the course of action be then? Should they be prohibited from running because they're not the "correct" gender? Should the votes they received count, but towards Tim for prince and Rheanna for princess, or should they be allowed to run as is? In the grand scheme of things, Homecoming is not very important, but questions like these are. What should the standard be? Is gender merely a matter of genitalia or does it include state of mind? At one point, in "Dammit, Zammit," the author expressed his sympathy "for those who are suffering under [Tiffany's] homophobic reign." First of all, let's cut the melodrama and acquit our fair president of those ill-founded charges placed at her feet. Secondly, when did sexual orientation become an issue? Gender-bending has nothing to do with which way a person swings. There are plenty of straight drag-queens and tom-boys in the world, so why is it that we immediately think sexuality when we think gender? Ms. Keefe-Powers, one of the people who have been shoved into the limelight, emailed us with her take on the whole situation. "It doesn't bother me that I didn't get nominated," she writes. "Frankly, I wasn't expecting to." And what about the real issue here? Forget about Homecoming- what about gender identity in general? What should the standards be? "I don't think it should matter one way or another," Keefe-Powers says, "but if there are going to be rules, I personally believe they should be based on gender [what a person identifies with], not sex [what's defined by a person's genitalia]." In the end, it matters not who wins Homecoming prince or princess. What matters is that people have the right to define themselves according to their own personal values, regardless of whether these values fit society's definition of "normal."	Archive Back Issues Why? Cartoons Poetry Random Rants Disclaimers Losers and Kudos of the Week Letters to the Editor Editor's Notes Picture of the Week
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Dante Alighieri

It's that time of year again, kids: Homecoming. Once again, we are caught up in that rich fall mix of football fervor, school spirit, and speculation as to who will compose this year's homecoming court. What a fine example of a high school tradition. This year, however, the festivities are shrouded in controversy over a little thing called "gender."

As per usual, slips were delivered to every class so that the student populous could nominate people for homecoming court - a prince and princess from each class. They were filled out, turned in, and counted. Amongst the nominations from the senior class was something out of the ordinary. A group of seniors, their exact number unknown, decided to step away from the conventional by nominating Tim Chase for Princess and Rheanna (Joey) Keefe-Powers for Prince, reversing the standard gender roles. These two did not end up on the ballot, prompting the question "coincidence or conspiracy?"

One of our readers emailed us an article entitled "Dammit, Zammit!" in which he thrashed the students in Leadership, accusing the Senior Class President of refusing to allow the pair to run because they were in the "wrong category." He then demanded that their supposed actions against Rheanna and Tim be brought to light. Rather than simply publish it, we decided to do some digging. Our results: there was no conspiracy. Tim and Rheanna simply didn't have the votes. The slips with their names were counted and, in the end, weren't enough for either of them to be on the ballot. Case closed. End of story.

The end of the story perhaps, but hardly the end of the issue. This whole situation raises a question of "what if?" If Tim or Rheanna had gotten enough votes, what would the course of action be then? Should they be prohibited from running because they're not the "correct" gender? Should the votes they received count, but towards Tim for prince and Rheanna for princess, or should they be allowed to run as is? In the grand scheme of things, Homecoming is not very important, but questions like these are. What should the standard be? Is gender merely a matter of genitalia or does it include state of mind?

At one point, in "Dammit, Zammit," the author expressed his sympathy "for those who are suffering under [Tiffany's] homophobic reign." First of all, let's cut the melodrama and acquit our fair president of those ill-founded charges placed at her feet. Secondly, when did sexual orientation become an issue? Gender-bending has nothing to do with which way a person swings. There are plenty of straight drag-queens and tom-boys in the world, so why is it that we immediately think sexuality when we think gender?

Ms. Keefe-Powers, one of the people who have been shoved into the limelight, emailed us with her take on the whole situation. "It doesn't bother me that I didn't get nominated," she writes. "Frankly, I wasn't expecting to." And what about the real issue here?

Forget about Homecoming- what about gender identity in general? What should the standards be? "I don't think it should matter one way or another," Keefe-Powers says, "but if there are going to be rules, I personally believe they should be based on gender [what a person identifies with], not sex [what's defined by a person's genitalia]."

In the end, it matters not who wins Homecoming prince or princess. What matters is that people have the right to define themselves according to their own personal values, regardless of whether these values fit society's definition of "normal."