A lesbian student is told to take a boy instead.
Remember last year when US teen Candace McMillen wasn’t allowed to take her girlfriend to the prom? The ACLU stepped in, as did Ellen Degeneres and the US court system. A federal judged ordered that the school district had violated McMillen's rights by banning same-sex prom dates and she ended up with $35,000.
It looks like the same controversy has hit again, but this time at Ivanhoe Girls' Grammar in Melbourne. Sixteen-year-old Hannah Williams was told that she could not bring her girlfriend Savannah Supski to her formal and that she should bring a more appropriate male companion instead.
Williams told The Age, "I put a lot of effort into trying to fix things. I had meetings with principals; looked through the Equal Opportunity Act; all my friends put posters up around the school and the teachers ripped them down."
Her dad stood behind her and lodged a complaint with the Equal Opportunity Commission, alleging that the school discriminated against his daughter because she’s gay.
The school maintains that they did not breach the Equal Opportunity Act, as the policy is there to make sure boys get invited to the dance at the all-girls school. The headmistress Heather Schnagl rushed to the school’s defense saying, “If we opened it up and said girls could bring another female they would all bring females…”
Oh, right. Well we certainly couldn’t have that.
Miss Williams has since moved schools to a public institution. Her girlfriend went with her.