Did you not even glance at the article that you yourself posted? "God created Adam and Eve not Adam and Steve" among other religious quotes are clearly visible. Also, I don't know what it's like where you live but homophobia in my region is almost exlusive to "Christians" and men who are struggling with their own sexuality.

I'm not reading that anywhere in the article.  (Edit: Oh the pictures... so you used one picture out of 4 to stereotype an entire class group... really?)

We are talking about this article correct?

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2014/03/20/classmates-and-teacher-harass-gay-arkansas-high-school-student-after-yearbook-dispute/

Outside which, saying that homophobia is limited to christians and men struggling with their own sexuality is like saying that Racism only exists among Republicans from the south.

It's a blatant untruth that hides casual homophobia/racism.

Outside which... "men struggling with their sexuality."

That's pretty much the definition of being a male in highschool.  It's called puberty.

You have a point about adolescent insecurities. That being said, it's downright assinine to deny the link between the Abrahamic relgions and homophobia.

Based on that particular article, they removed ALL the stories.

The statement made still holds true if they decided to just get rid of stories permanently and said group pushed for their readmission.

Whether or not all the stories, some of the stories or why they got rid of them isn't actually addressed in the statements quoted, thanks to the assnine buisness lawyer strategy of "Say nothing... even if you are innocent because people will just forget."

If  recent scams like "Tips for Toni" and other simalar scams are any indication...  It's that people need to be a little less myopic when looking at these things, even when it means giving people who turn out to be horrible the benefit of the doubt for a bit longer.

As people are more then willing to play on this stuff for their own benefit.  (Not the kid mind you, but it's possible the yearbook director had an axe to grind and basically lied to the kid."

Here is a question... are you from an area that is dominating by Abrahamic religions as far as religions go?

Because, people TEND to see things worse in the religions around them, as other religions keep a friendly fuzzy distance.

Like Buddism as a religion of peace, and Islam one of violence while being ignorant of say... the 969 movement.

Sikhism, Hinduism, and Buddism all have their own anti-gay messages...  The common arguement is that despite a majority of Hindu and Buddist people against gay marriage they don't speak for all groups, though the same goes for Christians, as not all Christian Churches consider homosexuality a sin.

When the pope says something anti-gay it's all up in our grill and people pay attention.  When the Dalai Llama does?  Everyone sorta just ignores it.

Almost any religion not created in the modern era has an anti-homosexual message in it somewhere.  Western focus just falls on the abhramic religions because it's what is here... and we can project what we want on farther away magical ones.

Why are religions so often anti-gay?  Because a lot of religious laws reflect society.

Religion doesn't make society homophobic.

Society makes religions homophobic.

I would aruge there are PLENTY of non religious homophobes out there.  I know some.

They're just not as well organized.

I'd also note the "It's Adam and Eve, Not Adam and Steve" one is totally something people tend to use to make fun of homophobes. So whether that's an actual serious picture or not, i'm not certain.

At this time people should just be what they are and don't put themself into groups anymore.... I find that is pretty normal to be gay or hetoresexual now that it gets annoying that people are coming out and still try to make a big deal of it... Ofcourse it depends on the region but here especially in the modal quarter I live nobody ask anymore if you are gay or not people just 'are'..

Yeah, not trying to offend anyone at all, but "the South" in most places, in my observation is often a bit "nuts". Even here in China. People in the south, some minorities and weird people eat dogs, sacrificing animals(Taoism?) and other strange stuff. And look at southern Europe with Spain and their bull fighting and what not, and southern USA with well, just say Texas. :P Gunlaws, NRA and all that stuff. I met a Swedish oldish fellow(around 50 years old) before. He worked as a teacher in Texas in the 1970s(I think?), and he told me once he went to a restaurant and they refused to serve a black family food, and more or less kicked them out. And he said he had never seen anything like this working in Canada or Sweden.

Haha yes, praise the homos! :P

But I actually met a guy from Texas last week here in Beijing, and his American accent was nothing like the typical hillbilly/southern accent that we see on TV/movies, more like a New York accent to me. I was very surprised! But he told me that from the bigger citites in Texas most people don't have a broad accent. I was a bit disappointed. :'(

It's fun to talk to people from all around the world, you learn so much. :)

That's sp upsetting. He orginally said he had so much support from his fellow classmates and now they are turning on him :(. 

This is a by product of the refusal by the school refusing to run the story, and thus it get interprited as 'endorcing homphobia.'  Any endorcement or refusal has more sway than people realize.  For example, but the US Supreme Court throughing out parts of anti gay DOMA and Prop 8 it has helped gay right not only in the USA, but also of the rest of the world.

Yes, it has given the school a bad name - but blaiming the kid is wrong, should be blaiming the staff that made the decision.

And as far as religion.  I don't think I have seen a single anti-gay person (save one here who claims to be an athiest) on VGC that hasn't justified it by Christiany.  But it also shows they do not understand the bases of their religion very well.

Funny indeed, considering Jesus ran around the desert with 12 other guys and one woman.