Nebraskans take a stand

I hope all of you have already heard about this and have already taken action. But if you have not, today the Nebraska School Activities Association banned Michael Barth from sharing his award-winning poem on  NET’s Best of the Best. After winning a statewide speech contest, the NSAA “read through it and they declined it because the executive director of the NSAA believes that it was advocating transgender rights and that demographic of people,” Barth told The Huffington Post Wednesday.  Quickly after this happened, word spread. Really quickly. Thankfully NSAA has released a statement allowing Michael to share his poem on the Best of the Best. Although I am proud of Nebraskans for their quick action on this discrimination and violation of freedom of speech, I remain alarmed that a group that supports students would do this. Michael’s beautiful poem was about being yourself and how as a man you do not need to adhere to “masculinity” as it has been taught to us. His poem was about defying typical and harmful gender stereotypes. I hope this reminds us all to continue speaking out against discrimination towards gender and sexual orientation in Nebraska.