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January 30, 2012 | Dan Rafter

Category: Call It Out, Parenting, Schools, New Jersey

Court Papers Show Other Examples of NJ Teacher’s Anti-LGBT Bias

Court documents filed by the Union Township School Board against New Jersey high school teacher Viki Knox illustrate a track-record of anti-LGBT bias that goes beyond her outbursts on Facebook and Twitter last fall.

According to the New Jersey Star-Ledger, the school district also found Knox:

  • Denied services to a special-education student wearing a gay pride bracelet
  • Accused her colleagues of indoctrinating students to live a gay lifestyle
  • Likened homosexuality to a "sin" that "breeds like cancer," during a class discussion of Rutgers student Tyler Clementi’s suicide

The school district filed the court documents last month, marking the beginning of the process required to fire Knox.

Knox originally posted her anti-LGBT rant to Facebook last fall, declaring: “Why parade your unnatural immoral behaviors before the rest of us? AND YOU ARE WRONG! I/WE DO NOT HAVE TO ACCEPT ANYTHING, ANYONE. ANY BEHAVIOR OR ANY CHOICES! I DO NOT HAVE TO TOLERATE ANYTHING OTHERS WISH TO DO.”

HRC worked with Garden State Equality and called on the Union Township School Board to take immediate action following Knox’s rant. We delivered signatures from over 75,000 members and supporters to a school board meeting and successfully called on the Executive County Superintendent to open an investigation into the incident. Governor Chris Christie also condemned Knox’s remarks.

Read the full story in the Star-Ledger.