Hundreds Turn Out for Wisconsin High Schoolers’ Performance of Banned LGBTQ Song |
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On Wednesday evening, high school students from Watertown, Wisconsin, performed a song that had been banned by the city’s conservative school board before an audience of hundreds of supportive community members.
The micropolitan city of over 23,000 people, which resides almost exactly between the two largest cities in the state, has made national headlines over the past several weeks due to the board’s decision to forbid the Watertown High School Wind Symphony from playing “A Mother of a Revolution,” an instrumental piece that honors transgender activist Marsha P. Johnson, a famed participant in the Stonewall Uprising of 1969 in New York City.
For several months, more than 30 students in the band rehearsed the piece. Because lessons on LGBTQ subject matter are included on the list of “controversial topics” outlined by the school board, the band’s director, Reid LaDew, sent a letter to parents in the fall about the plan to play the song.
“The purpose behind studying Mother of a Revolution is not to provoke controversy, but to deepen students’ understanding of how music reflects the diverse experiences of humanity,” LaDew’s letter stated.
Parents were given the choice to withdraw their children from playing the song, with only a few families deciding to do so. Nevertheless, just days before the spring concert was set to commence, the school board announced that it would hold a vote on whether to allow the piece to be performed.
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The board members made dubious claims about the intention of the piece, with one member saying the music — which contains no lyrics whatsoever — “celebrated” political violence. Notably, the Stonewall Uprising was a response to years of violence from New York City police officers, who conducted frequent and violent raids of the Stonewall Inn, an LGBTQ........