I don't know about you...but THIS makes me want to cry

[Horse with no Name]

I'm SO proud that these kids have figured out what is important.:applause:

http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/latestnews/stories/101208dnmetqueen.39be68a.html

>>>snip
Kristin Pass, an 18-year-old senior with Down syndrome, became Aledo High School's homecoming queen Friday to a joyous standing ovation and the flutter of a thousand tissues on a remarkable night for an amazing young woman.

>>>snip
Carolyn Pass stood at the edge of the football field, taking pictures of her daughter and friends' daughters in the court, when the stadium erupted.

"It's just something you can't even imagine," she said. "And afterward, everyone was just running down to her, congratulating her. And the other girls in the court, they're all just beautiful girls, inside and out."

[jjanpundt]

1. Wow! There is some hope for humanity! n/t

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

2. This is lovely!

I'm so proud and happy for all of them!

[Fridays Child]

3. Beautiful! K&R

[madokie]

4. Tears of joy

and look at the proud smile on that young lady. me :cry: too

[madmax]

5. It's the Obama effect

;) Love is in the air.

[Peregrine Took]

9. The whole "ugly/Bush/Cheney/mean talk show host" is fading away.

For good and for always, I hope.

[Fire_Medic_Dave]

17. What causing us to call Palin names, in front of her kids, at a hockey game then?

I guess not everyones feeling the love yet.

David

[madmax]

21. Called her names?

Boo ?

[Fire_Medic_Dave]

28. The report hear said they booed and called her names.

[hwmnbn]

23. She tried to use her kid as a shield....

against negative reaction. Her child is not running for office, Sarah Palin is the adult politician who engenders vocal opposition. She KNOWS that.

What's to love?

[Fire_Medic_Dave]

31. Civility doesn't require love.

[MountainLaurel]

35. She should have picked a different town then

Phillie is known for having really rude, mouthy fans.

[Fire_Medic_Dave]

36. Ok so Phillie's not feeling the love.

I remember Mitch Williams.

David

[holly111]

60. GO PHILS!!!!

Only because us Philiadelphians are so passionate! lol...Palin is a moron

[newtothegame]

42. Thanks Dave. I agree Phillie doesn't even show love to Santa...

But I agree there are so many better arguments against Palin than her family issues.

[Fire_Medic_Dave]

66. That's my point, plenty to criticize on the issues, no need to be jerks.

[JonLP24]

25. I would've booed too

I don't know how well you can hear, maybe you're at the game, but I couldn't hear anyone calling her names. That doesn't mean they didn't but I can't hear that good so all I heard was boos.

[Fire_Medic_Dave]

29. Just reporting what was posted here.

[JonLP24]

32. I must've missed that one

The only report I saw was that Palin was booed at a Hockey game.

[Fire_Medic_Dave]

33. Here it is.

Source: CNN Ticker



PHILADELPHIA (CNN) – Although many Philadelphia Flyers fans cheered and clapped as Sarah Palin took to the ice at the Wachovia Center on Saturday night to drop the ceremonial puck kicking off this town's NHL season, their warm reception was no match for the 90 seconds of sustained booing that rumbled through the arena, drowning out most of the cheers in support of the Republican vice presidential nominee.

As Palin stepped onto the ice before a capacity crowd to drop the puck, joined by her daughters Willow and Piper, the arena's jumbotron flashed a futile message to the thousands of notoriously harsh Philadelphia sports fans in attendance.

"Flyers fans, show Philadelphia's class and welcome America's #1 hockey mom, Sarah Palin," the massive electronic message board pleaded, to little effect. Booing quickly erupted when the smiling candidate emerged from a tunnel leading onto the ice, muffling the applause of any Palin supporters in the crowd.

Some in the audience simply gave her a thumbs down gesture. Others called her names.

[cui bono]

34. It's not the same situation.

Palin is a public figure. She's running for VP and she's a pathological liar. She's inciting and condoning hatred and violence with her lies and hate speech. She is a danger to America. The reaction to her is based on her character, and again, she's a public figure who chose to put herself in that position. And as far as having her kids there, again, she chose to do that and she chose it because she thought no one would boo her with Piper there. So she knew she would get booed and brought her kids with her to endure it. Terrible person.

The story about this Homecoming Queen is about teenagers rising above picking on someone who's different and even voting her Homecoming Queen. We all know how mean spirited so many kids can be, but this school looked beyond surface and accepted her for who she is.

One is being rejected for her character and the other is being accepted and more for hers.

[Fire_Medic_Dave]

39. That excuses the behavior?

Can't the neocons make the same excuses about Obama? He's a public figure who chose to run for president. They think he's a terrible person. I just wish we practiced what we preach, instead of acting like school kids saying they did it first.

David

[cui bono]

44. Well it's still not the same situation.

They are smearing him and doing a character assassination on him. You just can't equate the two. Palin assassinated her own character. Oh wait, she doesn't have any. Now if they just want to boo Obama because they disagree with him, then fine. If he threw out that puck and got booed that's okay. But insinuating that he is a terrorist that doesn't love his country, smearing him with lies to make people afraid of who he is as a person and getting theh crowd irled up to the oint of yelling "kill him" and such, that's something else.

So are you against protesting too? And protest signs? Do you have a problem with people booing Bush in public? Or making floats with his image? Or dressing up like him and his gang in jail outfits? I don't see what is wrong with that. They're political figures. It comes with the territory.

[holly111]

61. palin? come on

I don't know about everybody else, but everytime Palin is on tv I think she looks so scared. She is saying "what the heck was McCain thinking, I have no clue what I'm doing here."

I am truely scared to even think about our country potencially being in her hands, she is pretty darn stupid.

[Fire_Medic_Dave]

62. I think I've made it clear what I'm against.

I'm against calling anyone names in front of their kids. I'm for trying to get some small amount of civility back into the political process.


David

[Occulus]

67. "I'm against calling anyone names in front of their kids."

And that's exactly what she's counting on every time she trots them out.

[Fire_Medic_Dave]

68. So you are in favor of calling people names in front of their children?

[TahitiNut]

50. (Sheesh!)

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

63. You're still here?

The Palins had it coming.

[Fire_Medic_Dave]

65. Alive and well, although Mom's been quite ill so I haven't been around much.

Sorry to disappoint.

David

[Stuart G]

6. Every once and a while, people do the right thing..K & R

[asjr]

7. That puts the lie to the old adage

beauty is only skin deep. That entire high school is beautiful.

[OhioChick]

8. How heartwarming! n/t

[liberalmuse]

10. Some of us are evolving.

This is beautiful!

[FloridaJudy]

11. I would have voted for her

She sounds like a fantastic human being.

Congratulations, Kristin!

[Tandalayo_Scheisskopf]

12. Those kids that voted for Kristin?

They are the hope and the future of their town and, dare I say, Texas. May they fan out to every corner of the state and the nation and teach us what they know.

[malaise]

19. Ditto n/t

K & R

[progressoid]

13. Happened here in Iowa too last weekend! It was great!

Students name girl with Down's syndrome Homecoming Queen

...

Alba claims she knew she could be queen. It was her dream. She admits to an abundance of confidence, "and I have friends. Lots of friends. A lot of guy friends, too. I hang out at lunch with my friends, my homeys, people at school."

Her mother, Kyla Alba, thought her daughter might have a shot, but she wasn't sure, since the outgoing teen has Down's syndrome.

"The part I find fabulous is, her peers have accepted her unconditionally. My understanding is a group of senior girls lobbied to get her onto the court," Kyla Alba said.

Kyla Alba was right, Graybill said. "Victoria was the only one of the six of us who deserved it."

Malick explained that "we decided she'd be the best person to represent the senior class. So we spread the word and worked together." ... There are 1,400 students at Abraham Lincoln High School, and Alba needed to get the largest number of votes to win.

Read the whole thing: http://www.nonpareilonline.com/site/news.cfm?newsid=20162342&BRD=2703&PAG=461&dept_id=555106&rfi=6





:cry:

[Horse with no Name]

14. Awesome.

It never would have happened when I was in school.
How uplifting!

[progressoid]

38. Dare I say it?

It makes one hopeful!

[undergroundpanther]

15. way cool

damn I have to admit it gives me a twinge of bittersweet jealosy. I say that because in my stupid knuckle dragging ,shallow,nasty horrible high school in the late 70's full of trite, mean, backbiting ,vicious ,sadistic bullies..there is no way in hell a girl with downs syndrome would have been treated like a human being by her peers,let alone made prom queen unless they were going to set her up and humiliate her..

I and a few unique kids the ones with issues of many kinds and physical differences too we all went through hell in our terrible school.Day after day abuse dished out by ignorant peers and tolerated by indifferent teachers.Why was I born too fucking early for,so I'd grow up with a million scars that scream? And the story makes me want to cry for that reason and for joy,because it means at least in some schools,the fucking bullies do not dominate the culture there and the kids they care for the least and different among them.As it should have been , but hasn't been until now.

I wish all the people in that school every happiness,they deserve it far more than the bully excusing by-standing cowardly generation of peers I struggled to endure in school does.

[hunter]

54. My 'seventies high school was a nasty violent place too.

I hated high school. The harassment was constant, and the best any unusual kid could aspire to was invisibility. I did everything I could to stay out of the open, to avoid being a target, and I could still expect something rotten to happen most every day.

It's fantastic this town has progressed to the point of celebrating someone with Down syndrome as homecoming queen but it's baby steps on the way to fully celebrating human diversity.

Nevertheless, let's be optimistic: Maybe in a couple of years they'll elect as their homecoming queen the transgender daughter of undocumented Mexican immigrants.

[renate]

55. I'm so sorry

There's nothing I can say... the pain must be very deep. So much of our self-image is shaped by those years, when our psyches are so raw and tender.

I'm glad you survived that hellhole. :hug:

[Schema Thing]

16. "The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward (love)"

[OnyxCollie]

18. There is a tv commercial running exactly like this.

The girl's name in the commercial is Becca. Can't remember the organization it was for, though.

[lonestarnot]

20. Woodamnwho Kristin! Congratulations!

:applause:

[waiting for hope]

22. That was truly beautiful Horse -

Thanks for bringing it! K&R!

[Catherine Vincent]

24. That's just too sweet!

:)

[MamaDem]

26. Love it!!! Thank you...brought tears to my eyes!!! nt

[proud patriot]

27. Very Cool

:)

[tom_paine]

30. That is about the kindest, most hopeful, hope-giving story I have seen in awhile.

That is pretty fucking cool what those young ladies did.

I'll say it again, because I have just been reminded forcefully once again that the Old American Spirit is indeed alive and well. I can blah blah blah all day about sheepel and the Amerikan Subject Populace but, by God, there still so damned fine people in this country.

MILLIONS of them. They don't deserve this. We don't deserve this.

A beautiful story that screams to the world Old America is still alive! Under all the bullshit and thoughthe Bushies have been trying so hard to snuff it out these last 8 years, and really 28 years.

As story like this. Some other stories I have seen recently. Hope.

Maybe it IS the Obama Effect.

Or maybe it's just that Good Old Fashioned American Decency is much more alive that I had thought.

HOORAY FOR BEING WRONG! :party:

[Liberal_in_LA]

37. This picture in the comment section...goodness

look at the kitten.

http://www.dallasnews.com/membercontent/memberprofile.html?ukey=15358132

[Stand and Fight]

40. It does make me cry...

This is an absolutely beautiful thing, and it represents a shining light in a sea of darkness. I believe -- despite all the crap going on -- that the world is becoming a better place, and this speaks volumes for that belief.

[newtothegame]

41. Great story!!! I love this stuff and would much rather see stories like this at DU more often...n/t

[donheld]

43. That's just wonderful

Thanks for sharing!

[poverlay]

45. Now that's a high school I would have liked to go to. What wonderful kids. I'm so proud of them!

Thanks for the post. A shining example of how the world should work.

[snappyturtle]

46. Wonderful! Our future looks bright to me when young people such

as those at Aledo High School change the status quo. Good for them! :woohoo:

[deaniac21]

47. Even though he isn't yet elected, the hope Obama brings is

already beginning to heal the planet.

[OneBlueSky]

48. very cool . . . proves there's lots of great kids out there . . . n/t

.

[FatDave]

49. We're going to see great things from this generation.

I keep seeing the signs everywhere. I hope they take good care of me in my old age.

[rvablue]

51. So nice to see. These kids are awesome.

There is so much bad news nowadays about kids behaving badly.

This warms the heart. Wonderful kids!!!

[Mr_Jefferson_24]

52. K&R. How nice to see this in our younger generation.

[BrklynLiberal]

53. Wow...just Wow....

[SmokingJacket]

56. Incredibly uplifting.

Holy cow, that certainly wouldn't have happened in my old school... kudos to these students.

[YOY]

57. That was sweet.

The memory of being Homecoming Queen will live on and be far better in Kristin's mind than it would in any other I'll warrant to say.

[bonito]

58. Socialist bastards!

As if looking out for one another makes a difference!

Hell yes it does! closer to my heart things do not come :)

Peace and love...

[LibDemAlways]

59. That's lovely. Sadly, my daughter's high school is not

that evolved.

Several of the girls who were nominated for homecoming princess are overweight unpopular girls the kids nominated as a joke. Two of them ended up as finalists. Kids can be so cruel.

[proud patriot]

64. I printed this article out

and put it on the staff lounge table .

Everyone just loves this story . I work at a pre
school for disabled kids .. We are hoping one our
grads will get this honor someday .

:loveya:

[alphafemale]

69. That is such a beautiful story.

Thank you so much.