Club that supports gay teens facing hostility

OKEECHOBEE, Florida (AP) — A high school senior in Okeechobee is facing an uphill battle against her high school to establish a Gay-Straight Alliance.

Yasmin Gonzalez, who is a lesbian, says she wants to establish an after-school club that promotes dialogue and tolerance.

Instead, the 17-year-old has become something of a target since November, when the American Civil Liberties Union filed a federal lawsuit on her behalf against the Okeechobee High School principal and school board for refusing to let her establish the club.

Gonzalez is suing under the 1984 federal Equal Access Act, which was initially pushed by evangelical Christians after some public schools banned after-school prayer meetings. It says that if a public school allows any extracurricular activities to meet on campus it must allow all groups to do the same.

Gonzalez says that when she tried to register her club administrators first told her the school didn't allow any despite listing more than a dozen on its Web site. Gonzalez says she was later told there were too many clubs, and finally that the school had an abstinence-only policy.