Over time, families who have money and time can sue the district and move their kids to private schools, while families without resources have to stay in under-resourced schools. This makes the gap between public schools and social classes even bigger.

From a social point of view, I think this issue goes beyond just individual teachers. Our whole society has long-standing stereotypes about race, behavior, and ability, and these ideas quietly shape how people see students before they even get to know them. So when a teacher misidentifies a student of color or sets lower expectations, it’s not always coming from personal intention but from the social messages they’ve absorbed.

I think the best way is actually not to tell other students or even most teachers that she has any special needs. Instead, the school can assign one coordinator who quietly supports her in the classes where she might need extra help. I’ve always believed that people learn best from people, not from systems or labels. Even a child with special needs still has to learn how to interact with others, and the more normal the environment feels, the easier it is for her to build those skills.

One example that happened around me was when I was coaching after-school sports for elementary and kindergarten students. There was one kid who got really discouraged whenever he didn’t perform well. I didn’t think too much about it and just kept encouraging him like I would with any other student. But later, when I was putting the equipment away, another coach told me that the kid had special needs and was on the autism spectrum. I didn’t ask for this information, but once I heard it, I couldn’t unhear it. After that, even if I tried to act the same, the thought that “he is a special-needs student” would always pop up in my mind. And then I started worrying—if I spend too much extra time helping him, what about the other kids?

It feels like many arguments about what is age-appropriate are not really about protecting children. They often come from adults who are uncomfortable with topics they do not understand. Schools can freely talk about male and female bodies in sex education and even show condoms in class, but the moment anything related to LGBTQ+ comes up, it suddenly becomes inappropriate.

For me, my parents always felt that anything I did other than studying was a waste of time. Even when I dyed my hair in high school, I didn’t dare tell my dad because I knew he would think it was meaningless and distracting. When I think about this now, I honestly can’t imagine how he would react if my identity or orientation were LGBTQ+. And the crazy thing is, my parents are already considered pretty open-minded compared to a lot of Asian parents.

From my own experience, a lot of things only start to feel “different” after other people point them out. When you’re just interacting with someone who has bipolar disorder or autism, you might notice that they act in a way that’s not typical, but you usually just adjust how you get along with them and it’s fine. There isn’t anything “wrong.” But once other classmates start saying that this person has a certain disorder or that their orientation is “weird,” you slowly get influenced. Something that was originally just unfamiliar becomes something you start to judge, and without even noticing it, you also begin to look at that person through a tinted lens.

One time when I was filling out my Social Security application, I noticed something that felt a bit off. The form asked for “Parent” information, and then gave two boxes—one labeled “Father” and the other “Mother.” I didn’t think much of it at first, but later I started to wonder. What if someone has two moms? Or what if they don’t know who their biological parents are? How would they fill that out?

To be honest, I keep wondering if she wasn’t a lesbian, would the school have acted differently? Would they have held a memorial for her right away or shown more sympathy from the start? Part of me feels like they probably would have. It’s sad to say, but sometimes it feels like people only show respect when the victim fits into what they see as “normal.” That double standard is exactly what makes LGBTQ+ students feel invisible or unimportant.

I think one of the reasons homophobia persists today is not necessarily because people are against LGBTQ+ identities, but because of how identity politics sometimes shapes public discourse. For example, in the film industry, when a highly anticipated project is handled by LGBTQ+ directors, writers, or cinematographers and the final result doesn't meet public expectations, any criticism toward the work is sometimes labeled as homophobic. However, people rarely ask whether the criticism is about the quality of the work rather than the creator’s identity. In many other cases, straight directors also receive harsh critiques without their identity being part of the conversation. As a result, some neutral audiences feel silenced or unfairly accused, which creates resentment and eventually contributes to homophobia—not out of hate, but out of frustration with not being able to express honest opinions freely. I believe this is a misunderstanding rooted in overprotectiveness and a lack of space for dialogue.

In 2019, I was still in middle school in China. That year, I saw how hard it was for classmates who didn’t fit the “normal” expectations of gender and sexuality. I remember one boy who performed a Blackpink dance during an event—he danced with so much emotion and confidence, but a lot of people laughed at him or called him names. At the time, I didn’t really understand him either. But as I grew older and met more people from the LGBTQ+ community, I started to understand their experiences and slowly began to accept them.

With the fast growth of the internet, online communities easily form their own circles and often define themselves by opposing other circles. This makes the narratives around gender even more amplified. Biological sex is something we are born with, but identity and self-understanding come from personal experience and practice. Society usually does not care about the reasons behind someone’s identity; it only reacts to the result. When people do not accept the way someone understands themselves, they often respond with judgment or hostility, which creates even more division.

I think it is important to remember that religion and culture are not fixed. They have changed across history and will continue to change as society develops. Many ideas that were once seen as absolute were later reinterpreted or replaced. So when some people use tradition to justify strict beliefs about gender or sexuality, they may be holding on to only one version of that tradition. If we look at the past, we can see that many cultures and even some religious communities once accepted more diverse gender roles.

I am curious about how norms will change in the future. For a long time society has created fixed expectations for men and women and these ideas became so common that people often forget they are learned. As transgender people become more visible and more accepted I wonder if new expectations will slowly form around them too. It is possible that society will start creating its own image of what a transgender person should look like act like or live like even though the whole point of acceptance is to allow people to live freely. I think this shows how important it is to stay aware of how norms form so we do not turn one kind of freedom into another kind of pressure.

This social consensus was formed over a long period of time. Early societies viewed heterosexual marriage as the basis for survival and continuation. Later, religion, law, and education reinforced this idea, shaping clear expectations for how men and women should behave. Media and cultural messages kept repeating these images, making people believe this is the norm. Although modern society is becoming more open and diverse, these frameworks still exist, only in more subtle ways within daily communication and thinking. New habits, ideas, values, and even technologies all take time to move from being questioned to being accepted and finally recognized. The world keeps moving forward, but it always takes time for people to truly adapt and accept change.