The following comes from a Dec. 17 release from the Life Legal Defense Foundation.
On Monday, December 16, 2013 the school board for the Portland Public School District voted to terminate the teaching contract of Bill Diss, a teacher who has been an outspoken opponent of Planned Parenthood. Mr. Diss experienced censure in his teaching career beginning in 2007 when he publically opposed the building of a new Planned Parenthood abortion clinic in downtown Portland. The current action follows Mr. Diss’ opposition to being forced to facilitate presenters from the Teen Outreach Program, a program administered by Planned Parenthood, coming into his tutorial session to recruit students.
“Bill Diss is a well qualified teacher with a track record of success,” states Dana Cody, president and executive director of Life Legal Defense Foundation. “As the circumstances surrounding this termination demonstrate, Mr. Diss has done nothing that would merit being fired from his job. LLDF will pursue every possible avenue in defending Mr. Diss’ rights in this matter, and hopes to see his rights ultimately protected despite PP’s actions.”
Background: Bill Diss has taught Technology, Math, Computers and Electronics at Benson High School since 2002. He has also taught several classes at the community college level. He is highly regarded in his abilities and his success both by students themselves, by their parents, and fellow teachers. Mr. Diss is the only teacher in the state of Oregon who has been certified as qualified to teach college level computer science to high school students for dual credit. His initiative and hard work have attracted outside grants to Benson opening up even greater opportunities for Benson students. For the first five years at Benson High, Mr. Diss was rated as proficient or better, with numerous positive compliments in his reviews. Mr. Diss’ methodology and teaching style has remained substantially the same in all his years of teaching.
The positive reviews took a dramatic change for the worse, however, when Mr. Diss began to speak out in opposition to the building of a new Planned Parenthood facility in downtown Portland. Mr. Diss was involved in opposition activities on his own time, and did not bring his political or religious convictions into his instruction in the classroom. Nonetheless, he began to experience complaints about his political activities from school administrators, and his teaching came under sudden, rigorous scrutiny. Complaints, negative evaluations, letters of reprimand and formal meetings became a regular part of Mr. Diss’ life at school for as long as he engaged in outspoken, public opposition to Planned Parenthood.
Shortly after the beginning of the 2012-2013 school year, presenters with the Teen Outreach Program came to Mr. Diss’ tutorial classes to give a presentation recruiting students for the program. When presenters entered the tutorial, Mr. Diss, consistent with district policy, asked for identification. He was handed a card that identified the presenters as employees of Planned Parenthood. This knowledge surprised Mr. Diss, and caused him serious emotional distress due to his well-known personal religious convictions and his years of work to oppose that organization. He expressed his dilemma to Benson principal Carol Campbell at the time and asked to be excused from being present for the presentation due to his religious convictions. His request was denied. He was told that he would be required to be present for the presentation. Through the remainder of the school year during which he taught, Mr. Diss continued to have to deal with Planned Parenthood staff as they administered th program.
Simultaneous to his request not to be involved with the presentations, Mr. Diss’ teaching came under renewed censorial review. Mr. Diss accepted the input from school administration, but the year proved to be extremely stressful, including numerous classroom observations and meetings with school administration. On March 19, 2013 school administrators summarily demanded that Mr. Diss leave the school premises and not return—placing him on paid administrative leave. Mr. Diss was told to leave the school and was escorted off the premises by a police officer. This unnecessary show of force is symbolic of the animus faced by Mr. Diss throughout the year.
To read the original release, click here.
It’s called “building a case.”
It’s called “shafting an employee”.
Bob One, “building a case” for what? Are you actually comfortable with this story?
Bob one…how can we be able to be comfortable with your comments, why do you contradict yourself….you sometimes want to come off as a faithful Catholic with your compliments and such but then you say something scandalous as you have now. Bob one….Do you hear Jesus asking “why do you persecute me?”
Because I do….I can’t sleep at night Bob one, if I heard Jesus tender voice asking me that.
Why do I get the feeling that some are dealing with spiritual envy? I am speaking of those who are deciding to not support this good teacher.
I was in the human resource profession for thirty years in a number of companies. In most states it is nearly impossible to fire someone without cause, even in the employment-at-will states. Therefore, when a manager wants to get rid of – fire – an employee they don’t like or whom they disagree on some issue, you have to have a reason for the dismissal. Even if the employee had great reviews for a number of years, the manager would start “building a case.” It usually took several months to develop enough evidence that the person “wasn’t doing a good job and should be fired.” That is what I meant by “building a case.” Nearly anyone who has managed people would have known what I meant. It happens every day in the business world. In government and schools it takes a lot longer and is more difficult. In this case, what was reported smelt like management “building a case.”
Sorry if you thought I meant something else.
Bob One guess what I have some HR background too…executive administrative assistant as well……..you are correct you “were”(times are different too) and so was I and when I was I remember also when they wanted to get someone fired, they also knew how to get the job done….especially today…it is not hard to fire someone who is anti-gay or depending on the job…a pro-lifer……it is getting easier to fire those with morals….yes I have seen it happen not as bad as this article but yes it can happen………
I even saw court justice go bad, my cousin owns a gas station, he is a hard worker, he caught on video an employee stealing, he fired her……he went to fight off unemployment benefits…the judge still rewarded the employee who stole even with a video showing their stealing…..see wrong gets rewarded but it’s usually the opposite for those who are good.
So your point proves nothing, just your denial and your lack of compassion for this gentleman.
Oh yes and building a case…could also mean that you can pretty much nit pick at what will build that case, especially if you want to get someone fired….if they liked him, they can let almost anything go….Hopefully this teacher fights this because he can actually prove that they fired him due to his convictions but they will slander the poor guy…they will because it can get nasty …like you said “build the case” you can pretty much makeup or magnify what you want to make this innocent man look bad. It is an injustice. God have mercy! We need justice! and justice would be to fight the monsters, the root of this injustice!
Bob one tonight I prayed the rosary and we added Bill Diss in our intentions…as we prayed, after mentioning him in our prayers this came to thought:
Oh yes they also had to “build a case” for Jesus, “building a case” to have him crucified.
Bob One this man is innocent and does not deserve this persecution.
Bob one are you listening…well in this case…are you reading?
A flagrant unconstitutional act committed by the school authorities! Strange how the people who purport to be concerned with people’s rights have none for Mr Diss’s rights. The Nouveaux Fascists are on the march and this is just the beginning. Ridicule and dry martyrdom are the early symptoms of religious persecution.
One thinks of the Norwegian teachers threatened with dismissal or prison (some actually sent for a time to concentration camps) for refusing to teach the Nazi ideology as demanded of them by the Quisling regime (1940-1945). The teachers won because they hung together, because the public supported them and because the occupying Germans didn’t want the fight. We have worse than Quislings here, for they were traitors to Norway, while PP are traitors to all humanity, and because (alas) so much of the public supports their Culture of Death.
Mr. Diss works for the STATE. Eventually ALL doctors and nurses will work for the STATE. If the STATE assigns them to work at Planned ParentHood, they will work there or not work at all. Christianity teaches that individuals need to be subject to God’s laws. Christian thought is the enemy to the STATE. The STATE will silence individuals it NEEDS to silence. The STATE will reward compliant WORKERS of the STATE. Parents will babysit the STATE’s children. Welcome to the SAFE new world of Utopia! Equal misery for all!
So Catholic Schools get to fire homosexuals for getting married. Goose meet gander (er, goose . . . ) Nothing to see here.
False analogy.
First, Catholic schools are private, state schools are public and the rules for free speech are different.
Second: homosexuality is a disorder, opposing abortion and the culture of fornication of lust is supports and abets is a virtue.
Peter, nothing to see here? Catholic Schools exist to promote Catholicism. Catholicism IS a religion! An employee of a Catholic school who promote’s an ideology at war with Catholic teaching is akin to employing a jihadist to be an actor in a Nativity Play! Which brings us back to my previous post. The “State” i.e. “Secularism” IS a religion which IS at war with Catholicism first and all of Christianity second. “Statist” or “Secularist” have their leaders as well as their faithful followers no differently than Catholics do. Today’s Public education belongs to the Religion of Secularism. To this end, Peter, the fate of Mr. Diss does not surprise me in the least.
The question is Peter, which Religion do you embrace? The Religion of Life or the Religion of Death?
Mr. Bill Diss I am grateful to have come across this article. This gives me another reason to pray. To pray for you. Don’t fret, God will open the right doors for you. Right now the world seems like its falling on you but Jesus is the one holding you. You are a hero and even if they think that they have won, little do they know that your strong stance actually may have helped some of your students open their minds to better things. Your perseverance has actually saved another soul for Jesus.
Thank you for standing up for what you believe in, in those morals that honor God! Your stance is godly, not worldly, that is why you are facing this.
As I am more maturing and growing in the Lord, still growing though, I have come to the understanding that our morals in Christ, is who we are. It is our identity and without them, then we are better off dead. They might as well kill us because they can kill us but they can not take away our love and faith that makes us who we are in Christ.
God bless you, you are a real gentleman! A noble one, you probably saved an unborn with your stand!
Unfortunately, there are casualties on the front lines of all wars. Mr. Diss is one. He needs our prayers, our support and our gratitude. It is ironic that we read about the teacher’s unions supporting child molesters to secure their rights when they harm children but apparently they do nothing to help one of their members when he tries to help the do students–or at the very least refuses to participate in what he see harmful. With our help, it is a high profile case to win in the courts and the hearts of our fellow voters.
If we Americans keep electing leftist and “progressive” politicians who not only pass their own kind of laws, but also install their own kind of judges, right up to, and including, the US Supreme Court, what happened to Mr. Diss will happen to many others all over this nation, until true Christians will be banished to their closets.
Gabe the reality is that the majority of Americans don’t give a hoot. You are speaking to the choir, those of us who are faithful will vote our conscience but the sad reality is that there are more Americans with less morals and common decency who are also voting.
Gabe,
If true Christians are banished to their closets, THEY will find out what those closets contain!
May God have mercy on an amoral Amerika!
Viva Cristo Rey!
God bless, yours in Their Hearts,
Kenneth M. Fisher, Founding Director
Concerned Roman Catholics of America, Inc.
How can we help Mr Diss. Let us pray and fast and find a way to help him and let him know we care and love him.
I don’t know how we can help him but we can keep him in our prayers.