Think Amerika is a really progressive place? Then you haven't been to Kansas lately. Matthew Limon, a bisexual adolescent, is appealing a 17-year prison sentence. His crime? He had consensual oral sex with another teenager when he was a student at a school for the developmentally disabled.

The state of Kansas supports the sentence, which is part of an archaic code of justice. Kansas has a "Romeo and Juliet" law which provides relatively lenient sentences to heterosexual adolescents who have sexual activity. That alone is outrageous, but the attorney for the state is arguing that a lesser punishment will encourage the heterosexual teenagers to marry!

No, I didn't make it up. Kansas is really that twisted.

There's also some good (sort of) news. Remember the teenager in Philadelphia who killed himself because two police offers threatened to tell his family he was gay? A court has ordered a settlement of $100,000 for the family of the boy. It isn't much comfort, but at least it's a message.

And in Arkansas, some school officials told a teenage boy's parents that the boy was gay without getting his permission. They also made him read from the Bible, and punished him for talking about his sexual orientation.

Civil rights of any kind don't mean much in Amerika these days. And these were kids and not heterosexual, to boot. But I'm sure the people in Kansas and Arkansas feel a lot safer, knowing that their law enforcement officers and school administrators are busy saving them from adolescent boys who are attracted to other boys. You can't have enough of that Homeland Security.