In grade school (the 70's) I would have described Disneyland dancers as being "so gay", as in
exhibiting extreme gaiety to the point of ridiculous. I read a lot, and had parents who used archaic terms; I didn't associate it with sexual preference, was ignorant of variety in sexual preference, and would have probably still been unaware of the fear and hatred behind the sneering use of the word—the odd horror at cleancut enthusiasm, and iconic Americanism gone "wrong". After Tab Hunter, how could any strapping, beautiful all-american man be trusted?
Of course, I use that example because I later met a Disneyland dancer who let me know that he, and many of his fellow dancers were gay gay gay. He had leapt, pirouetted, and pranced about me at the clothing store we worked at, and he still had to
tell me he was gay.
Why was I so dumb, er, I mean, imperceptive? My mother, when she heard me use the word, spent a lot of time telling me not to assume someone was gay (as if it should have been my business, anyway) if they had effeminate affectations. I believe it was she who told me it was an awful word to throw around, because it could hurt, it was a "bad" thing to call someone. Implicit in this, her attempt to enlighten me, was the idea that it was bad refer to someone's behavior as "gay" because it was bad to be gay.
And that's why I went on to work in a gay bar. Thanks mom!
I miss it still.
After I moved to SF, I decided to assume everyone is gay, until they tell me otherwise.
This is my long-winded anecdote-laden way of saying that the term was already loaded in the 70's, and I had reason to know better, and kids now can't feign ignorance when told their use of the term term is offensive
But, I don't think it should be a legal matter, unless a student is inciting others to hatred, or if it is an issue of slander.