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Story of gay high school teacher to illustrate lack of civil rights protections

Guillaume Paumier/Flickr
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Flickr
Credit Guillaume Paumier / Flickr
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Flickr

In Michigan, you can be fired or denied housing for being gay. That's because there are noLGBTprotections in the state's Elliott-Larsen Civil Rights Act.The story of  teacher Gerry Crane illustrates that. Crane, a gay high school music teacher, was outed by his students, forced to resign, and several months later died of a stress-related heart attack. 

ChristineYared, an attorney from Grand Rapids, is writing a book about Crane's life. The book will be called "Gay Teacher: A Story About Love, Hate, and Lessons Yet To Be Learned."* Correction: an earlier version of this story stated that Mr. Crane was fired. This is incorrect. The correction has been corrected above.  

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