A Wisconsin elementary school has banned students from singing the song Rainbowland by Miley Cyrus and Dolly Parton at the spring celebrations.
Dolly Parton and Miley Cyrus, photo by LaPresse
It happened to the students of an elementary school in Wisconsin, the Heyer Elementary School in Waukesha: the boys were denied the right to sing the song Rainbowland for their spring break. In recent days, in fact, the administrators of the school have made public the reasons why the students will not be able to sing the song of the couple Miley Cyrus – Dolly Parton: “It can be perceived as controversial“. All this happened last March 27, when Superintendent James Sebert, as reported by the USA portal NPR, told Fox 6 that he had removed the song from the set list of the first grade concert, because “not appropriate for the age and maturity level of the students“. To the aforementioned reasons, the school official added that a policy of confrontation was instituted in the school building, but that it forbids students and professors from raising highly controversial issues in classrooms.
The banned song for the promotion of LGBTQ rights
But why was Cyrus-Parton’s Rainbowland being sued by school officials? The song, born in 2017 and released on the album Younger Now, describes the perfect but utopian world of Miley Cyrus: a Rainbowland in which “you and I go hand in hand. I’d be lying to you if I said it’s okay, with all the pain and hate out there“. A clear reference to the evolution of the international panorama of LGBT rights, of which Cyrus has always professed to be a fervent icon, also linked to the collaboration with Dolly Parton. As first grade teacher Melissa Tampel declared, the song was was chosen for its universal and sweet message, in a concert where songs will be performed as Here Comes the Sun of the Beatles and What a Wonderful World by Louis Armstrong: “My students they are just devastated. They really liked this song and we had already started singing it“.
But Miley Cyrus and Dolly Parton’s Rainbowland isn’t the only one
It is not the first decision to be discussed, as NPR points outhappening in the Wisconsin complex: just a few years ago, Superintendent James Sebert it had banned the display of rainbows and LGBTQ flags in Waukesha classrooms and suspended work on equity and diversity in the school district in 2021. Compared to the Spring Concert, one other song was also banned before the decision was reversed: it was Rainbow Connection by the Muppets: clearly only due to the rainbow reference in the title, given the completely distant nature of the song.