Southern GLBT youth running the gauntlet for prom

2010 is the year the prom became ground zero for the culture war in the South. Constance McMillin wanted to bring another young woman to prom in Itawamba County, Mississippi and was denied by school officials. The ACLU sued, so the school canceled prom. But now there's going to be a private prom and the story goes back and forth about whether everyone can attend with his or her chosen date. I'm betting not.

Inspired by Constance's stand, Derrick Martin of Cochran, Georgia decided to approach his school about bringing another young man to his prom. At first the school denied his request, but then they decided to grant it. As a consequence, his parents threw him out of the house. And people in the community have decided to protest the school's decision to be inclusive.

So let's summarize. First, people who are barely adults have to take a risk getting thrown out of their homes, risk getting denied by public school officials, and risk setting off the wrath of their community FOR PROM! Can anyone seriously deny that gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender youth are substantially more likely to commit or attempt suicide than their heterosexual peers?

I think if you asked people in these two small towns (before Constance and Derrick made their requests) what prom is about, they would say things like a high point of the school year, a rite of passage, a night of fun for the students; the word special would no doubt appear over and over. But now that these two extremely brave students have asked to have a night of fun, experience this rite of passage, and commemorate a high point of the school year with someone they care about, the prom is revealed to be a celebration and defense of heterosexuality.

No? Sounds like something from a p.c workshop at a lefty university? Well, here's what people in Derrick Martin's home town said:

"We knew Derrick was gay," said Keith Bowman Jr., a high school senior who showed up at the rally. "They don't want (Cochran) to be known as a pro gay town."

Most of the dozen attending the rally said they weren't bothered by Martin being gay or being allowed to attend prom with his partner. But they said the school system's decision has brought too much attention to their small town.

"People who don't know the area will think it reflects on everybody," said John Smith, a grandfather who owns an air-conditioning business in Cochran.

Guess what, Mr. Bowman and Mr. Smith, how you include or exclude people does reflect on the entire town. So we can now add another part to the gauntlet: (a) your parents might throw you out, (b) the school might say no, (c) the community might reject you, and (d) you have to keep quiet about it.

Issues like these are exactly why two events happening at opposite ends of the state in the coming weeks are so important. Jonathan has written in a previous post about the Stand for All Families Rally happening on Monday in Shelby County. The event will highlight those in Shelby County who stand for a message of inclusion in response to the Tony Perkins/Family Action Council of Tennessee event happening the same day. And on April 16 students in Knoxville will hold their Breaking the Silence event to bring attention to anti-GLBT violence and bullying in schools.

What these two events and the stands taken by Constance and Derrick illustrate is that youth are providing valuable leadership for inclusion in our communities and there are views that run counter to the kind of ideology that leads to invisibility, violence, and the pressure to take your own life. But can we step out of the situation for a second and acknowledge it's insane that we're making kids fight for the chance to participate in the prom and fight to be safe in our public schools?

Bone-headed quote of the day

In response to a 365gay.com story about Tennessee's proposed adoption ban, here's what one commenter had to say:

• Casey Cameron Said: February 5th, 2009 at 4:30 pm

  • I wish the entire south would succeed. The rest of the country could do without their pro-slavery values.

Yes, this daft person wrote "succeed" instead of "secede," but the substance of the point (if substance is the right word), confirms last Saturday's post.

Forgetting the South in the GLBT rights movement

The national GLBT rights movement still doesn't know how to deal with the South. Those of us working in the statewide organizations, like the Tennessee Equality Project, of course, live the challenges of that work every day. But we have largely been left behind, to recall the title of a popular Evangelical novel.

Perhaps we're just not cutting edge enough. No Southern state is positioned for marriage equality in the next 10 years, as far as I can tell.

Some helpful conversations have begun that could suggest the way forward. For example, there's lots of talk about engaging religion, but it's mostly the safe kind of engagement with those who are already our allies, not the Southern Baptist Convention or the congregations of the Church of Christ. And now there is a renewed call to deal with racism in the GLBT rights movement. Consider the words of Rea Carey, the executive director of the National Gay & Lesbian Task Force:

Have we done enough as a community to deal with our own racism and to make sure that our movement is one that reflects the true diversity of LGBT people? We sure haven't. But the finger pointing and scapegoating was an affront to the many people of color and others who worked on and with the campaign and to our allied organizations. Furthermore, it avoids the complexity of the work we still have to do to win equality.

She's absolutely right. Some white gay activists blamed the African American community for the passage of Prop 8 in California. It was ridiculous. But a lot of the efforts to deal with race in the GLBT community look like what is described here. No doubt these workshops help, but there's a much more obvious issue and it involves a bracketing of region.

You can't deal with the issues of race, religion, and the GLBT rights movement without acknowledging that national organizations ignore the South. How can you address the issue when you ignore so many states with high African-American populations?

Consider these facts helpfully compiled from Census data:

*States with more than 1 million African Americans include New York, Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Louisiana, Maryland, Michigan, Mississippi, New Jersey, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, and Virginia. 7 of those states are solidly Southern, while Texas and Florida retain significant Southern heritage.
*African Americans make up at least a quarter of the population in these states: Mississippi, Georgia, Maryland, Louisiana, South Carolina, and Alabama.
*The states with the largest growth in the African American population are Georgia, Texas, Florida, and North Carolina.

Out of the states in the lists above, only Florida has received significant national attention recently and that's because of the marriage ballot measure.

I think the problem is that when progressives (including GLBT activists) think of the South, they think of a collection of red states, the recently blue states of Virginia and North Carolina nothwithstanding. They forget that the South is where a large number of Black GLBT people live and an increasing number of Latinos as well. They forget that the South is the home of the religious organizations most opposed to our rights.

It's a lesson that should have been obvious from the results of the November election. The South votes differently. Progress in the South means something different from what it means in California and New York. But guess who's talking about regionalism. Republicans. They are beginning to have conversations about the dangers of becoming a regional party. Will the GLBT movement have a conversation about the dangers of abandoning an entire region of the country?

I'm not holding my breath. Any time there is a hate incident in the South and it gets mentioned on national blogs, you inevitably see something in the comments section like, "We ought to boycott the state of _______." Fill in the blank with any of the thirteen. Never mind that horrible hate crimes occur in states on both coasts and well above the Mason-Dixon Line. The South has been written off.

Tennessee (non) Volunteers

Citing a Corporation for National and Community Service survey, the Knoxville News Sentinel is reporting that Tennessee ranks 39th among the states in volunteering. Nashville did a little better, coming in at position number 22 among 50 large cities in volunteer rate and 30 out of 50 in volunteer hours.

The largest category of volunteering in Nashville was understandably religious. 44.1% of those who volunteer do so through their faith communities. One of the lowest categories was civic, coming in at 4.2%. But compared with other Southern cities, that rate is slightly higher than most, although Atlanta came in at 4.6% and Orlando came in at a whopping 9.3%.

Charlotte-4%
Memphis-3.5%
Louisville-4.2%
Birmingham-3.6%
Jacksonville-3.3%
Raleigh-2.6%

Even given Nashville's comparatively high rating for civic volunteering, I'm surprised it's not higher. Not only have we seen an explosion of neighborhood associations that engage Metro government, but most of the statewide advocacy groups on several issues as well as the state political parties are based here.

Equality with "order and dignity"

One must be extremely careful in making connections between the Civil Rights Movement and the GLBT rights movement. I spoke about this topic at UT-Martin earlier this year during their week long celebration of of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. I found myself trying to be clear about the connections while adding dozens of qualifying statements. It's important to try respect the difference in historical events without lazily assimilating them to the present. Despite the differences, I find that I am drawn to the Civil Rights Movement and all that preceded it for instructive clues on the way forward.

I've been reading Paul Conkin's The Southern Agrarians, a monograph on the literary and political movement that emerged from the friendships of a group of men with ties to Vanderbilt. Usually described with a dismissive blanket conservative label, the Agrarians were obviously not free market fans. And while they had an appreciation for fundamentalism, their socially conservative stance differed in its sources and details from fundamentalism as it was then and is today. They are also remembered as segregationists, but there were fissures in the group on this very point. Conkin highlights the disagreement by pointing to the debate between Allen Tate and Donald Davidson. In opposition to Davidson, who was a convinced segregationist, Tate argued that the "South should take over the process of desegregation and do it with 'order and dignity.' "

It's not clear how history might have been different if Tate's advice had been followed by state and local governments throughout the region. We get glimpses of it in Governor Frank Clement's decision not to oppose court ordered integration. His leadership is credited with Tennessee's comparatively peaceful transition to greater racial equality, though Tennessee was not spared violent detours along the way.

I think Tate's argument is relevant. Just as Tate saw integration as inevitable, I think most if not all of the legal forms of equality that our community is working for will be achieved. The questions are how long and what methods. Based on the analysis of the Williams Institute at UCLA, one is forced to conclude that either the number of same-sex couples is increasing rapidly in the South or that they are being increasingly open about their relationships. I think the path ahead is either one of gradual accommodation by state and local governments to these realities or a long build up to controversial decisions by the courts.

Tate's equality with "order and dignity" would mean that the South would have to own GLBT issues as native to the citizens, families, and institutions of the region, not as an alien force out to destroy the particularity and vitality of the region. For now, the resistance remains strong.

Gay Pride in the South

Birmingham Mayor Larry Langford won't sign a proclamation for the city's annual gay pride celebration or allow banners on city property. This act alone would not prevent a celebration of gay pride in Birmingham, but Langford took the extra step of rejecting Central Alabama Pride's permit application for a pride parade.

The salient quote from Langford:

I don't think I'm intolerant, I just don't condone the lifestyle. Your personal lifestyle should be nobody's issue but yours. It's not a civil rights issue, it's a personal choice issue.

If pride parade permits have been issued by the Mayor's administration since 1989, I find it unbelievebly disingenuous to claim this is not a civil rights issue. There is some animus at work here.

But don't fret. According to Central Alabama Pride's website, it looks like a state legislator was able to persuade Mayor Langford to issue the parade permit after all.

I'm curious to know what sort of opposition gay pride organizations encounter from their local goverments elsewhere in the South.