Sometimes it’s just hard to find a middle ground.
True Story: Last week the University of Central Arkansas (UCA) removed a sign celebrating Gay Pride Month from outside its campus library. The sign’s message: Being gay is like glitter. It never goes away. — Lady Gaga.
University Life has learned that this action followed weeks of negotiation between UCA and gay-rights advocates that had ended in a stalemate. According to a high-level administrator at the school, UCA had proposed an alternative Gay Pride sign for the library: Being gay is evil. You’ll go to hell for sure. — God. A second alternative put forward by UCA: Gay? No way!
The administrator maintains that “the gay-rights advocates were not willing to compromise, so that left us no choice. We had to move the sign. This is Conway, Arkansas, for Pete’s sake! We’re not a major metropolis like Little Rock or Fayetteville, where nobody thinks twice about wearing a rainbow bandana in public.”
The original sign now resides in front of a 24-hour convenience store on U.S. Highway 71 in De Queen, Arkansas, a town in the state’s southwestern, far-left corner. “We thought this location would be a much better fit,” the administrator claims. “The store’s beef jerky aisle also serves as a satellite campus for our MBA program, so at least some UCA students will see the sign when they come to class.”
Not a perfect solution, to be sure. But it’s a beginning.