Al-Jazeera just wrote a story
about racism in Arkansas. Everyone knows about Harrison and its
KKK ties, but there is a great diverse population in Northwest
Arkansas, particularly in Fayetteville and Eureka Springs. Nobody
ever hears about this beautiful community.
I'm from Fayetteville, Arkansas and I'm a Lesbian. I moved to Massachusetts
for a couple of years. I thought it would be a Lesbian's heaven. My marriage
would be legal, and I would have great health insurance, and of
course the beach would be nearby. Life would be great, right?
I absolutely hated it. The first week there, someone yelled, "Homo!" at
me while I was in my car. There was no real gay community-
unless you wanted to go hook up, or to church, or to some online site.
That's not the type of community that I was looking for, and I don't
do church, so... I felt like a fish out of water. The main thing that
I realized is that there is hate everywhere. But in Fayetteville,
Arkansas, we have a sense of community.
Recently, our town lost a big human rights ordinance. Ordinance 119
“seeks to protect and safeguard the right and opportunity of all persons
to be free from unfair discrimination based on real or perceived race,
ethnicity, national origin, age, gender, gender identity, gender
expression, familial status, marital status, socioeconomic background,
religion, sexual orientation, disability and veteran status.”
Terrible tactics were used to repeal this ordinance by TLC's 19 Kids and
Counting stars, The Duggars, and by their financiers, NOM
( National Organization for Marriage).
Michelle Duggar recorded a hateful, trans-phobic robocall
encouraging voters to overturn Ordinance 119.
Lies were spread that Ministers would have to preside over
weddings for LGBTQ couples, even though the ordinance had an exclusion
for ministers. They also bought up domain names of
their opponents and had all traffic redirected to their own site.
So, I am greatly aware of the hurdles that Fayetteville and
other communities face. We could have focused on the hate. We could
have fought back and played dirty. We didn't. We canvassed. We talked
to our friends and relatives. We informed as many as we could about
the facts. And at the end of it all we gathered in a Local Restaurant to
watch as the votes were tallied. After a couple of hours of hope filled conversation
and anxious glances at the television, the results came in. That night,
we lost a battle for Human rights by 483 votes. The majority voted
on the rights of the minority, and once again the minority lost.
The LGBTQ, the People of Color, the Veterans, the Alternatively-Abled -
everyone affected by this repeal of civil rights- they responded to this
news with tears, with pain, with sadness but, ultimately,
with Love.
Let me repeat that.
The spread of hate and lies has affected this small town, but our
community responded with Love. That says something great for Arkansas
and other southern states. We are tough and we will endure until
equality is reached!
Here is some footage from the watch party. I hope that at some point,
Al-Jazeera, and other news sources, could write a piece that shows, not just the bad side of the
south, but the good side.
PS I moved back to Fayetteville. How can we change anything if the
Agents of Change keep moving away from the areas that need it the most?
List of U.S. ballot initiatives to repeal LGBT anti-discrimination laws.
