Arizona’s Newest Minority Group?

by David Safier

We may be seeing the emergence of a new minority group in Arizona. At the risk of being called a bigot, let me say I hope to see this group’s numbers decrease in this state and across the nation.

The group I’m talking about is homophobes. The event that triggered my hope that we are seeing a change in attitude (The words Hope and Change have seen a phenomenal resurgence this year) in our often-backward state is the election of a gay Prom King at an Arizona high school.

This didn’t happen at one of our local schools in what conservatives sometimes refer to as “the People’s Republic of Tucson.” It was at Red Mountain High in Mesa, not exactly a hotbed of liberalism.

An openly gay senior was elected Prom King by his peers. I won’t say “by a majority of his peers” because I know how these things work. Not everyone votes, and if a group of people decides to band together and mount a campaign to elect one candidate for Prom King, his chances of winning are vastly improved.

And I won’t say he was greeted with universal acclamation. In fact, as he stood in front of the audience, he was booed by a group of students. I wasn’t there so I can’t say, but I hope the boo-ers were part of that dwindling minority group I was talking about — a small knot of die-hard, vocal homophobes who want to spread their message of hate and intolerance.

Kyle’s parents were heartbroken by the response, but he seemed to take it more philosophically:

“The people who booed me, I forgive them. But, I guess there’s really nothing to forgive,” he said.

“I refuse the idea that ‘being gay’ is a reason to hate someone. I refuse to accept it, it has become obsolete.

“Those who do hold that hate in their hearts, well, after my crowning it is obvious they are now the minorities.”

I hope things have changed enough (Hope and Change. There are those two words again.) that the right wing won’t be able to gin up enough anti-gay hysteria to sway the November elections. After all, gay couples have gotten married over the past few years, and the world as we know it hasn’t come crashing down on our heads. Straight married couples have stayed married. New straight couples are getting married every day, and I have yet to hear of people at weddings crying over the demise of the institution of marriage because a few more loving couples have been allowed to enter into the state of matrimony.

I hope we’re getting to the point where embracing our differences is becoming more the norm, and people still uncomfortable with the concept of homosexuality are more able to shrug their shoulders and say, “Live and let live.” The true haters may not know it, but they are in danger of becoming an ever dwindling minority.