Forgive me if I don’t feel sorry for Constance McMillen.
She’s the teenager who created a nationwide controversy when she requested that she attend her high school prom with her lesbian girlfriend, and that she wear a tuxedo. She was denied that request, which led to an uproar, resulting in a court hearing and a manipulated and subversive series of events that ended up with Constance being purposely separated from the rest of the school during the prom. The ACLU was involved, local courts and a whole group of parents who have no clue what America represents but are working diligently to undermine it. All the while proclaiming some patriotism that is antithetical to all things American.
I realize what Constance has gone through is more than any teenager should have to go through on an emotional level, let alone a lesbian teenager from a backwater town in the middle of nowhere. What has come out of this, however, is a legacy that Constance, despite her intentions of participation, will be able to look back on for decades to come. She’ll pass the story down to the next generation of LGBT Americans about how a simple request to follow your heart can create an uproar in a country which, for the time being, only pretends to honor it’s foundational principals of freedom for all Americans.
We all know that virtually everything in your teenage life is traumatic. Being an LGBT teen, let alone a teen designated by any of the other dozens of layers of specific sexuality, is automatically at odds with the incomplete, accepted, traditional identities of American society. But, let’s get real for a minute, and stop being so self righteous. Constance has confronted her sexual demons in an age when an isolated incident in a small, conservative town in an unknown section of the United States has the possibility of making national news. On top of that, her actions resulted in a national support system which never existed before.
I grew up in Clovis, California. I was then moved with my family to Alaska. In the 1970’s, Alaska was a prehistoric version of the still prejudiced, non-evolved state of California. Nothing, and I mean nothing (since the internet didn’t exist at the time) would have propelled any of my travails into the public, let alone, national, eye. There simply was no support for LGBT kids in those days.
Constance, however, has now been invited to the White House reception for gay, lesbian and transgender citizens from around the nation, in recognition of gay pride month. President Obama will be in attendance. This is the kind of honor that not only LGBT Americans are not used to, but that most Americans are not used to. This is a once in a lifetime event, and for Constance, this is happening at at a very early age.
This is not meant to criticize or condemn any of the assistance efforts that have dropped into her lap, just to point out that the help that Constance has received was simply unimaginable only 20 years ago. Constance received a $30,000 College Scholarship fund while appearing on the Ellen Degeneres show. Ellen even told Constance, "I admire you". That’s the tip of the iceberg of the opportunities that have dropped into the lap of Constance McMillen.
Constance recently stated, "I’ll never get my senior year back"
Constance is too young to fully understand how important her senior year was to the LGBT movement. True, she’ll never have memories of a normal senior year, but she’ll have something much more meaningful. Her senior year will be rolled out year after year, as part of the fabric of LGBT civil rights action in America. Her senior year has become a part of American history. In a nation refusing to evolve in any intelligent way, Constance made a stand for civil rights.
Sure, her senior year was not what she hoped it would be. Let me tell you, I would give anything to have my senior year as disrupted as hers. So disrupted that it would have a positive effect on the evolution of LGBT civil rights in this nation. There’s something wrong with us when we consider our own personal lives more important than the results of our protests.
I don’t slight Constance for this. She’s young and is right about everything she feels concerning the incident created by her simple request. Who I slight are those holding Constance up as a victim. Constance is not a victim, not in historical terms. She’s had more support than anyone in a similar situation has had before her. As LGBT Americans, we’d better be sure to focus on the importance of our stands, rather than our personal sacrifices. I admire and applaud Constance for her choice to stand by her choices as a human being. I certainly will not pity her for it, not in an age when she was quickly and easily afforded so much outside assistance and support.
Years from now, Constance will be telling her story. It will be about how much support and encouragement she had from the LGBT Community in the United States, when all she wanted was to take her girlfriend to the prom. It will be about how a national dialogue was created out of her innocent request, a request to be honored for her honesty and integrity. It will be about the reasons she was denied that request, and what she had to endure in the ensuing months. It will also be about what she missed out on, but the bigger picture is far more important.
No one should feel sorry for Constance. We should all have the privilege of making such a monumental difference in the effort for equal civil rights that she was able to participate in. We all had traumatic experiences as teenagers. Wouldn’t you have preferred to be in the position Constance is in, rather than something no one would remember, and certainly, no change would have been based upon? Constance is a brave, proud lesbian who accomplished something that was simply unimaginable years ago. Constance created ripples around her that will flow for years to come.
