A different approach to Ind. town's anti-gay "traditional prom"

The media is taking the wrong approach on this whole “traditional prom” nonsense.

Last week, a group of people from a small-town Indiana high school called for a non-school sanctioned “traditional prom” — one that explicitly banned gay students and couples from coming to the event.

The efforts of the planning committee were clear.

“We want to make the public see that we love the homosexuals, but we don’t think it’s right nor should it be accepted.”

And in return, the nation’s media has made its headlines clear: They’re a load of sheltered, hateful, homophobic idiots who should sod off. And I agree.

But what’s unfortunately happening is this small school is being used as a cultural whipping boy, striking it for the sake of teaching the rest of the homophobic lot a lesson.

That is neither productive, nor a very insightful approach to this particular case.

What we fail to recognize is the fact that every prom is a “traditional prom.”

Aspects of this kind of homophobia are found in every school — in the very nature of the event.

Prom is inherently conservative, heteronormative and isolating toward LGBT couples.

Story time: My junior year at prom, there was a lesbian couple in my group.

They were close friends of mine, and they looked absolutely beautiful together, not to mention they were possibly the most confident relationship I could think of.

When picture time came, they were nowhere to be found. When I asked where they’d gone, my friend said they had gone to their parents’ house to take their own private photos.

“A gay couple makes things kind of awkward,” my friend said.

He was referring to several more conservative parents in our group who would have felt uncomfortable, including my own parents, who were openly anti-gay at the time.

I felt hurt and particularly defensive, because I was gay and feared the opinions of parents on myself had I brought a date.

Even parents who were not homophobic were “traditional,” and the notion of a gay couple made them uncomfortable.

Furthermore, how had my two lesbian friends felt so shy and insecure that they would subjugate themselves to please this veiled bigotry?

So prom not only instigated harmful norms but uprooted prejudices I didn’t even know existed for parents who were not used to seeing what they themselves grew up with.

Because of that, the lesbian couple made a case for how gay people tend to hide themselves even more in the hopes of enjoying their own, private prom pictures on which no one will impose.

We can sequester ourselves in these instances even if a small Indiana planning committee isn’t there to do it for us.

My senior year, I had a boyfriend.

Neither of us were out to our parents, so the result was us finding two fake dates/close friends that would be in the same prom group.

Looking at these photos now, it’s sad to see how distant we look.  

The fear put in us by the traditionalism of prom had made us cower, and I had never felt further from him.

We would scarcely talk to each other until we got on the bus which strictly forbade same-sex couples to register together as “dates.”

When we got to the dance, one photo was taken of the two of us standing in tuxes, which I still later asked to be removed from Facebook for fear that too many people would see it.

Prom needs to be rethought.

Not just in how, exactly, we could exercise our capabilities in opening up the dance floor for LGBT couples, but in how we ourselves can make greater efforts to be more visible.

Until then, the tide of LGBT acceptance for small and large towns alike can never advance.

­— ftirado@indiana.edu