JACKSON, Miss. — A northern Mississippi school district decided Wednesday not to host a high school prom after a lesbian student demanded she be able to attend with her girlfriend and wear a tuxedo.
The Itawamba County school district's policy requires that senior prom dates be of the opposite sex. The American Civil Liberties Union of Mississippi had given the district until Wednesday to change that policy and allow 18-year-old Constance McMillen to escort her girlfriend, who is also a student, to the dance on April 2.
Instead, the school board met and issued a statement announcing it wouldn't host the event at Itawamba County Agricultural High School in Fulton, "due to the distractions to the educational process caused by recent events."
The statement didn't mention McMillen or the ACLU. When asked by The Associated Press if McMillen's demand led to the cancellation, school board attorney Michele Floyd said she could only reference the statement.
"It is our hope that private citizens will organize an event for the juniors and seniors," district officials said in the statement. "However, at this time, we feel that it is in the best interest of the Itawamba County School District, after taking into consideration the education, safety and well being of our students."
The ACLU said a school policy banning same-sex prom dates violated McMillen's constitutional rights.
Kristy Bennett, legal director for the ACLU of Mississippi, said the district was trying to avoid the issue.
"But that doesn't take away their legal obligations to treat all the students fairly," Bennett said. "On Constance's behalf, this is unfair to her. All she's trying to do is assert her rights."
Bennett said she wouldn't allow McMillen to comment on Wednesday, saying "she's still trying to process" the district's actions. Calls to McMillen's cell phone went unanswered.
Itawamba County is a rural area of about 23,000 people in north Mississippi near the Alabama state line. It borders Pontotoc County, Miss., where more than a decade ago school officials were sued in federal court over their practice of student-led intercom prayer and Bible classes.
Anna Watson, a 17-year-old junior at the high school, was looking forward to the prom, especially since the town's only hotspot is the bowling alley, she said.
"I am a little bummed out about it. I guess it's a decision that had to be made. Either way someone was going to get disappointed – either Constance was or we were," Watson said. "I don't agree with homosexuality, but I can't change what another person thinks or does."
Other students are on McMillen's side.
McKenzie Chaney, 16, said she wasn't planning to attend the prom, but "it's kind of ridiculous that they can't let her wear the tuxedo and it all be over with."
A Feb. 5 memo to students laid out the criteria for bringing a date to the prom, and one requirement was that the person must be of the opposite sex.
The ACLU said McMillen approached school officials shortly before the memo went out because she knew same-sex dates had been banned in the past. The ACLU said district officials told McMillen she and her girlfriend wouldn't be allowed to arrive together, that she would not be allowed to wear a tuxedo, and that she and her girlfriend might be asked to leave if their presence made any other students "uncomfortable."
McMillen said she feared she would be thrown out of the prom because "we do live in the Bible Belt."
I am connecting this to "Same Love" because it talks about being gay. Being apart of a family that fully supports gay and having lesbian aunts, I think that everything that happened in this article is sad and disappointing. People should be able to be who they want to be and not be afraid to show it. If a girl or a boy wants to take a person of the same sex to prom they should be allowed to with no questions asked. Not allowing someone to be who they're meant to be is unacceptable and sad because if the people who cancelled the prom due to the fact that those girls were gay and would make other students "uncomfortable," were told to hide something that they should be proud of and open about, they would be outraged too. Today in society people have become so insensitive and unaccepting to people who are different and they don't understand that those people are exactly like the rest of us, but they just have a different preference in gender. This girl should have been allowed to dress the way she wanted and taken whoever she wanted, it was the night in high school that was supposed to be memorable, but instead the jerks in charge decided to tell a student to hide who they are so everyone else could have a good time and that's wrong. Nobody should ever be discriminated against for liking the opposite sex, like the words in "Same Love," "I can't change, even if I try," nobody should have to change to please other people.
