Fulton, MS: For the past month, the sleepy town of Fulton, Mississippi had been inundated by civil rights legislation that, for once, isn’t racially inspired. Instead, the focus has been on one lonely lesbian and her tuxedo.
The Constance McMillen story has garnered quite a reputation, as the ACLU, LGBT-friendly periodical The Advocate, and lesbian pixie talk-show host Ellen DeGeneres have made the situation a cornerstone for how
far gay rights and tolerance still needs to go in society. Miss McMillen was first barred from going to her Itawamba Agricultural High School Senior Prom in a tuxedo with her female date.
When a judge ruled in favor of McMillen, the school board proceeded to cancel the prom, prompting more media coverage and pressure to re-organize prom. The re-organization involved staging the prom at a local country club for McMillen, her girlfriend, four teenagers from the school’s special needs class, and the school’s mascot. Apparently, the rest of the school attended a secondary prom, located at the local community center which featured pigs-in-a-blanket, a boom-box with three mix CDs, and a square-dance-off competition.
Today, members of the school board finally spoke in behalf of their decisions up to now.
“Hello?! This is Mississippi. We’ve been about discrimination and segregation since our ancestors got their wagons stuck in the mud and said, ‘Well, guess we’re settin camp here!'” stated board-member Marsha Thompson.
“Everyone thinks we’re a town of evil people, but we’ve come a long way. It was only 6 years ago that we lynched some guy for giving mouth-to-mouth resuscitation to another man,” added PTA member Arnold Rivers.
Indeed, in light of the history of the state of Mississippi as a whole, many people wondered if this latest stance for civil rights would have little, if any, effect on its residents. Only two years ago, the city of Charleston had its first integrated prom, which only happened because city native Morgan Freeman offered to pay for the whole thing. Even then, most parents were wary of “that weird old black man” that wanted to party with their children.
“We’re really trying to get with the rest of the country in regards to civil rights and tolerance,” explained local resident Randall McGovern. “To our credit, we haven’t let loose anyone like Fred Phelps on the rest of the world for eighty years. To us, that’s progress.”
There are others that even question Constance McMillen’s motives for wanting to attend a normal Mississippi prom. “We actually thought we were doing Constance a favor by letting her have a party without a crowd of us sh*t-kicking hillbillies,” stated senior Brian Henderson. “She’s getting a scholarship from Ellen, so she’s getting what most of us want: out of this backwards-ass state.”