Articles tagged with: Mississippi
Constance McMillen, youth activist (LGBT History Month)
Constance McMillen became a poster child for LGBT rights after asking permission to bring her girlfriend to the prom. When her school responded by cancelling the prom, McMillen took legal action. Bent Alaska presents her story as part of our celebration of LGBT History Month 2011, with thanks to the Equality Forum.
Constance McMillen
“Stand up like I did. It was hard but it was worth it.”
Constance McMillen (born 1992) became a poster child for LGBT rights after asking permission to bring her girlfriend to the prom. When her school responded by cancelling the prom, McMillen took legal action.
As a senior at Itawamba Agricultural High School in Fulton, Mississippi, McMillen challenged the prom rules forbidding same-sex couples from attending and girls from wearing tuxedos. When the school cancelled the prom, students responded by harassing McMillen.
The ACLU filed a lawsuit requesting that the court order the school to hold an inclusive prom. The case was settled when a U.S. District Court ruled that McMillen’s First Amendment rights had been violated. The Itawamba County School District consented to a judgment in which it paid McMillen $35,000 and $81,000 in attorneys’ fees.
After the settlement, the school held a prom. Only McMillen and seven learning disabled students attended. Parents organized a separate prom that all other students attended, but to which McMillen was not invited.
The school district agreed to implement policies that would prevent future discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender identity for extracurricular and educational activities. This was groundbreaking for a Mississippi school district.
McMillen’s story received national attention. Glamour magazine named her Woman of the Year in 2010, and she appeared on national television shows including “The Ellen DeGeneres Show,” where she received a $30,000 scholarship. She was invited to the White House and served as Grand Marshal of the New York Gay Pride Parade.
McMillen transferred to a school in Jackson, Mississippi, and graduated in 2011. She enrolled at Northeast Mississippi Community College to study psychology.
Here’s the March 2010 Ellen Degeneres Show on which Constance McMillen appeared — and received, to her obvious astonishment, a $30,000 check from Tonic.com towards her education. Watch:
For more about Constance McMillen, visit the Tonic.com page about her, her LGBT History Month page, or the Wikipedia article about the prom controversy.
Photo credit: Constance McMillen at the 2010 GLAAD Media Awards, 17 April 2010. Photo by Greg Hernandez (greginhollywood on Flickr); used in accordance with Creative Commons license.
Court upholds right to attend Prom with a same sex date
Students have a First Amendment right to bring a same-sex date and wear gender non-conforming clothes to the prom, a federal court ruled today. School officials violated Constance McMillen’s rights when they canceled the prom rather than let her attend with her girlfriend and wear a tux.
“All I ever wanted was for my school to treat me and my girlfriend like any other couple that wants to go to prom,” said McMillen, an 18-year-old senior at Itawamba Agricultural High School in Fulton, Mississippi. “Now we can all get back to things like picking out our prom night outfits and thinking about corsages.”
School officials told McMillen that she could not arrive at the prom with her girlfriend, who is also a student at the school, and that they might be thrown out if any other students complained about their presence. The school board canceled the prom when the ACLU and the Mississippi Safe Schools Coalition demanded that the district reverse its decision.
In the 12-page ruling, the court wrote, “The record shows Constance has been openly gay since eighth grade and she intended to communicate a message by wearing a tuxedo and to express her identity through attending prom with a same-sex date. The Court finds this expression and communication of her viewpoint is the type of speech that falls squarely within the purview of the First Amendment. The Court is also of the opinion that the motive behind the School Board’s cancellation of the prom, or withdrawal of their sponsorship, was Constance’s requests and the ACLU’s demand letter sent on her behalf.” Further, the court says that since the school represented the private prom being organized by parents at a furniture store as open to all students, then the court expects that event will indeed invite McMillen and her girlfriend.
McMillen said that she plans to attend the “private” prom, but has also long planned to attend the Mississippi Safe Schools Coalition’s Second Chance Prom, to be held Saturday, May 8 in Tupelo. That event, sponsored by Green Day, Tonic.com, Iron Chef Cat Cora, and Lance Bass, among others, will be open to all LGBT students in the state, as well as straight students who are LGBT-supportive. The MSSC and the ACLU deal every year with complaints from LGBT students all over Mississippi who face resistance from their schools about bringing same-sex dates to proms or who don’t feel safe going to their own school proms.
“Today’s ruling isn’t just a win for Constance and her girlfriend – it’s a win for all the students at her school, and for all lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender students who just want to be able to be themselves at school without being treated unfairly,” said Kristy Bennett, Legal Director of the ACLU of Mississippi. “Public schools can’t just stomp on students’ free expression rights just because they don’t want to deal with these students, and if schools do try to do that they’ll be dealing with us.”
In Alaska, some LGBT students bring same sex dates to their school prom, if they feel comfortable doing that. Many don’t attend prom or bring an opposite sex friend to fit in. But they have the right to bring a same sex date, if they want to.
Alaska also has an alternate prom for LGBT students and their high school allies. The annual Pride Prom is the closing event for Day of Silence/Night of Noise, organized in Anchorage by the Gay-Straight Alliance student clubs.
