I highly disagree with the majority of the claims Ginny Robinson makes in her critique of the Love is Love campaign ("Love is propaganda?," Feb. 15). Her arguments are flawed on many levels. First of all, I would hope that in claiming that the entire student body was scammed into supporting a subliminal campaign for gay rights, thereby making our entire student body unintelligent, that she has performed some sort of laboratory study of our student body - a study that carefully examines and analyzes students' feelings toward the campaign, with carefully controlled variables and multiple means for controlling for biases. Otherwise, there is no way she is able to give a fair and impartial rendering of the student body's opinion. I am at a complete loss as to how she surmised that wearing a t-shirt in support for a campaign of any sort makes any of us unintelligent.
Another problem that I see in this argument is the extremely broad analogies she has made comparing random, past political campaigns to the LGBT Resource Center's Love is Love campaign. Here, I am referring to "the Bolshevik Party's 'peace, land, and bread'" diatribe. If she did her research, she would find that the Resource Center is not political in any way. All the money that is given to the LGBT Resource Center comes from the Serpentine Society: UVA's LGBT alumni network. It is highly offensive for the LGBT community to be accused of manipulating students through some sort of subliminal political campaign. I think other students would agree the only thing that we manipulated with this campaign was Valentine's Day. The message itself did not serve as a political statement, but rather as a means for spreading awareness of the LGBT community at UVA. It gives both LGBT individuals and allies an opportunity to support all love, in a bipartisan manner.
My next problem is an echo of my last critique. Each person who received a shirt was supposed to receive written information about the campaign and write down his e-mail address for future contact. Trained volunteers in the Resource Center also articulated the meaning of the campaign to each visitor asking for a shirt. In my opinion, the Resource Center had no other duty beyond articulating the campaign as we all saw fit and had agreed upon. As I said before, the message is not political in any way. And as far as social support goes, there is absolutely nothing wrong with students putting support behind the LGBT community, whether it is attending Live Homosexual Acts, the Laramie Project, or wearing a Love is Love t-shirt. The reason the shirts were free was not because the Resource Center has a limitless supply of money. Rather, they were made free because the Operations Board, under guidance from Dean Edward Warwick, coordinator for LGBT Student Services, deemed the campaign functional and empowering for the support of the LGBT community at the University. Therefore, enough money was allocated to keep the t-shirts free for students and faculty.
With respect to Ginny's claim that "the LGBT did not even put its logo on the shirts," let me address two important misconceptions. First of all, I personally talked to Dean Warwick about these shirts for the 2010 campaign. The reason the LGBT logo was not put on the t-shirts was purely a matter of cost. As I already stated, we handed out a plethora of information about the campaign with each shirt. This was an effort to spread the word about the t-shirts and the meaning of the campaign while keeping the cost at a minimum. My second point addresses the language in which she addresses the LGBT community members in her article. It seems evident that Robinson knows very little about the LGBT community. She addresses the community as "the LGBT," as if all LGBT individuals are one single entity. This sort of language is highly offensive - the community is not a singular noun. Rather, we are individuals, with varying and contrasting ideals and beliefs. If she was going to address the LGBT community, she should have made herself aware of basic LGBT terminology, which was also handed out with each shirt.
Lastly, I would like to draw on a final note as to the point of Ginny's article. I assume the purpose of this article was to tear a hole in the Love is Love campaign. Well, as I have shown, her arguments were rather varied and flawed, mostly based off of her own assumptions and a few random and unfounded claims about other students, the whole student body, and the LGBT resource center. However, aside from this, her recommendation to reconsider the Love is Love campaign and how it promotes its message comes without any real advice as to how we can accomplish this. Therefore, it is rather hard to decipher exactly what her critique of the Love is Love campaign is. If she was indeed only criticizing the student body and how "malleable" it is, then she should reconsider her language and make her argument clearer. However, it seems as though the critique was more directly aimed at the Love is Love campaign and the LGBT community itself. If this is the case, then she spent very little time considering her argument against the entire campaign. It most certainly was not a paradoxically candid and tricky effort to con students into wearing t-shirts in support of gay rights. Additionally, it did not just consist of giving away free t-shirts. Rather, the campaign sought to make the student body aware of the LGBT community by asking students to show their support by expressing their openness to love for and amongst all members of the University community. As a member of the Operations Board that helped approve this campaign, I am rather pleased with the outcomes and hope to see a comeback during my fourth year.
Nicholas Gunter is the coordinator of the LGBT Resource Center's Speaker's Bureau.
Read More
CARTER: U.Va. Health owes clarity to transplant patients
By Nathaniel Carter | 7 hours agoUnfortunately, this negative press is fully the fault of U.Va. Health — it failed to address significant stakeholder concerns when crafting its justification.
EDITORIAL: Upholding medical amnesty is a collective effort
By Editorial Board | YesterdayUniversity leadership, Greek life organizations and students themselves must recommit to the safety provided by an effective and knowledgeable use of medical amnesty.
KURTZWEIL: Dockworkers’ unions cannot avoid the threat of automation
By Paul Kurtzweil | 2 days agoInstead of continuing to demand decreased automation, the union should work with the legislature in the hopes of driving investment into the reorganization of the current workforce.
