The measure was defeated, 58 percent to 42 percent, after a record number of ballots for a student government election were cast in last week’s referendum.
Although most Student Government Association elections have garnered 4 percent or less of the student body vote, 13.5 percent, or 4,895 of the 36,206 students enrolled at UNT, cast ballots in the referendum.
That means that 2,839 students at the University of North Texas voted to uphold heterosexism and maintain homophobia. It also means that 2,056 students at the University of North Texas voted against the homophobic and heterosexist majority.
I hope that this referendum is reversed. However, I do not expect the University of North Texas to be listed in the The Advocate College Guide for LGBT Students: A Comprehensive Guide to Colleges and Universities with the Best Programs, Services, and Student Organizations for LGBT Students.
Tags: discrimination, heterosexism, Higher Education, homophobia, LGBT, Social Justice, University of North Texas
Just because 2,839 students voted against the bill, that doesn’t mean UNT is a school that discriminates against the LGBT community. UNT is a great place for LGBT people. The votes of about 3,000 people do not represent the majority opinions of the UNT student population. UNT is not homophobic.
First of all, 2,839 students voted to discriminate against same-sex couples…if the majority of folks at UNT were in support of same-sex couples, they would have gone out and voted in support of the LGBT community. Talk means very little when policy making is what often decides the fate of a group of people. The silence of the many just allowed a large portion of homophobic individuals to dictate policy at UNT.
I wouldn’t call 2,839 students a large portion when UNT is a school of over 30,000.
Do you go to UNT? My guess is, probably not. So how can you claim that a school is homophobic when you have not experienced it first hand? You can not.
I do attend UNT so I can make a valid claim that it is not a homophobic place.
Approximately 3000 students aren´t very represantative. This are nearly 10 percent.
Approximately 3,000 students voted to maintain heterosexist values…about 2,000 voted for same-sex couples. That means that about 31,000 students were either apathetic, uninformed, homophobic, etc. How can anyone say that UNT is not a school that discriminates against the LGBT community when the majority did nothing to stand up against discrimination?
“Man’s inhumanity to man is not only perpetrated by the vitriolic actions of those who are bad. It is also perpetrated by the vitiating inaction of those who are good.” — Martin Luther King, Jr.