Why I Refuse To Attend My College’s LGBT Graduation Ceremony

LGBT icon Ellen DeGeneres once mused, “Do we have to know who’s gay and who’s straight? Can’t we just love everybody and judge them by the car they drive?” This was obviously a joke, but it contained a kernel of wisdom.

After coming of age in a time of gay oppression, with her show canceled after she came out as lesbian, DeGeneres knew that the full potential of American values could never be realized until all people, regardless of sexual orientation, were treated alike. So in a fair world, this means sexuality should be irrelevant to a student’s education.

Many modern campus progressives reject that vision. I recently realized just how far the LGBT left has strayed from this egalitarian mentality when I received a curious invitation from administrators at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, from which I’m set to graduate this May. The note invited me, a gay man, to attend a special “Rainbow Graduation,” an event supposedly “hosted every year to honor our graduating seniors within the LGBTQ community.”

I wasn’t flattered to receive this invitation, I was mortified. Self-segregated celebrations are the exact opposite of the egalitarian vision of gay rights I believe in, where all Americans ought to be treated the same, with sexual orientation little more than a footnote in our public life. Yet identity politics ideology has become so pervasive on college campuses and the progressive elite that they’re blinded to the individualism gay advocates once stood for. Now, they champion regressive groupthink.

How else could one possibly justify such a spectacle? The annual event regularly features keynote LGBT speakers, and is attended by LGBT students and their guests. Additionally, awards are given out to LGBT student leaders, sympathetic staff, and program participants. Interestingly, a “Spectrum” award is given to a student deemed most influential within the self-segregated LGBT residential community on campus.

These types of events send a chilling message about how progressives view LGBT students. Are we incapable of standing out from the student body on our own merits, rather than our sexual proclivities? What’s more, it reinforces the odd notion that sexuality alone is worth celebrating. No one should face discrimination or violence for his identity, but we also shouldn’t act like the sheer act of being gay is an accomplishment. It really isn’t, even if some people still do have to overcome additional obstacles due to their orientation.

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