University of Virginia Library

Who Determines Decency?

Imagine the screams of horror Student
Council's allocation of $45 to the Gay
Student Union would have caused a few years
ago. In fact, it is hard to imagine such a group
even enjoying the freedom to appear before
the Student Council with a request for money
a few years ago. The aspersions and hate that
would once have engulfed the University at
such an announcement are fortunately absent
today, but we have not come so far that such a
thing does not still raise a few eyebrows, if
not a little ire.

What is the appropriate response to this
Student Council action? We might say it
should be applause for the courageous stand
taken by those who supported the measure.
Or we might say that it should be anxiety for
the future of the Student Activities Fund as it
presently exists. But, no, neither of these
reactions seem to address the actual event and
its ramifications.

First of all, under the present criteria for
Student Activities Fund allocations, it is
difficult to find a reason why the Gay
Student Union should not have been funded.
It is an organization which promotes activities its
small membership enjoys just as does the
Rifle Club or the Chess Club. Just because
the Commonwealth of Virginia considers
certain homosexual acts illegal, that does not
necessarily mean that the Commonwealth is
right. Indeed, the larger question that must be
faced is not what sexual activities should be
illegal, but whether the state has the right to
outlaw certain private mutually-agreeable
relationships.

To say this, however, is not to make the
issue one of awful moment to the University.
It is not, and it should not be. Those who
supported the measure should not be hailed as
heroes just because they stood up for a
potentially dangerous position any more than
those who opposed it should all be chastised
as reactionaries. Instead, those who supported
this funding should be commended for being
consistent enough not to select the Gay
Student Union as the sacrificial lamb required
to quiet the forces of true reaction
represented by Christian White, Bill Hurd, and
their cohorts at Tuesday's meeting.

Granted, there is serious opposition to
mandatory student funding nationally and we
sympathize with Mr. Sabato's concern for the
future of the Student Activities Fund.
Nonetheless, Council would have set a truly
unfortunate precedent in denying funds to
the Gay Student Union simply because such
funding may potentially add ammunition to
the attack against mandatory fees.

Bill Hurd, an effective articulator of every
anti-libertarian position which fortunately
has been in disrepute since the swan-song of
the Old U., has claimed that no student
should have to support organizations opposed
to his political or moral beliefs. In claiming
that Tuesday's action shows the Council to be
"trampling upon student opinion, justice, and
moral decency," Mr. Hurd has shown the
incredible arrogance of assuming to speak for
student opinion.

We do not pretend to know what student
opinion is on this issue, but Mr. Hurd's
opinion does not coincide with ours, and we
too are students. In fact many students, less
morally self-righteous than Mr. Hurd but
equally concerned with how their money is
spent, are probably not pleased with
supporting clubs which encourage shooting
guns or dodging the draft. Each of us has his
own peculiar set of morals and values just as
each of us has his own pet club or
extracurricular activity. Since when is a
handful of students who are disgusted with
homosexuality vested with the responsibility
to protect the public against deviations from
"moral decency?" The Student Council has
the right, if anyone does, without resorting to
plebiscite, to determine the allocation of the
Student Activities Funds.

It is time for us in the University
community as well as in the nation to protect
our freedoms from those self-styled morally
superior individuals who are always waiting
around for an opportunity to protect us from
ourselves.