BGALA offers resources to campus and provides necessary 'safe zone'

A moment should be taken to remind my learned friend Mr. Farnsley, from Tuesday's letter to the editor, that the Bisexual, Gay and Lesbian Association (BGALA) is not a club/organization, but a resource center that serves not only the student body, but faculty and staff which make up the whole of the campus population. BGALA has always been committed not only to the gay population but to everyone everywhere and its office serves as a Safe Zone to those who want and need to be in an unthreatening environment.

When last week I attended the senators' meeting as an interested member of BGALA, Sen.Garcia had indicated that we were a minority group. If we are, it is not by choice. And if we are as such, are Sens. Garcia and Sliger planning a review of other resource centers under the ASUA that are aimed directly at minorities? Have they been unaware that student enrollment declined slightly this year and that perhaps visible minority resources would play an integral role in an enrollment resurgence?

Sen. Sliger questioned also, at last week's meeting, the expenditure of funds for bringing in Dr. Bob Bernstein to give a lecture on his work with and for Parents and Friends of Lesbians and Gays (PFLAG) as its executive vice president. Both BGALA co-directors were asked by Sen. Sliger if such an expenditure was necessary. I wonder if such questioning would have come up had the senators imagined what it might be like as an adolescent being maligned publicly either by a friend or family member for dating someone of the same sex? Or had they seen that a mother and daughter in Dr. Berstein's audience had reconciled their differences regarding the daughter's sexuality because of his work? Certainly, they could not consider this an indication of moving away from family values, which, as we have seen in last year's national elections, still causes some considerable commentary and criticism. As senators and as students, both should be aware that BGALA's membership would be more than happy to see them enter its office and understand what it's about. Their failure to do so sends a pointed message. Perhaps, then, they would have seen that to remove BGALA from the ASUA's programs and services would be a step backwards towards fear and indifference instead of forward towards tolerance and understanding.

By Michael Cruz (letter)
Arizona Daily Wildcat
April 21, 1997