Tennessee state Senator Stacey Campfield's
portrait will remain on Vestal High School's Hall of Fame despite his
anti-gay comments.
Some graduates of the southern New York
high school had called on the school board to remove Campfield from
the Hall of Fame. They argued that his views on homosexuality and
the origins of HIV/AIDS disqualify him for the honor.
Campfield is the chief sponsor of a
bill dubbed “Don't Say Gay,” which would outlaw the discussion of
sexual minorities in Tennessee's public schools before the ninth
grade.
Appearing on Sirius XM's The
Michelangelo Signorile Show to
discuss the controversy surrounding his bill, Campfield
asserted that “AIDS came from the homosexual community” when host
Michelangelo Signorile asked, “What's harmful about
[homosexuality]?”
“It was one guy screwing a monkey, if
I recall correctly, and then having sex with men. … It was an
airline pilot, if I recall.”
“My understanding is that it is
virtually – not completely, but virtually – impossible to
contract AIDS through heterosexual sex. … [It is] very rarely
[transmitted vaginally],” Campfield insisted as Signorile denied
the claim.
“Senator Stacey Campfield's unabashed
homophobic rhetoric and his blatant ignorance regarding how AIDS is
transmitted serves only to oppress, hurt and diminish the dignity of
other human beings while at the same time fueling the cause of
bullies everywhere,” said John Perricone, a Vestal Class of 1977
graduate. “Displaying his picture on Vestal's Wall of Fame
disgraces and tarnishes this school's reputation. We simply ask that
Vestal's BOE remove his picture so that our pride in our Alma Mater
can be restored.”
Vestal Central Schools Superintendent
Mark LaRoach told WBNG
Action News that the Hall of Fame is not an endorsement of views.
“It is a lesson in civics. We're
blessed, in this country, to have the safe-guards of a constitution.
We may not agree, and we may find it offensive, what other
individuals may say in a public forum. It does not mean that we're
going to abridge those comments, unless they occur in our buildings
and would be hurtful and certainly negative to the development of
young people,” LaRoach said.