It's a real shame Fayetteville is made up of the most distrustful, divided population in Arkansas.
Is that description off the mark? My wife was raised in Fayetteville and I arrived 19 years ago and we've always felt Fayetteville was a town full of people who enjoy debate but who, day in and day out, get along pretty well with one another no matter what their differences. I bought into the notion Fayetteville was a town that welcomed everyone who wanted to contribute to the community. When the mayor consistently declares "I love this city," I assume it's because Fayetteville has far more positive attributes than negatives and that its people are pretty outstanding.
In recent days, however, it's been hard to see that Fayetteville. The population was dragged into battling encampments by Alderman Matthew Petty's sponsorship of the Human Rights Campaign's so-called civil rights ordinance. The City Council adopted the measure in August by a 6-2 vote. Will that 75 to 25 percent tally reflect what Tuesday's final vote will be?
My use of the term "so called" shouldn't be interpreted as suggesting the ordinance is not an effort to protect someone's rights, but the ordinance cannot be so easily summed up with a title that evokes visions of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., lunch counter sit-ins and fire-hosed demonstrators. One Little Rock commentator said only one question is on Tuesday's ballot: Are you for legal discrimination or against it?
That, of course, is ludicrous. If the Fayetteville City Council had adopted a measure that was that clear and concise, Tuesday's vote wouldn't even be happening. Nobody could have collected 4,000-plus signatures to force the issue onto the ballot. Describing the ordinance so simplistically is tantamount to saying one's stance on immigration reform is either pro-American or anti-American. It's more complicated than that, and so is the ordinance on Tuesday's ballot.
What can hardly be disputed, however, is how this ordinance has transformed the perception of Fayetteville among people within its own borders. People who formerly touted all the wonderful reasons Fayetteville is their chosen homes have allowed the divisive nature of this issue to redefine their perspective. For some on both sides of this divide, Tuesday's vote will be the litmus test for whether Fayetteville is a community they can embrace.
One supporter of the ordinance declared in social media the other day that he was already making plans to curtail spending and involvement in Fayetteville should the measure be repealed. He simply did not want to support a bigoted community.
Fayetteville, like the ordinance, should not be viewed so simplistically. If Fayetteville is a town you've loved for years -- for its intense debates, its eclectic people, its geography, its wonderful events -- Tuesday's outcome shouldn't become a take-it-or-leave-it proposition. Don't we love Fayetteville's complexities?
A view that falsely recasts Fayetteville by the worst imagery of this campaign -- as solely a protector of bigotry or as a place that embraces pedophiles in public restrooms -- is an odd outcome of the Human Rights Campaigns' decision to press its advocacy in Fayetteville. It's not because Fayetteville was a place where civil rights were being trampled that the national organization for gay rights decided to seek a foothold of victory in a small Southern state. Instead, it's precisely because Fayetteville is known as welcoming that this organization believed victory was within reach. There are dozens of other towns in Arkansas where a gay person -- heck, any person viewed as "different" by monolithic populations -- no doubt would see far more discrimination than in Fayetteville. The Human Rights Campaign didn't tackle a city rife with discrimination. The group didn't come to Fayetteville because the town is full of bigots, but because it is a place where people generally live and let live.
The town still, however, has a streak of Ozark independence and doesn't always take kindly to being manipulated by an outside influence, especially when the city's elected leaders had never broached the need for such legislation based on their own knowledge and experiences. Some view this ordinance as Fayetteville being on the cutting edge, at least within Arkansas; others believe the elected leaders have allowed the city to be manipulated to the national organization's purposes.
However one votes, and whatever the outcome of Tuesday's election, Fayetteville can still be embraced by all as the wonderful place it is to live, work and play. The town is far, far more than a single issue or election. That's why people on both sides have loved it for years, and will for years to come.
GREG HARTON IS OPINION PAGE EDITOR FOR NWA MEDIA.
Commentary on 12/08/2014