Yesterday in Alabama, a few fans of the Spanish Fort Toros high school football team announced to the world, via this shot on ESPN, that purple is “gay.” The Toros played and beat the Daphne Trojans but in the stands these fans (image, top,) took time out from their Labor Day weekend barbecues to gather their friends and go to the store and buy paint, brushes, and paper, to make a nasty, homophobic sign to prove how “straight” they are.
“PURPLE? Man, that’s Gay,” the sign reads.
Welcome to Alabama.
Image via Imgur
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{ 12 comments }
Gosh…and here I thought purple was just a mixture of red and blue…
Hey, it's Alabama; what would you expect?
Great, well I love purple too
Actually, back in the old days before the pink triangle became a major symbol of pride out of oppression, purple really was gay. Well, lavender. As in "the lavender scare" (know your herstory as Margaret Cho would say) and then "lavender menace".
In antiquity purple was by far the most expensive color and reserved for the aristocracy and the highest offices
HAHA….it's funny because I don't like purple and I'm gay. Now cobolt blue, that's where it's at! Wait, don't let them know that down in Alabama! They might somehow associate cobolt blue with being gay and ban it outright!
Oh wait, they'd have to learn to SPELL it first. :-/ (Sees signs for "Ban Kobult Blu" popping up) LOL
so close- cobalt blue I believe is what your joke hinges on.
That sounds like something that idiot Pat Robertson would say. In fact, didn't he go off on a teletubbie? Dylan sang a blues about the Birch Society, first on a bootleg album, then a studio release. He said that before it was all over, Birchers would be looking for commu-in-ists under the kitchen refrigerator. What he meant was, when the far right nutjobs get this far out, we should ignore them. When I was in grade school I made certain to avoid green on Thursdays. That was because only homos wore green on Thursdays. It goes on and on. Zits on your face because you jerk off. Hair between your girlfriend's eyebrows means she is a werewolf. And so on and so forth.
I am a student and coaches assistant at Spanish Fort, and I feel that I should post a reply here in response to some of your comments about the sign. This sign was not sponsored or encouraged at all by the school, and in fact it was removed by school administration about three-quarters of the way through the game. The students holding the sign clearly were not thinking about the potential consequences of their actions, because now our school will be forever immortalized on the web and elsewhere as the school that allegedly condones this kind of behavior. We do not at all encourage this kind of behavior, and personally, in my own opinion, I was outraged by it. Considering some of the students involved are members of my own senior class, it's even more shocking that they aren't mature enough to realize that something like this wouldn't exactly be the best way to represent the school on national TV. Especially since the word "gay" is not an adjective for bad or lame. Our principal made a school-wide announcement about the signage this morning talking about some of the emails he received about the signs, and he stated that he was ashamed and disappointed that the school, and the state as a whole would now be seen as a harbor for ignorance. He even went as far as to quote an email that said "what else could you expect from the South." He said that this really was hurtful to him, and said he would take any future inappropriate signage or behavior at athletic events very seriously. After seeing a photo of the sign on Facebook the evening after the game, I immediately sent an email to my principal with a photo of the sign so that he could address the issue. Clearly I was not the first person to point it out to him, which brings me some relief.
Regardless, please do not let this one-time event represent all of the students and faculty at the school in a negative light. Our principal gave a very stern warning about inappropriate signage at games, and he even stated that he would remove anyone taking part in this kind of unsavory activity from the athletic complex.
If anyone has any questions, you can contact me via email at the address I will post below:
spanishforttoros@gmail.com
Disclaimer: Any views or opinions presented in this comment/post are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of Spanish Fort High School or the Baldwin County Board of Education.
Shh! …don't tell them about PINK
I am so sorry this sign was posted at the game and I am even more ashamed that my face is in this picture. Half of the people holding up the sign did not know what it said. I refused to hold the sign. As soon as people realized what the sign said, they tried to get it down as soon as possible, but a few (idiotic) people kept putting the sign back up, and some people were still unaware of what it said. This sign by no means reflects Spanish Fort as a school and I am embarrassed that my fellow classmates decided to be idiotic on national tv.
This was the first time these two high schools played each other. The "purple" was referencing the color of the other teams jersey. "Man, that's gay" is something idiot kids say all the time without thought. My question to you David Badash is – what do you mean by welcome to Alabama? Do I have to point out all the idiots in this story?
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