I’m seeing a lot of yelling and screaming on unofficial SCA social media regarding the recent passage of RFRA legislation in the state of Indiana, including a lot of impassioned pleas for people to contact the SCA Board of Directors and ask them to move the SCA 50 Year celebration event (to be held in June, 2016) to a different state. I disagree with moving it, for several reasons.
Before we get into that, let me tell you where I’m coming from, so you know my inbuilt biases and can appropriately frame what I have to say.
1. I’m a resident of the state of Indiana and have been my whole life.
2. I’m a member of the SCA, active within the Barony of Sternfeld – the most active local group near the site where the 50 Year Celebration is being held.
3. I’m not personally involved in the planning or organization of the 50-year event. But it is being held within 15 minutes of my house, and many of the event staff from our area are people I consider friends. I have seen the hard work that people are putting in to make this event happen.
4. I’m a supporter of the LGBTA community, as a straight ally. I believe that sexual orientation deserves to be considered just as much a protected class as others like age, gender, race, etc., and that discrimination against folks in these communities is a violation of their civil rights.
5. I know firsthand what it is like to be persecuted for being gay – throughout my middle school years I was targeted and bullied by several students in my grade for being gay. (Their reasoning: I don’t fit the profile of a typical “manly” man, so clearly, I must be gay.) I’ve been beaten, tripped, pushed into walls, spit on, and called names. And those in power at the school ignored my pleas for help. So I know what it’s like to be discriminated against for being gay.
6. I’m strongly against RFRA, as it was passed in Indiana. Both the intent, and the different wording make it a much more poisonous version of the law than the one other states have passed. There’s a lot of online debate as to whether the law is the same as it is in other states. I’ve seen sufficient evidence to indicate Indiana’s version is not the same RFRA as in other states as it can be applied to private interactions, not only to actions involving the government.
Having said that, attempting to move the SCA 50 Year event at this late hour is a bad idea all around. I’ve heard several arguments as to why we should pull up stakes and move the event. Allow me to comment on a few of them:
Myth 1: Gen Con said they are moving their convention and breaking their contract – we should do the same thing.
While Gen Con has indeed stated they were looking at the possibility of moving to a new state/venue if RFRA was passed in Indiana, they aren’t willing to break their contract to do so – they would make a move at the end of their current contract. Large events like this sign long-term contracts with their vendors. Gen Con is no different – in fact they have a contract through 2020.
I’m sure that the SCA has signed contracts for the 50 Year Celebration already. I am not a lawyer, but I’d imagine we cannot break those contracts without some sort of financial penalty, and that doing so may even open ourselves up to a lawsuit. Additionally, it is impractical to throw out all the work that has been done on the event so far, just to start over with just over a year to make all the arrangements.
Additionally, the Barony of Sternfeld, the Indianapolis SCA group, regularly uses this event site – it’s the best winter event site we’ve found, which is why we hold our Better War Through Archery event there each year. This year we are also holding our largest event (A Simple Day in the Country) there as well. This event site has been a fantastic boon to our local SCA group. If the SCA were to pull out now, I worry that it would damage our local group’s ability to get and use this site in the future. We’ve had a hard enough time finding event sites that meet both our needs and our budget – making it hard for our group to put on affordable events. Losing one of our best options would be difficult for us.
Myth 2: It will hurt the State of Indiana financially, which will help get the law overturned.
While it is absolutely true that the SCA 50 Year Celebration will have an economic impact on the area (obviously it will – I believe I heard an estimate of $2.5 million in local media), it is but a drop in the bucket compared to other events held in Indiana, such as Gen Con ($50 million each year), the NCAA Final Four ($71 million each year), and others, who have indicated their interest in pulling their events in the future if the law is upheld.
Additionally, several major corporations (Angie’s List, Salesforce, and others) have all stepped forward and stated they are cancelling/scaling back their plans for Indiana expansion due to the law. Likely totaling in hundreds of millions of dollars lost from the local economy. They’ve put an immense amount of pressure on the Indiana legislature to fix the problem.
In comparison, the economic impact (to Indiana) of moving the SCA 50 Year Celebration, a one time event, is negligible. Would it send a message? Perhaps. But given the many other loud voices in the local business community sending much bigger messages with a longer term financial impact, I’m not sure our message would be especially helpful.
Myth 3, etc: Atheists are in mortal danger if they visit our state. When purchasing condoms, people are required to indicate who they will be using them with. Etc. Most of these sorts of comments are coming from one or two fear-mongers who are being especially loud and offensive.
I’ve seen many of these arguments (some of them more than once). They are absurd. The RFRA, as passed in Indiana, does not trump other laws, such as laws against assault, murder, etc. The atheism example is especially bizarre – how does a gas station attendant know you are an atheist in the first place?
No where in this state are you seriously going to find a drug store that is going to ask specifics about what you plan to do with condoms you purchase – that’s just weird. As homophobic as a small minority of people are in this state, people in general tend to live and let live and mind their own business.
Most of the services used by people visiting the state for 50 Year will be in one of the following categories: Gasoline, Pharmacy, Restaurants, Groceries and Hotels. There’s not a lot of reason for the topic of religion or sexuality to come up in those contexts. Not impossible, but highly unlikely. If there are specific businesses that (by the time of the event) have signs saying they don’t serve certain people, they can be easily avoided – there’s tons of businesses that won’t care who you are – discrimination is bad for business!
In addition to it being harmful to the event and to the SCA to move the event, given the climate on the ground here in Indiana currently, I would be very surprised if RFRA stays on the books in its current form – there’s already movement towards fixing, removing, or replacing the bill. The national attention this issue has received has been extremely loud and has got quite a few politicians ready to fix the law to be more like the implementation in other states (where it is used to protect people’s religious freedoms, not to explicitly justify discrimination). This issue should be resolved long before the event actually happens.
Thanks,
Antonio Bellini (mka Dan McGillen)
SCA Member for 6 years, residing in the Barony of Sternfeld, Constellation, Middle Kingdom, Knowne World