May be you have heard about the story of a lesbian couple visiting Dolly Parton’s Splash Country, a water park near Dollywood, last month. One of them was wearing a t-shirt boldly showing a ‘Marriage is so gay’ message, and she was stopped at the gate by an attendant who told her to wear the t-shirt inside-out if she wanted admittance.
Dollywood P.R. manager Pete Owens explained:
‘Thousands of times a day our front-gate hosts are asked to enforce our dress code policy. It doesn't have anything to do with who the people are or what their belief system is … (W)e try to prevent as best as we can upon entry of the park one of our guests being offended by something someone else is wearing.’
Yeah Dollywood is in Tennessee, we have to keep this in mind. One of the two wrote to Dollywood to ask for more explanation. She noted that her wife had seen a few confederate flag shirts (very good point) and declared to NBC:
‘I was curious what he found offensive about the shirt. If it was the fact that it had the word 'gay' on it or that it was in conjunction with the word 'marriage.’
Oh I actually could answer to that question: both!
But Dolly Parton is a cool gal, she apologized to the couple, gave them a refund and issued this statement:
‘Everyone knows of my personal support of the gay and lesbian community. Dollywood is a family park and all families are welcome. We do have a policy about profanity or controversial messages on clothing or signs. It is to protect the individual wearing or carrying them, as well as to keep down fights or problems by those opposed to it at the park. We even offer free shirts in exchange to those who want to remain on the park.’
Dolly, who has a huge gay following by the way, did a good thing, but now, what about changing this policy? Can they define more clearly what controversial is? It’s pretty tricky because in this part of the country gay marriage still is profanity and blasphemy, there is no doubt the guard would not have stopped a ‘marriage is for a man and a woman’ t-shirt, even though it is offensive for a part of the population.