Keith Boykin, a nationally known activist who was once the highest-ranking openly gay official in the Clinton White House, will be speaking at the University Friday night.
Boykin’s speech, which will be in the EMU Ballroom at 5:30 p.m., is free and open to the public as part of the celebration of National Coming Out Week.
According to his Web site, Boykin is the founder of the National Black Justice Coalition, an organization which works for civil rights of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgendered people in the black community. He has written about the experience of being black and gay in America.
As an aide to President Clinton, Boykin helped organize the first meeting of members of the LGBTQ community with a sitting president, said Becky Flynn, the regional director of Basic Rights Oregon, who called that meeting “historic.”
Flynn said Boykin is the leading speaker in the country on the intersection of race and sexual orientation because he has written so much on the topic and because of his work in the White House. She said he was invited to speak because several organizations around Eugene wanted to bring a speaker to Eugene who could “address that intersection.”
“We do want to build bridges between the African-American community and the LGBTQ community and provide support for people in Eugene who are part of both communities but are in a position where they’re expected to represent one part of themselves or the other,” Flynn said.
The event is mainly sponsored by Basic Rights Oregon and the OUTLAWs, a LGBTQ law school organization, but several campus and community groups stepped up to help bring Boykin to the University.
“I’m hoping he’ll help people to understand that even though we have all these differences we can use those to our advantage to help each other out and work as a community, together,” said Emily Farrell, director of the OUTLAWs.
The sponsors had very little time to plan the event, as they only learned in September that Boykin would be making an appearance in Oregon – at OSU – for coming out week. The OUTLAWs and Basic Rights Oregon set out to find additional sponsors, Farrell said.
“I think that’s really a testament, how quickly people cut though the bureaucracy to make this happen. It shows how eager people are to hear what he has to say,” Flynn said.
Farrell said the various sponsors came up with the money for Boykin’s honorarium, travel and lodging in just three weeks.
“It’s pretty incredible,” she said.
Several departments around campus, including the School of Journalism and Communication and the College of Education, stepped up to help pay for advertising for the event. At a Sept. 26 meeting, the Student Senate voted unanimously to allocate $2,500 to the event, which Sen. Neil Brown said he was “giddy” to attend.
“We were so excited,” Farrell said. “We wouldn’t have been able to come up with it if the ASUO hadn’t helped. The fact that they unanimously voted in favor of our request illustrates that they’re very interested in promoting diversity on campus.”
Farrell said she thinks donations to sponsor the speech came from such a multi-disciplinary group of sponsors because people want to get involved in a cause that matters.
“I think diversity in general is something that affects everybody’s life and no matter who you are, it’s something that affects you,” she said. “This is a situation when we have someone who comes from a couple of different groups and he represents groups coming together and working together.”
Boykin’s speech begins at 5:30 p.m. Friday night and is free, but it is recommended that people show up as early as 4:30, Farrell said.
“It’s important enough that we wanted to make sure that people have access,” she said. “This is for absolutely everybody and we will not be charging for it.”
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