The Arkansas school board member whose anti-gay posts on Facebook have gained national recognition will resign his position.
Clint McCance has announced that he will be stepping down from his position in an effort to spare the school district from further bad press and distractions resulting from his Facebook postings.
McCance made national news this week due to anti-gay comments he had made on Facebook that insinuated he wanted gay people to commit suicide.
The comments were in response to a to a campaign that GLAAD was conducting to bring awareness to the bullying that goes on against gay youth. As part of the campaign the group initiated Spirit Day on October 2o, when they asked the public to wear purple to honor those students who had recently committed suicide after being bullied.
The screenshot taken of McCance’s comment showed him using the terms fag and queer and saying that the only way he would wear purple for them is if “they all committed suicide”. He expressed his belief that the world had “gotten stupid” and was honoring people for sinning and killing themselves because of their sin.
The comments led to criticism from education officials on a local and state level. Tom Kimbrell, Arkansas commissioner of education, made a statement that he condemned the statements and they were a “significant departure” from what is expected of school leaders.
Midland School District, where McCance was a Vice President, has denounced the statement and expressed its desire to foster an environment free from bullying in its schools.
The State Department of Education shared its dismay at the public posting of such insensitive comments.
News of the postings led to the creation of a Facebook page aimed at urging the district to fire McCance. As of Thursday evening 60,000 people had ‘liked’ the page.
McCance expressed his apologies on Thursday as he made his statement. He shared that he was sorry for making ignorant comments and hurting people with his words. According to McCance he would never support suicide as an option and does not support the bullying of others. He extended an apology to the families who have recently lost children and to the children who felt they had no other alternative.
McCance said since the news became public he has received phone calls, hate mail and death threats to his family. He has had to send his family out of the state while he installs security at their home. His reaction was that he had “reaped what he had sown”.
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