Same-sex formal turns three
The throng of more than 400 young Victorians who converged on Collingwood last Saturday were not from the same graduating year, same school or even the same town.
But they all supported the right of their friends to take whoever they liked to the school dance, marking the third Same-Sex Formal held in Melbourne.
The event is run by youth support organisation Minus18 and its general manager Micah Scott said this year’s event was slightly bigger than last year.
“Every single year we get more and more young people coming along but as well, more people are sponsoring tickets and we’re getting more and more people contacting us before the formal wanting to help out and get involved,” he said.
“We had lots of people coming from regional Victoria, we had people from Sale and people from Warrnambool.
“I guess part of it is that it is our third event so news is spreading but I think as well, in regional areas there is that chance of feeling isolated.”
The first same-sex formal took place in 2010 but did not continue in 2011 due to a lack of funding. It was held again last year where almost 400 young people attended.
More than $2,500 was donated from the public to allow up to 110 young folk who may have faced some disadvantage to attend the formal free of charge.
Scott said the feedback he was receiving about sponsored tickets was that many LGBTI adults did not want today’s young people to miss out on something that hadn’t been available to them.
“That’s the sad reality that a lot of people didn’t feel comfortable or weren’t allowed or didn’t know their own identity at the time so if they can help out someone else who’s going through exactly what they went through… that’s pretty awesome,” he said.
He summed up this year’s event with an encounter with one of the young lesbians and a group of her straight friends who attended.
“Her straight friends were saying it was amazing and that they had never seen her around her lesbian friends, she was so comfortable,” he said.
“It was something they had never considered before and to see that their friend was comfortable and part of a bigger group made them really happy.”
