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Rainbow-colored "Fagbug" is Unveiled at Sage

April 10th, 2008

Albany and Troy, NY – Sage Graduate School student Erin Davies won’t be driving around the country with the words “fag” and “u r gay” written all over her Volkswagen Beetle anymore. Instead, the 30-year-old art education student, whose car was vandalized in a downtown Albany parking lot this time last year, will drive around in a Beetle repainted in a rainbow of colors courtesy of the Volkswagen Corporation. The rainbow colors reflect the symbol of the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender community, the same symbol on the windshield sticker Davies suspects made her car a target for vandals.

The new rainbow-colored car will be unveiled on The Sage Colleges’ Russell Sage College (RSC) campus on Monday, April 21 at 2 p.m. followed by a gay pride march down 1st Street, up Division Street, over 2nd Street and back onto the campus. The unveiling and march will follow a talk given by Davies on Wednesday, April 16, at 11 a.m. in Bush Memorial Auditorium about this past year, which she spent touring the United States, showcasing the vandalized Beetle and trying to raise awareness about homophobia.

During her trip, Davies covered 45 states and put more than 50,000 miles on her car. The tour was taped for a documentary that’s currently being edited. Davies also plans to write a book about the experience. The documentary film will end with the one-year anniversary of the attack and the unveiling of the car. The National Day of Silence, which brings attention to anti-LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender) name-calling, bullying and harassment in schools, takes place this year on Friday, April 25. The attack on Davies’ car last year took place on the National Day of Silence.

This year’s National Day of Silence is being held in memory of Lawrence King, a California 8th-grader who was shot and killed Feb. 12 by a classmate because of his sexual orientation and gender expression. Davies was among hundreds of mourners gathered at a church in March to remember the eighth-grade boy who was shot to death inside a junior high school computer lab by a fellow student in what prosecutors called a hate crime.

Davies’ talk is on Wednesday, April 16 at 11 a.m. and the unveiling of the car and gay pride march are on the following Monday, April 21 at 2 p.m. in the Russell Sage campus courtyard along 1st Street between Congress and Division streets in Troy. Marchers will proceed down 1st Street, up Division Street and over 2nd Street and end right back in the RSC courtyard in front of Buchman Pavilion. 

For more information, call (518) 244-4593.

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About The Sage Colleges
The Sage Colleges is an independent comprehensive university with two four-year undergraduate colleges: Russell Sage College for women in Troy, N.Y and the coeducational Sage College of Albany. Through SCA's Sage After Work program, working adults with prior college credit can complete the bachelor’s degree in a flexible schedule and format. The coeducational Sage Graduate School offers master's and doctoral degrees on both campuses. 

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