Pride, a student government agency that serves and increases awareness for the issues and concerns of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender students, staged two flash mobs on campus this October. Characterized by spontaneity, the flash mob tactic has become a popular marketing method called guerrilla marketing and thrives off the power of word of mouth.

“The idea came from an anti-smoking ad,” said John Dougherty, director of Pride.

He believes that if the tactic could convey the negative effects of smoking, then the tactic could also convey the negative effects of LGBTQ bullying.

During Market Wednesday on Oct. 13, a group of around twenty students wearing black shirts marched into the Union. They were all wearing duct tape over their mouths and had  “NOH8” painted on their cheeks, similar to those who posed for the silent photo protest against California’s Proposition 8, known as the NOH8 Campaign.

For a brief moment, they stood in silence holding hands with blank stares on their faces. One member waved a large rainbow flag, and they all dispersed into the lunch hour crowd as the audience cheered.

A week later, on Oct. 20, Spirit Day was not only designated by a Facebook group calling for people to wear purple in memory of the suicides, it was the day Pride staged a more enduring demonstration.

The group divided itself throughout high traffic locations on campus that included Strozier library, Ogelsby Union, and the Wescott fountain. Once at their locations, members simply lay on the ground. Some stayed for fifteen minutes, others for up to three hours.

They wore purple shirts – the color representing spirit on the LGBTQ flag.  On the shirts, they wore flyers displaying statistics, like that 42% of LBTQ youth that have reported being bullied in school vs. 21% of heterosexual youth, according to Lambda LGBT Youth Risk Data. Members held a smaller version of the flyer in their hands for anyone to pick up.

As a member of Pride lay next to the Westcott fountain, many students arriving at the bus stop and leaving Diffenbaugh would walk by and take notice. Jesus Hernandez was one of a few students who approached him.

“At first I thought he was tanning but then I saw the rainbow flyer and just knew,” said Hernandez.

He found the tactic helpful to their cause because it portrayed the statistics.

“It’s just like when a soul falls down,” said Hernandez.

That is precisely the message Pride aimed to deliver with this demonstration. Having participated in both flash mobs, Megan McKenzie, a junior, believes they are effective in raising awareness.

“People are most likely to notice us lying flat on the ground with our fliers than if we were just handing out fliers like every other cause on campus,” said McKenzie. “Seeing as I went through about four stacks of fliers, I’d say it was pretty successful.”

McKenzie has been a member of Pride since her freshman year and was involved with of Gay Straight Alliance at her high school.  She believes raising awareness is important to making most people understand the severity of the situation and prevent it from recurring.

“Homophobia kills people both through suicides and murders,” said McKenzie. “If people treated our LGBTQ brothers and sisters as equals, this would never happen.”