Today marks the eighth annual National Day of Silence. One of the more recent and less well-known civil rights events, the Day of Silence Project was organized to highlight the silence many gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender Americans are forced to live with.

Today and every day, countless GLBT Americans must hide their true selves in a closet of silence for fear of rejection and possible harm by friends, co-workers, employers, religious leaders and sometimes even family. When they break out of this forced quiet, many are confronted with a new form of silence in lost friendships and tattered family ties. And all GLBT Americans face the quandary of second-class citizenship in this nation where their love, and their identity, dare not speak its name.

The National Day of Silence attempts to turn this terrible paradigm upon its head and use intentional, dramatic silence to highlight the more deadly kind that gays, lesbians and other sexual orientation minorities face every day. It is a calm that calls attention to a storm too often overlooked in daily American life. Many SMU students will be participating in this year’s display of wordless defiance.

The Editorial Board could show its support for their cause by running another editorial in support of gay rights, against Texas’ bigoted sodomy laws or in favor of equality. We could add more words to a day that is not supposed to have any.

But instead, we will do our part by joining in the silence . . .