COLUMN: With a strip club on the horizon, the Airport Road dump has come full circle (with POLL)

First a caveat: I can say narrow-minded and puritanical things today or any other Saturday because 1) The Editor Mr. Hatfield can always refuse to print any of my rantings,  2) I’m old enough that I can get away with being blunt, and 3) I don’t get paid for this gig, so I’m not afraid of being fired. So, there.

Once upon a time, Airport Road was not Airport Road. There was no airport, nor anything else out that way. It was a rough stretch of dust and potholes, but it served its purpose. Known then as “Garbage Dump Road,” it led to our little village’s dumping ground for residential trash back in the 1950s. Back then, Destin’s children loved to climb into the back of Daddy’s truck and accompany the garbage out to the appointed spot.

Then came, with paving, the modest homes, small businesses, later a hospital (now gone), and a small air strip.

And, the people looked upon it all and declared it good.

In 1982, Safe Harbor Presbyterian was built on the corner of Airport and Main across from the Texaco station. The Destin Log moved there from its tiny quarters on Marler Street in 1984. And the people declared it good.

The garbage dump became a fading memory for old residents. But the people still declared it good.
Now the garbage dump is back, but it’s not for coffee grounds, banana peels, egg shells, and yard debris. It’s a dump for another kind of trash. And I can only hope Destin’s decent people will look upon it and declare it NOT GOOD.

It doesn’t take an empirical study or a fortune teller to predict the escalation in crime that will descend on Destin with the advent of a strip club, whether it’s on Airport Road or anywhere else in town. And it really makes no difference whether or not nude dancers gyrate four feet or six feet from the drooling, drunken, and debauched patrons.

The concessions from Mr. Stephenson that newspaper advertising will be limited and non-explicit is a no-brainer for him. The average deviant doesn’t read a newspaper anyway. At least, we’ll be spared the pornographic billboards as long as we don’t travel out of Okaloosa, Walton, or Santa Rosa counties. Advertising in the wee hours on radio and TV and painting the building beige instead of screaming red will also make no difference.

A drunk in heat will follow his nose to the spot without any media directions. But oh, goody, he agrees to operate only one topless club in Destin. So, what would prevent other erotically inclined entrepreneurs from following suit once the precedence has been established?

After all, they would say, “It’s only fair.”

Interestingly enough, it seems the city has promised to expedite the construction of the club once it has an exact location in Destin’s Industrial Zone.  Funny, I remember when my church was building an addition, the permit authorities turned it into a lengthy ordeal of one obstacle after another. We joked at the time, “Gee, if we were building a topless bar, we’d probably get permitted immediately.” Words of prophecy.  

Laissez les bons temps rouler, and bring on the rampant crime that will follow.

Color me judgmental, Bible-thumping, and bigoted, but don’t ever paint me in the colors of compromise like some of our council members. Thank you, Dewey Destin and Jim Bagby for realizing that soulless compromises are made by an “appeaser {who} feeds a crocodile, hoping it will eat him last” (Winston Churchill).

But, then, there’s another old saying about how “a lean compromise is better than a fat lawsuit” (George Herbert). The lawsuit thing seems to be the stimulus behind the decision to allow the establishment of our first (but not last) strip club in Destin. Shakespeare said that “the evil that men do lives after them.”

I think we’re going to find out the truth of that statement the hard way as the garbage dump re-appears, but this time as a refuse heap for human lives.

If we can find any blessing in this obscenity, I’m kind of pleased that strippers, their clients, and assorted criminals will congregate in the shadow of a church. I have heard that Safe Harbor has a heart for lost souls, so maybe the new club will become a “field white unto harvest” for them.

I’m winding down now, but don’t bother leaving hate mail for me on the Log’s Web site. I don’t read them.
Hey, how about re-naming Airport Road, “Sodom and Gomorrah Parkway”?
 
Mary Ready of Destin is a twice-retired English teacher and long-time area resident. Her columns are published on Saturdays.

_______

WHAT DO YOU THINK?

This is your last chance to vote in our online poll at the right-hand side of the page.

_______

A COLLECTION OF COVERAGE

EDITORIAL: Idealism, reality and nude dancing

EDITORIAL: Isn't under oath enough for city after Oasis bares it all

EDITORIAL: Oasis makes a mole hill out of a Mountain

EDITORIAL: The naked truth: Strip clubs can lead to trouble

EDITORIAL: Family matters, but does a topless bar?

THE ANATOMY OF A TOPLESS BAR LAWSUIT 

Pastors gear up for 'spiritual warfare' as city vows to fight

Secondary harm: Destin's case against strip clubs