“I'm just like any other average citizen around here," Cody Barlow tells NewNowNext, "straight, white, and Christian.”

Cody Barlow didn’t expect this to happen.

A 28-year-old college student at Northeastern State University in Tahlequah, Oklahoma, Barlow couldn’t go to Tulsa Pride with his friends because he was helping some family members move the same day. So instead he decorated the tailgate of his 1991 Chevrolet Silverado pickup truck in rainbow duct tape, along with a message spelled out in mailbox letters: “Not all country boys are bigots. Happy Pride month.”

In a phone conversation with NewNowNext, Barlow claims his goal was to bring the spirit of Pride to his small town of Hulbert, a community of just 543 people located 50 miles from the Arkansas border. Hulbert is known for its abundant fishing and wildlife, as well as a Benedictine monastery located on the outskirts of town.

“Originally, I was going to paint the entire truck in the design of the Pride flag, but it ended up not working out,” he says. “I still wanted to do something.”

Cody Barlow

Since Barlow posted a photo of his truck on Facebook last Thursday, the post has gone massively viral. In a caption that accompanies the picture, he says the display is dedicated to the “countless people [who] have dealt with hatred and judgement [sic] simply for who they are.”

“Obviously doing this isn’t going to change the minds of those who are intolerant,” he wrote on June 6, “but hopefully it can help drown out the hatred with love.”

At the time of writing, that post has amassed more than 20,000 comments and 80,000 shares. In addition, Barlow says he has received thousands of more messages in his personal inbox from “all around the world.” According to Barlow, people have written in from “different countries, several continents, and pretty much every U.S. state.”

Some wrote in to say they were in some “pretty dark places” when they saw his message, Barlow claims.

“They felt like there was no hope,” he says. “They told me that [my message] lifted their spirits. This can’t be easy for somebody to reach out and tell a complete stranger something like that.”

One of the things that has garnered so much interest in Barlow’s story—which has been covered by publications like USA Today, CNN, HuffPost, CBS News, and the New York Post—is that he is, in his own words, a “straight dude driving a jacked-up truck in Oklahoma.”

“I’m just like any other average citizen around here: straight, white, and Christian,” he claims.

Cody Barlow

Barlow certainly fits his community’s demographics to a tee. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, Cherokee County—despite its large Native American community—has a population that is 52% white. Although he was deployed in the Navy and didn’t receive an absentee ballot in time for the 2016 election, his county went for Donald Trump by a 27-point margin in 2016. So did every other county in Oklahoma.

While Barlow says he didn’t know any LGBTQ people growing up in rural Oklahoma, serving in the military for four years alongside out servicemembers educated him about the struggles they’ve faced for acceptance in their homes and families.

“Growing up in this kind of town, you don’t ever really hear about [the LGBTQ community] because most people are afraid to come out,” Barlow explains. “They don’t want to come out because they’re afraid of what’s gonna happen. They don’t want to be shunned from their community.”

However, Barlow says the moment that everything came together for him was when a friend told him they were afraid to come out to him because “they didn’t want to lose [him] as a friend.”

That hit him really hard, Barlow says.

“How can somebody be so close to me and be afraid to tell me something?” he asks. “That just made me feel really bad that somebody would be afraid to tell someone that they were so close to who they are and who they love.”

Barlow hopes that his Pride message reaches other straight people, both in Oklahoma and across the country, who haven’t had the opportunity to know a member of the LGBTQ community. While a 2016 survey from Pew Forum found that 87% of U.S. adults say they know a queer person, that leaves 13%—or about 30 million people—who don’t. Over 160 million people have never met someone who is trans.

Cody Barlow

As an ally to the community, Barlow knows he has a certain responsibility to help further acceptance among other straight people. While he claims some members of the local community have given him “dirty looks,” others yell “I saw you on Facebook!” or “Thank you!” as they see his rainbow tailgate driving by.

Barlow maintains that the reaction has been “overwhelmingly positive,” even despite a smattering of hate mail here and there.

“By the time I actually get to read one of the negative messages, 30 or 40 people have already gone after them,” Barlow claims. “For me to deal with the negativity that’s come in my way, that’s nothing compared to what people in the community are dealing with.”

His one regret, however, is that he hasn’t gotten to meet any of the people who have reached out to him on Facebook. Barlow is hoping to rectify that later this month, when he is slated to appear at Northwest Arkansas Pride in Fayetteville and Oklahoma City Pride. He is planning to drive his truck, which he claims will be decorated for Pride the rest of the month.

“I want to actually be able to talk to people face-to-face, shake their hand, or give them a hug,” Barlow claims. “I want to thank them for opening up, give some more encouragement, and let them know that it’s okay. Keep going, keep your head up.”