One Town’s War on Gay Teens

This article… this hate is why we started this project.

One Town’s War on Gay Teens – Rolling Stone Magazine (online)

In Michele Bachmann’s home district, evangelicals have created an extreme anti-gay climate. After a rash of suicides, the kids are fighting back.

by: Sabrina Rubin Erdely

A candlelight vigil in Minneapolis for the victims of gay bullying.

© Richard Tsong-Taatarii/Minneapolis Star Tribune/ZUMApress.com

Every morning, Brittany Geldert stepped off the bus and bolted through the double doors of Fred Moore Middle School, her nerves already on high alert, bracing for the inevitable.

“Dyke.”

Pretending not to hear, Brittany would walk briskly to her locker, past the sixth-, seventh- and eighth-graders who loitered in menacing packs.

“Whore.”

Full text after the cut.

RIP Jamey Rodemeyer

thedailywhat:

RIP: 14-year-old Jamey Rodemeyer, a victim of relentless anti-gay bullying, was found dead earlier this week of an apparent suicide.

“I always say how bullied I am, but no one listens,” Jamey wrote on his Tumblr blog in a post dated September 9th. “What do I have to do so people will listen to me?”

The bullying got particularly intense about twelve months ago, when classmates started leaving homophobic remarks on Jamey’s Formspring page. “JAMIE [sic] IS STUPID, GAY, FAT ANND UGLY. HE MUST DIE!,” read one of the many vicious comments.

Friends were always there to defend him, however, and Jamey himself even appeared to be taking the abuse in stride, contributing a video to Dan Savage’s “It Gets Better” project, in which he echos the words of Lady Gaga, telling other bullying victims to “hold [their] head up.”

Sadly, despite assuring his parents multiple times that everything was fine, all was not as it seemed. On Sunday, Jamey posted one final note on his Tumblr: “Thank you Lady Gaga.”

“He touched so many hearts, so many people,” Jamey mom Tracy’s told The Buffalo News. “I didn’t realize how many people he touched. He was the sweetest, kindest kid you’d ever know. He would give all his heart to you before he gave any to himself.”

As American servicemen and women across the globe celebrate the long-overdue demise of the military’s discriminatory “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy, Jamey’s untimely death offers a stark reminder that the struggle for tolerance is far from over.

Damian Furtch shares his experience of being a victim of anti-gay violence in NYC

Damian Furtch Shares His Story About Being a Victim of Anti-Gay Violence in New York City

Credit for story goes to GLAAD’s Website.

GLAAD sat down with Damian Furtch, the 26-year old who was violently attacked last Sunday in front of a West Village McDonald’s, for his first interview since the attack. Damian shares his story of what happened.

“My name is Damian Furtch, and I was violently attacked on March 27 by two men in the West Village. My friend and I were at the local McDonalds ordering food when I noticed two men staring at us. My friend and I ordered our food and waited for our order to be filled. I stepped outside to make a phone call in an effort to avoid the tension in the restaurant and remove myself from the situation.  The two gentlemen stepped out after me and asked if I had a problem. I told one of them that I had stepped out just to use the phone and had no problem with him or his three friends. Then, all of a sudden the second gentleman hit me on the right side of my face causing me to stumble. Then I felt three punches to the face.

After the attack, I stumbled back into the McDonald’s and told my friend that we needed to go to the hospital because I had been attacked. We then rushed to Roosevelt Hospital where I received medical attention.

The attack against me is part of the larger issue of violence against gay and transgender people in New York City.  While I am grateful for the opportunity to share my story, I hope to shed light on the larger issue of violence against my community. This has to stop. Under no circumstance should a person be attacked for their sexual orientation.

This has been a traumatic experience for me, my friends and my family.  I’d like to thank my close friends and family who have been supportive and loving through this situation.  I’d also like to thank City Council Speaker Christine Quinn’s office, the New York Police Department’s Hate Crimes Unit and the LGBT and ally community for their continued Facebook and e-mail support. It’s much appreciated and recognized.

GLAAD provided Damian with a media training and is also helping garner media attention around this particular incident and the larger issue of violence against the gay and transgender communities.

 

You are Loved…by Gennie Z

I guess you could say that I’m not your standard bullying victim. I’ve never been physically assaulted. I’ve been called names, but ‘fortunately’ that had nothing to do with my sexual preferences. As far as bullying goes, I’ve been lucky.

I wasn’t attacked. I was invisible.

I had a few friends growing up in elementary and middle school that I could spend time with. In high school I discovered the music department, and made friends with some of the other ‘music geeks’, though at times it seemed they were just tolerating my presence because they felt sorry for me. I later switched to another high school, where I was an outcast because I was quiet, shy, and a good student. I spent my lunch breaks sitting on a bench in the sun, wearing sunglasses and pretending to be asleep because it was better than being rejected, than admitting that I was lonely.

Most bullying is acknowledged as physical and verbal abuse. But often people forget the emotional bullying, which leads to mental abuse. No, I wasn’t attacked. But the isolation, the loneliness, began to make me think that there was something wrong with me. That something about who I was, was simply unlikeable. My confidence and self-esteem plummeted, and I stayed shy and quiet, trying to stay out of the way of people who were more important than me. Because clearly, I wasn’t someone worth knowing. It was better for me to stand back and let the people who were right, and strong, and good take the spotlight.

That wasn’t to say I was always miserable. I was happy with the few friends I had, to the point of being clingy. When I was happy, I threw myself into the feeling, desperate to hold on to it. Which made the days when I was lonely, sad, and miserable, even worse.

As I hit my mid-teens, things started to get complicated. My friends and family began to make comments about my sexual preferences, hinting that they thought I was gay. I wasn’t very feminine as a teenager, because I didn’t know how to be. And something about that made the people who were important to me, as well as the people who weren’t, believe that I was hiding my interests.

Brandon Bitner: Anti-gay bullying leads to another tragic teen suicide

Brandon Bitner

MIDDLEBURG, Penn. — Anti-gay bullying has reportedly claimed another teen life.

Brandon Bitner, 14, of Mount Pleasant Mills, Penn., walked 13 miles from his home early Friday morning to a busy intersection and threw himself in front of an oncoming tractor-trailer after leaving a suicide note at his home, according to The Daily Item.

There seems to be little doubt in the students’ minds why Bitner did what he did.

“It was because of bullying,” friend Takara Jo Folk wrote in a letter to The Daily Item.

“It was not about race, or gender, but they bullied him for his sexual preferences and the way he dressed. Which,” she said, “they wrongly accused him of.”

Brandon’s suicide note reportedly explained that he was constantly bullied at Midd-West High School in Middleburg, where he was a freshman.

Bullies allegedly called Brandon gay, girly, fag, and geek. He stated in the note that a humiliating event in school this past week was the “straw that broke the camel’s back.”

Brandon was an accomplished violinist, having been a member of the Susquehanna Youth Orchestra in 2009.

His death came just days after an anti-bullying assembly at the high school, which, according to district Superintendent Wesley Knapp, was not held in response to any specific problems at the school, but because it is an issue Principal Cynthia Hutchinson has always felt strongly about.

After the assembly, according to student Briana Boyer in another letter to The Daily Item, “No one took it seriously, and joked around about it.”

Friends of Brandon have set up a Facebook page, “RIP Brandon Bitner.”

A memorial website is here, and the Patriot-News has Brandon’s obituary here.

GetEqual Youth response to President Obama’s message to lgbt youth

Watch: Anti-Gay Bullied Teens GetEQUAL Message To Obama, Congress

by David Badash on October 26, 2010 · Comments (0)

in Civil Rights,Gay Agenda,Legal Issues,Legislation,Marriage,Media,News,Politics

GetEQUAL co-founder Robin McGehee reached out to three icons of gay teen activism, Ceara Sturgis, Constance McMillen, and Will Phillips, all of whom found themselves victims of anti-gay bullying and harassment, and brought them together to make this video message to President Obama and Congress. It’s stunning, heartwarming, and simple: “Display the courageousness that these youth have shown by producing the change they have promised.”

High School sucked … by Erin

I went to a school in the exurbs of Detroit (for those who know the area Northwest Oakland County), one of schools that is a selling point for the nice houses in the newly sprouted subdivisions.  It was one of those schools that even offered a variety of support groups for kids who  may have had various problems.  It should have been a great place for a kid with some of the “issues” I had (new girl, introvert, depression, queer). My junior year was miserable, but my senior year, I started to pull my self together and started to be more out publicly, and then there were problems…

The first problem was when the student newspaper was going to do a story on the queer students at WLC, and I was expressly forbidden to use my real name during the interview; because, I might not really be gay (besides, I don’t look like a gay),  and the school doesn’t want to be responsible for me if I come out.

I don’t listen very well, so I came out in other ways than in a HS newspaper. I came out in AP English, I told people at lunch, I called people on their hetero-sexist bullshit. And it caused problems…leading to a moment where I was walking the gauntlet of junior and senior guys (aka the hallway to get from English to US Government)  and a group of guys circled round and told me how they were going to “make me straight”. I was rescued by a sympathetic teacher, but when I sought to have the problem addressed. The school councilor told me because she didn’t think I was really a lesbian, the guys who threatened my safety in school were completely unpunished.

The Safe School Improvement Act of 2010 should be passed, so that kids can feel safe going from English to US Government. So that don’t have their identity invalidated by a school professional. And so things are actually made better for kids now; rather than telling kids it might get better later.

Yet another loss… (article courtesy of the Michigan Messenger)

Gay Oakland University student found dead of suicide on campus

By Todd A. Heywood 10/20/10 4:45 PM

The Oakland University community in southeast Michigan is mourning the loss of one of its own.

Local officials report the body of 19-year-old Corey Jackson was found in a wooded area of the campus. Police and the medical examiner’s office tell the Oakland Press the young gay man hung himself.

The suicide happened Tuesday night, as activists across the nation were preparing for a Facebook driven day of activism to counter a wave of suicides of young gay people across the country that have been tied to bullying. Wednesday was dubbed Spirit Day by the Facebook plans, and was designed to draw attention to the suicides by encouraging people to wear purple.

Police say there is no indication bullying was a factor in Jackson’s suicide.

And while bullying may not be a factor, Melissa Pope, director of the university’s Gender and Sexuality Center said the issue points to larger, hidden epidemic of suicides among LGBT youth.

Apologetics – Neo Prodigy

This was contributed by Neo Prodigy, originally posted in 2005 in his LiveJournal.

The following is my response to KC’s letter. A significant portion of the information and research I used in my reply is courtesy of cmpriest. Mad props to her and her immeasurable brilliance. Hopefully I did it justice. Hopefully I did good.

Dear Denny,

Hey, I know that I can’t talk you out of your delightlful lifestyle, but please don’t give real Catholics, ones who believe what the Church teaches, a bad name. If there is a classification for Pagan, I would suggest that is more appropriate.
This is from the Catechism of the Catholic Church:

2357 … Basing itself on Sacred Scripture, which presents homosexual acts as acts of grave depravity, tradition has always declared that “homosexual acts are intrinsically disordered.” They are contrary to the natural law. They close the sexual act to the gift of life. They do not proceed from a genuine affective and sexual complementarity. Under no circumstances can they be approved.
2359 Homosexual persons are called to CHASTITY. By the virtues of self-mastery that teach them inner freedom, at times by the support of disinterested friendship, by prayer and sacramental grace, they can and should gradually and resolutely approach Christian perfection.

[I think you have at least 3 of these 4]

2396 Among the sins gravely contrary to chastity are masturbation, fornication, pornography, and homosexual practices.

1035 The teaching of the Church affirms the existence of hell and its eternity. Immediately after death the souls of those who die in a state of mortal sin descend into hell, where they suffer the punishments of hell, “eternal fire.” The chief punishment of hell is eternal separation from God, in whom alone man can possess the life and happiness for which he was created and for which he longs.

On Being GLBT* and Living with a Disability by PD

On Being GLBT* and Living with a Disability

I’ve been wondering what to write for the “We Got Your Back” project. Neo Prodigy wrote a great essay (reposted here), which has a lot of generally-useful information as well as information targeted at teens of color. I wanted to expand on it with some thoughts for disabled teens. I use “GLBT*” as an acronym covering Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender, Intersexed, Questioning, and other non-mainstream forms of gender and sexual expression (I’m a geek, so of course I’d use an asterisk as a wildcard character).

As a note, if the tips below sound like I’m equating homophobia with some forms of violence and abuse? I am. In that vein, I have taken the liberty of adapting knowledge from domestic violence advocacy in developing this advice, including some relevant links. I do this because I’m more concerned with helping people who will be endangered by coming out than in only offering uplifting advice (though I offer some of that, too).

You Are Beautiful

As disabled people, we are often taught that our disabilities make us undesirable. Being GLBT* often adds another cultural message of unlovability to this equation. In my own experience, the diversity of tastes that humans have is so broad and expansive that everyone has something about them that someone else will find beautiful. There is no sound basis to believe that you will “always be alone” when it comes to love and relationships, unless that is specifically what you want.

Your Body, Your Self

You have a right to be sexual, and to decide when, how, and if you want to exercise that sexuality. This is true regardless of your sexual orientation, but it cannot be reinforced enough: Your body is yours. No one else has the automatic right to decide what to do with it.

Unfortunately, disabled people are at extremely high risk of abuse of all kinds: sexual, physical, emotional, and so on. If you a survivor of abuse, I strongly encourage you to find someone to talk to: a trusted adult, members of the clergy, a therapist, or even a support hotline.

The Ultimate Silence – 12 years ago Matthew Shepard was killed for being gay

THE ULTIMATE SILENCE
October 12, 1998

Listen to the mustn’ts, child.
Listen to the don’ts.
Listen to the shouldn’ts,
The impossibles, the won’ts.
Listen to the never haves,
Then listen close to me …
Anything can happen, child.
Anything can be.

~ Shel Silverstein

Eleven years ago, Matthew Shepard was murdered for being homosexual.

What will you do to end the silence?

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