page 11
Opinions
Homophobia and Bullying
RJ WALLIA Staff Writer An article came out in Rolling Stone magazine recently, entitled: One Town’s War on Gay Teens. It can be found online here: http://www. rollingstone.com/politics/news/one-towns-waron-gay-teens-20120202. I’ve always been a fan of Rolling Stone for providing in depth coverage of many different issues which I normally wouldn’t get access to in my normal everyday perusing of the internet. I’ll begin this with a quote directly from the introduction of the article:
“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." Like many 13-year-olds, Brittany knew seventh grade was a living hell. But what she didn't know was that she was caught in the crossfire of a culture war being waged by local evangelicals inspired by their high-profile congressional representative Michele Bachmann, who graduated from Anoka High School and, until recently, was a member of one of the most conservative churches in the area. When Christian activists who considered gays an abomination forced a measure through the school board forbidding the discussion of homosexuality in the district's public schools, kids like Brittany were unknowingly thrust into the heart of a clash that was about to become intertwined with tragedy.” This is not an article about Right versus Left or Republican versus Democrat. This is far more insidious than what we now consider to be political discourse. The article highlights the plight of many teens in this one town who are either homosexual or have been branded as such. The article goes into their own fears and emotions as they struggle to deal with the troubles of being a teenager in North America. We’ve all been there. It hurts and it’s not easy. Most of us make it. In this one town however, there have been a number of students who have taken their own lives, because, quite frankly, their only option left was to no longer be alive, rather than spend another day in this hell that is a community. It’s easy to write off the taunting of children and the indifference of school staff and
the OBITERdicta
adults as simply par for the course - that somehow these things just happen and it is outside of everyone’s control. Read the article. I’m pretty sure you’ll be outraged. And saddened. The language that has been quoted by the kids who are bullying others is beyond profane. It ranges from yelling “dyke” at a girl to taunting and encouraging another to kill themselves. Brittany, who was mentioned earlier, recently found out that her best friend Sam, who was also her support throughout all of this, finally killed herself. This is what greeted her:
"Did you see her blow her brains out?" "Did you pull the trigger for her?" "What did it look like?" "Was there brain all over the wall?" "You should do it too. You should go blow your head off." Kids aren’t born evil and mean. They are raised that way. Somehow they learned all this. They were trained into believing that this was acceptable behaviour. Judging by the rest of this town, I can only blame their parents and their upbringing, for it seems that this entire town is bent on treating everyone who is homosexual like an abomination and deserving of all the misery that can be bestowed upon them. However, this is not what sparked my sadness to the rage that has been carrying on with me for weeks since I read this. In reading the article, I was shocked and stunned by the systemic issues prevalent in this community. The school district had implemented a policy of what they called “neutrality” on what they consider to be a homosexual lifestyle and agenda. Groups like the Minnesota Family Council and the community created Parents Action League are quick to attack homosexuals for their lifestyle and have often blamed them for the teen suicides occurring in this town. The President of the Minnesota Family Council, Tom Prichard, wrote that, “youth who embrace homosexuality are at greater risk [of suicide], because they've embraced an unhealthy sexual identity and lifestyle," on his blog. Barb Anderson, author of the original “No Homo Promo” doctrine of education blames pro-gay groups for promoting this so called hedonistic lifestyle. I mention these groups for a reason. The school board in this town decided to listen to these groups and create policies which would not promote or discuss homosexuality in their schools. Students would receive no support and no help for any situation that may arise. You couldn’t have a club for anyone who was homosexual, as it would
be branded a sex club and shut down. Teachers who wanted to assist students were afraid of being fired. Some were even openly homophobic in the classroom. Essentially, they facilitated the bullying and teasing done by other kids with their ignorance, ambivalence, and apathy. When faced with the accusations and reports of what was happening, teachers and administrators are quick to point fingers elsewhere. Some continue to blame the pro-gay agenda and the media for feasting on the grief and struggles of this poor town. I don’t do this article justice. I’m sure I’ve missed some salient points that need to be mentioned. My point in writing this was to both bring attention to what is happening in this community and to somehow put my thoughts to paper. I was trying to boil down why I have this compulsion to write about this issue and the answer is unabashedly simple. I hate bullies. I hate the idea of a bully. I hate the notion that we need to make someone feel less because it makes us feel good. I hate the idea that kids are taught that bullying is ok, not necessarily explicitly, but by a lack of discipline and upbringing. What I hate most about this issue, in regards to this town, is that it was institutionalized. Bullying became policy. The people who were put in charge of protecting kids from this were on the one hand, impotent for fear of reprisal from other bullies and on the other, instigators to the point of open encouragement. This is what is so sick and twisted about this entire situation. People who were supposed to help, and wanted to, had their own hands tied by the bullies who had taken over the school board. People finally had an outlet for their hatred and misunderstanding of individuals and had a chance to take it out on innocent kids. Their only way of coping was to band together as much as possible, in secret, or decide to kill themselves. For myself, I began reflecting on my own actions in the past. My own casual usage of homophobic terms, simply because they are used in normal every day parlance needs to stop. I’ve been doing my best to be conscious of it. It’s not like this problem just hit me and I’ve just discovered this issue, but I am now paying closer attention to it. I recommend we all do this. I also had to reflect on my own past. I guess it may not be hard to figure out that, throughout my life, I had my own experiences with bullying. It wasn’t at all pleasant and there were days where it got to be near unbearable. I was fortunate enough to have had a strong support mechanism: my family, my friends, and the support of some very kind teachers when I needed it. Gradually I just developed a way to ignore it or deal with it.
Continued to next page... monday - february 27 - 2012