They killed themselves after being bullied for being gay. It’s not okay. They didn’t deserve that end.
It’s not okay for us to be so judgmental. God didn’t call us to be so cruel.
(Source: sav3theday)
Reading the story about Mitt Romney’s high school role as an alleged bully made me really sad. I was consistently picked on from 7th to 10th grade by the same three girls. It really really really sucked. I haven’t seen them since I left that high school (for reasons not related to the bullying), but if I did, I still don’t know if I’d be able to really forgive those classmates. I hope Romney’s apologies are sincere and not something he’s issuing to save face. If he did do these things, I really hope he remembers it one day. It doesn’t matter if you’re gay, straight, boy, girl, short, fat, or whatever — if you’re picked on, you don’t forget what happened. You just hope one day your bullies will realize what assholes they once were and learn never to treat people that poorly ever again.
FULL PIECE HERE
This is where we’re driven.
This is being queer and black, this is being a feminine black man.
1) Don’t read the comments, just… Don’t.
2) I wanna cry, for this mother who is only trying to keep her baby safe and her son who has to go to a school and live in a world that wants him DEAD.
This brought tears to my eyes, but hey its all about marriage equality tho right?
Later today I’ll be back with a transcribed version of this.
Coldeyesthatburn, word.
[accessibility request]
tips on how to avoid being a cissexist tool
tip #701: do not choose to be kind or unkind to someone because of what you think about their genitals.
tip # 457: remember, you are not half as smart or important as you think you are.
tip # 211: you are not special…nobody is. the only thing that sets you apart from anyone else in this world is how you treat people.
tip #24: did anybody ask you for your opinion?
I know I’m not alone. We all walk around scarred by experiences from our childhood; no one emerges unscathed. Because of this universality, we tend to dismiss bullying as an unavoidable part of growing up. “Kids will be kids,” right?
I disagree. Kids will be what we teach them to be.
”Donna Brazile, “Words Do Hurt,” Ms. Magazine summer 2011
I basically love this whole article, which discusses two bills in Congress right now—the Student Non-Discrimination Act and the Safe Schools Improvement Act.
Some more great quotes from the piece:
Some will reject this proposed legislation as ultimately ineffectual. But kids mimic the behaviors modeled for them. As long as their models treat bullying as par for the course, it will be.
And:
[Y]oung adults who reported high rates of LGBT-related bullying were 2.6 times more likely than others who weren’t so bullied to be clinically depressed and 5.6 times more likely to commit suicide.
And:
If this were any other group of kids, we would never stand for this. Yet with LGBT youth, we somehow believe that it’s okay for their daily lives to be torture, as if it will inure them to the vicious realities of being a minority class.
(via ladyatheist)
I just had this fight with my roommate last night. His excuse for bullying was that we all needed thick skin. Why? Why can’t we all just love one another. Do we really need thick skin? He also looked at me and laughed saying, quite proudly, that he would have been a bully toward me when we were kids. Really? that’s not something to be proud of! How dare you! You should be ashamed of yourself! and this is all coming form a TRANS GAY MALE! what the fuck is wrong with you?!
(via mycaptainraydor)(Source: brute-reason)
Seth's Law passes in California
California legislators passed an anti-bullying law on Friday in honor of Seth Walsh, a 13-year-old who committed suicide last year because he was bullied for being gay.
Seth’s Law will require public schools to create policies to address bullying, including stating explicitly that discrimination based on sexual orientation is not allowed. The law is, of course, named after Seth. It’s been approved by the state’s Senate and Assembly and now heads to the governor to be signed.
From the Advocate:
Wendy Walsh, Seth’s mother, testified before the Senate Education Committee in support of the bill.
“I can’t bring my son back,” she told lawmakers. “But the California legislature can make a difference today to protect young people across our state just like Seth who are or are thought to be lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender. Schools need to take harassment and bullying seriously when parents or students tell them about it, and when they see it and hear it on the school campus.”She couldn’t have said it better. This is for you, Seth.
The Futility of Suicide as a Response to Bullying
Where is everyone when a kid gets bullied for being fat? Usually urging the victim to meet with a nutritionist or go to Weight Watchers in order to fit in. Where are the “enlightened” members of the American populace when a child is tormented for speaking differently? Maybe giving the child pamphlets for ESL classes or speech therapists. When a child is tortured for having a disability, what happens? No one listens, and when someone DOES (as in the case of James Jones’ daughter) they are arrested for standing up to the perpetrators. And the parents of the child are usually advised to transfer their kid to a new school.
I remember being bullied all through my school years. Every day from 2nd grade up through college. Kids chanting songs calling me derogatory names. Boys calling me a slut because I was more developed then other girls my age. Sexual harassment on the middle school bus. Kids pushing each other into me. Spitting at me. Throwing sodas out of car windows as I was walking down the street. I still feel the pain today, though I have been out of school for 15 years. I suspect that I developed Borderline personality disorder as a direct result of the torment I went through as a child.I remember cutting myself over and over again to attempt to relieve the psychological trauma caused by my bullies. I begged my parents to transfer me to a new school, believing that somehow, things would get better in a new environment. I cannot even begin to tell you the number of times that I sat at home crying, contemplating killing myself to escape from my torment.Problem is, if I decided to kill myself, I realized, the bullies would have won. They would all show up at my funeral, and pretend that they really cared. They would cry and go to the therapist that is usually offered to the student body of the school when kids kill themselves They would go on and on about how special I was, how much I would be missed. And they would NEVER admit their complicity in my death. Nope. Instead, the would play the role of the victim, mourning after the death of a “friend”.
Beautiful, true words. Continue reading here.
Confessions of a Gender Traitor
I confess.
I am a gang member.
I have benefitted from my membership in this gang, all my life. Everything in my life has come to me easier than it has for most of the planet, because I belong to this gang. My clothes, food, shelter, luxuries and freedom are the spoils of my membership. We live a life of ease, gluttony, vanity and waste built on the backs of oppression, deceit and cruelty.
We are a gang that brutally opresses half of the world’s population with rape, murder, starvation, torture, disease, forced and unpaid labor, humiliation, lack of education and food and shelter. The mother of almost every child on the planet is the target of our oppression - controlled by words, weapons & fear and deprived of a voice or respect as human - as equal.
This gang also fights among its own ranks. The gang at the top of this pyramid of brutality, ignorance and brutality is run by several thousand gang members who use raping, pillaging, murder and destroying the entire planet to luxuriate in and hoarde the wealth of the planet. For every bite of food we eat, thousands of people die of starvation.
The annals of history are written by this gang, obliterating the thoughts, words and lives of all foes, vanquished or living. For four thousand years we have forged the planet around us into instruments of war, torture, enslavement and despair. We have roamed the surface of the planet in packs, armies and alone in dark alleys with an unquenchable thirst for the blood of our fellow humans. Those whom we do not kill outright, we eliminate in history, we remove their names from their own stories and place the names we choose to honor in their places.
The framework of language, philosophy, religion, reason, science and commerce are formed by the desires and efforts of this gang to make the world in its own image. We control the actions of the world because we own the words that people use to form the ideas of their lives. The bedtime stories of childhood, the news of the day, the law of the land and the ramblings of the deranged are messages we give you to reinforce our place in your mind as they who you serve.
We are the gang of men. The system we use to oppress is called many things: Patriarchy is one name, but I prefer Kyriarchy.
I am a white man, born into the clan who call themselves Christians. We tell stories of our superiority over animals and people. We have shaped the world into a bloodbath of bullets, disease, greed, corruption and deceit in the name of an invisible ‘god’.
I will not further this slaughter nor go one step further without naming it. You could state that I am a traitor to my gender and to my race.
I look at the brutality executed onto women, children and men in service to the gang warfare that has run unchecked for four thousand years, and I see a species of creatures committing ritual suicide.
I cannot change who I am or who I was, but I can choose what I do. I can choose my words. This gang is costing my child safety. It is costing us all a future. I have silently opposed this gang for years.
I am silent no more.
There is no “us & them”. There is only the life we share. Our survival depends on all of us working together. Abandon this gang warfare - and live.
-arvan
