Yes, it’s very sad, and fits with what I’ve observed.
To continue (I was talking with my mom):
The other day I skipped work to go do some Gay Education at a rather tough “alternative” high school in the West Island.
This was a rather tough crowd, you understand. Not someplace I would have wanted to spend my high school years - and my school was bad enough as it was.
Anyway, we started with the word association game - asking, “What do you think of when you hear the word ‘gay’?” Someone immediately shot back, “Sam!” and there was laughter.
I asked the teacher after the session. It seems that Sam is a boy they all pick on. (He wasn’t in the session.)
Damn. I hope he does OK. Especially if he’s gay - I hope he can stand coming out in such an environment.
Did you ask the teacher what she/he did when the students were caught picking on Sam?
Comes as no surprise to me, though it is nice to have something to point to as a cite when someone questions the notion that a non-heterosexual (or questioning) teen might have a harder time of things and such.
Articles like that make me glad I didn’t figure out I was bi until after high school. That place was homophobic and horrid enough to me anyway:(
Sidenote … there was one guy where I went to high school who was “out” in that we all knew he was gay, but nobody said much of anything. He got treated like shit from what I hear … I never hung around him much (he was two years ahead of me and rarely on-campus unless he had to be). After he graduated, he came out to his parents and they disowned him. Last I heard he was selling his body on the street. I’ve tried to find him but … nothing:(
The nice thing about a study is that it gives support to people who have been “saying that all along”, so to speak. What I like about this study is that it give a really good reason to address the problem - that fighting prejudice and bullying will positively affect these people for many years, and that teasing and taunts have a measurable long-term negative affect on people.
If I highlighted all of 'punha’s post, hit Ctrl+C and posted it here that would be plagiarism, so I’ll just say “yeah, me too.”
Hmm…three out of three for those risky behaviors. I’m batting 1.000. And I wasn’t even picked on all that much. Of course, I’m sure it didn’t help that my school wouldn’t let you through the door to a dance if you were alone or a same sex couple. Even if it was just a friend.
Crispy: That is just inane. I wonder what your school would have done with me - I went with both a guy and a girl.
Funny, Zyada – I did as well. I am a fairly “straight” female, and my two prom dates were a gay guy and a lesbian girl. Neither of them was, to my knowledge, fully aware of their sexual identity at the time (or if they were, they weren’t talking about it.)
I have seen firsthand what happens to kids who are either gay or perceived as such, though, and I can’t imagine how anyone could live through it. This is a huge generalization, but I’ve always felt that those who have been able to come out and manage to live their lives without cracking under the strain must be incredibly strong people.