What is Gaybashing Like?

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
182

Thanks Esprix, I have been lurking the board for a while and I have always enjoyed you posts.

It was tough to write that post it brings up a lot of emotions in me as well as did all the other posts.

I laid a little I do regret that I didn’t get to know the guy. We could have been friends who knows. I could have introduced him to others and showed he a regular guy with the same problems as the rest of us just trying to figure out who we are. At least that would have brought about a different thinking towards him or opened some people’s eyes like mine. My biggest fear is that he was finally left alone because people were afraid that brute squad would come after them instead of a change in attitude.

But I agree awareness is the key, at least it was for me.

You guys rock!

-Fox

183

Raynard, ya done good.

One of the major problems with modern society (in the US, anyway…can’t speak for anyone else) is that the school systems are, aside from academic subjects and near-murder violence, run like Lord of the Flies scenarios. With way too many Piggies left to the uncaring vagaries of fellow adolescents. Mini Cosa Nostras buying silence with implicit promises of violence. Bleah…

184

This thread… wow. Thank you everyone for sharing your stories. It’s difficult, but I know firsthand how important it is.

To anyone who thinks folks here are making things up or are exaggerating, I spent about a year on the hotline at Community United Against Violence (www.cuav.org), an organization dedicated to combatting anti-queer violence in San Francisco. Twelve months is a pretty good stretch. Most people burn out after four.

I did the hotline on weekends, and despite the training that taught you how to detach, I got calls that would leave me shaken and crying. There were tons of stories similar to those here, from verbal assault to physical violence to attempted rape. I never heard about the worst cases since they usually ended in the hospital or worse, dead. I can’t talk about any of the cases I heard since there’s obviously a confidentiality issue, but I can assure you that I got at least two calls per weekend that involved some kind of physical violence.

San Francisco is one of the most accepting places in America, but it’s also a target. A consistent problem are people who don’t live here but drive into the Castro with guns or bats. There were a fair number of people who weren’t queer but got targeted anyway because they went into the Castro district for one reason or another.

Personally I’ve never had anything worse done to me than verbal harrassment, but the worst of it was on a BART train from an Oakland A’s game. A half-dozen teens were calling us filthy dykes and wondering who was the “man”, who was on top, making up some really horrible and explicit details about what kind of sex we had. My partner wanted to stay and pointedly ignore them, but I finally had had enough and bolted to the next car in tears. The folks there (two straight couples) talked to us about it and helped calm us down. I don’t think I can thank them enough for being there.

185

I’ve been touched by this thread every time I’ve reread it, and seen the new stories added. Over in Great Debates in an appropriate place I mentioned being mistaken for being gay in my early teens. Having a gang of bigger kids throw you in the snow and stuff yellow snow into the briefcase you’re carrying your schoolbooks in was not fun; being called names and ostracized by your classmates was not fun. I don’t have a terrible gaybashing story to tell; it was a brief period, and then they moved on to other, better targets. But I’ve been there, and I understand firsthand what it was like.

I’m posting these thoughts, not to tell my own pitiful story, though, but to link to an article that startled me: This is a girl who lives less than five miles from me. At one time I was driving through her hometown daily to get to work. The story of Angel Collie.

186

Sucks about Angel’s problems, but it’s so great that there’s a school so he can continue his education and have the same chance at a good life as the rest of us. I wish there were more schools like that. Maybe some day we won’t need them.

187

I’m sorry I sounded like I was blaming the victim. That’s not what I wanted to do at all. My fault for launching into heterosexual “I’m fine with gay people as long as they keep it to themselves” spiel. That’s an outright croc.

188

TVGuy, sorry to hear about your experience.

189

In light of this thread, I think it’s time for a bump.

190

Megamark said, “I believe that marriage between a man and a woman is ordained of God. I believe that we are all God’s children and that he loves us all equally and without measure. When I see a gay couple, knowing that God loves them both just as much as he loves me, and that he loves all of us so intensely and with such a pure love that we cannot even comprehend it…”

If god loves everyone equally and without measure, than why is it that god frowns upon same-sex marriage? Isn’t that a major contradiction in your religion? How do you reconcile that?

191

Kalhoun, that sounds like a Great Debate. This isn’t the place for it.

192

You’re right. Wrong thread. Sorry…

193

Well, there ya go, I’m reviving it again. With the new year, new light, hopefully.

Wow. I’m not gay… I guess I can be counted as gay-friendly, since I’ve certainly had gay friends past, present, & future… but I don’t think of it that way very often. I mostly think of myself as good-person-friendly. The real jerks of the world, I couldn’t possibly care less if they’re neon pink or white, gay or straight… scum is scum. And good people come in all colors, all sizes, all religions, all personality types, and an assortment of sexual orientations - I truly believe that. I act upon that belief to the very best of my ability every day of my life.

Having read this thread, I am so sorry for all of you who’ve had to bear such pain when most of you wouldn’t even seriously consider inflicting it, except perhaps in self-defense. Sometimes I regret being human, knowing what it is humans do to each other. But there’s always a flip side, and in this case, the flip side is that you are triumphing over the scum which has tried to drag you down. I think you’re better people than every one of those who’d hurt you. As some of you have pointed out, they’re little more than fearful, ignorant, cowards.

There are those who’d say that gay people are cowardly. Because some are a bit effeminate, and some do not physically fight their attackers.

But there are deeper, truer forms of strength, wisdom, and bravery. And the deeper ones are the only ones that are going to last through this lifetime, and into whatever comes after.

The strength of those who’d hit you will fade. Their voices will become feeble. What brains they have will age or wander.

But the beauty of your souls is yours forever. Souls which will not fade, weaken, or abandon you with time. Nor will they be damned, no matter what the scum try to say. I grant I follow a nontraditional path to God, as I am a witch. Still, I am a witch with a genius IQ and a heart as big as it has been broken and bruised to grow to be. And I believe that you are all children of God (or whatever name you wish to use)… and that as such, you will not be abandoned for merely being homosexual.

I imagine God has bigger problems to deal with - including but not limited to the ignorant, abusive individuals who persecute you.

Though I’m a [physically] easy-to-beat 5’2" 90 lb. girl, I assure you I WILL NOT stand for any abuse. Not of gay people, or any people (or animals!). Not as long as I’ve a tongue in my mouth and a brain in my head.

I pray that you all have a happy, healthy, and rightfully tolerant New Year.

Luck, Love, & Light to you.

194

What can I say. This thread is so harsh. The first I read it I got up to the second page and started crying. It scares me that people can be so hateful and unfeeling. I came back an hour later, although I’ve given up reading the stories because I can’t stomach them. But I never realised until now how awful discrimination is. As Windwalker said, if I heard somebody use faggot as an insult now, it’d irritate the s**t out of me.
My heart goes out to every victim who has posted here and all of those who have not. You’re all ten thousand times braver than any bastard gay-basher.
-dani

195

I know this thread has been buried a while.
But I’m taking a Sexual Identity class (which is a sociology class about gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered issues), and was searching.

Us straight people need to read this.