Hate is not a family value

One thing I’m not shy about on my blog are my feelings about gay rights and what I’ve gone through as a gay man over the years.  I’m pretty lucky overall.  I have a loving and supportive family, friends who support me for who I am and organizations, such as my fraternity, that have always made me feel at home.  This has made me a very strong and confident gay man who is at peace with myself, comfortable with my sexuality and able to deal with the ignorance, bigotry and outright hatred that is in the world.

 

In the recent months there have been 6 boys from middle school to college age that have taken their lives, rather than live with the bullying and harassment that they were subject to, sometimes on a daily basis.

 

Recently, Tony Perkins of the Family Research Council (one of those “Family Values” coalitions that seek to eliminate any and all gay rights, as well as anything else that they don’t find fit into their small minded views") was given a platform for his views by the Washington Post as part of their desire to hear “both sides” of the gay teen suicide issue.  In this diatribe he turned around and blamed the problem on the Gay community.  Here’s an excerpt:

 

“Some homosexuals may recognize intuitively that their same-sex attractions are abnormal--yet they have been told by the homosexual movement, and their allies in the media and the educational establishment, that they are ‘born gay’ and can never change,” he wrote. “This--and not society's disapproval--may create a sense of despair that can lead to suicide.”

This is classic “blame the victim”.  The consistent cry from the religious far right is that homosexuality is a choice, that’s it’s learned and that you can be “cured”.  This is their basis for why there shouldn’t be gay marriage.  They argue against gay adoption because it could turn the children gay.  Now they are saying that the hate and hostile environment that groups like them foster isn’t the problem, it’s merely that the Gays are saying that homosexuality cannot be changed that is causing these children to take their own lives.

 

I have a few thoughts on this.

1. For the straight people reading this, when did you decide to be straight?  At what point did you actively consider, try out and process going either straight or gay? 
2. I am a gay child of straight parents.  Most gay children come from straight parents.  How exactly will gay parents influence their children any more or less than straight parents?
3. The American Psychiatric Association has long since moved away from the idea that homosexuality is a condition that can be “cured”.  Also, how often have we heard of members and leaders of these groups that preach the ability to change and be straight ending up embroiled in gay sex scandals? (George Rekers, Eddie Long, Ted Haggard)

 

The one thing that I take consolation in is that in the long run progress and understanding only move forward.  It won’t happen overnight, but I know that in my lifetime I will see a time when gays are equal to straights in all ways.

 

How to help and show support:

• There is currently a movement to recognize this unfortunate trend of gay suicide and in honor of those lives which have been cut far too short, on October 20 everyone is being encouraged to wear purple.  I will be doing so and invite you to do the same.
• It Get’s Better Project: A website to show lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and questioning (LGBTQ) youth that it does get better and that suicide is not the answer
• The Trevor Project: A national crisis and suicide prevention hotline for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and questioning (LGBTQ) youth.