![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Simon Says: Murder Is Being Done
Sep. 30th, 2010 03:45 pmTyler Clementi was murdered.
Seth Walsh was murdered.
Asher Brown was murdered.
Billy Lucas was murdered.
The Anoka-Hennepin School District condones murder by maintaining a "neutral" policy toward GLBTIQ students that tacitly condones their abuse.
Classmates gaybashed an 11-year-old male cheerleader, breaking his arm.
A Michigan assistant attorney general engages in a deranged campaign of blogging hate speech against a college student.
People keep calling it bullying, which minimizes and infantilizes it.
I call it murder.
I call it abuse.
I call it assault and battery.
I call it harassment.
I call it stalking.
I call it slander, libel, defamation, terrorism.
And these stories and articles don't even go into the abuse heaped upon the heads of those who don't feel that killing themselves is the only way to escape it.
I was first called a "lezzie" in fourth or fifth grade. Interestingly, that's when boys also started sexually harassing me about my looks, my body, my voice, my clothes, threatening to expose themselves to me. I never heard or heard of anything like it happening to my more conventionally feminine classmates. The harassment went on and on and on, through middle school, into high school, and on into college. My only respite was the two years I spent in a private high school, thanks to a scholarship and some luck, where no one knew me or cared that I was a baby butch.
The worst was in college, when the Theta Chi frat boys on the third floor decided I was sleeping with my neighbor across the hall, Cathy. They didn't go after me as much -- ruined my door decorations, knocked on my door and ran away a few times -- but they harassed the hell out of Cathy. Probably because she was smaller, frailer, and disabled. It got elevated to the residence hall manager, who was typically useless. Ironically, one of my best friends was being harassed by his hallmates at the same time, because they thought he was a black man daring to date a white woman -- me.
There was a flaming gay man living on the first floor of my dorm, who was also being harassed. Harassment involved screaming, shouting, kicking his door, throwing bottles and other objects at it, calling him homophobic names in the hallways, picking on him in the bathroom. He finally moved out of the dorm because it kept escalating, and no one was doing anything about it.
Note that I didn't even really begin to suspect I was gay until my freshman year of college. I didn't come out to anyone until the summer between my frosh and sophomore years.
And this was happening to me in the 1980s, but clearly this and worse is still happening, and continues to happen to children, teenagers, and adults too. And it isn't the fault of the queer young people, no matter how much the school administrators try to make it be.
It is the fault of the schools, the teachers, and the administrators who refuse to respond to complaints or stop it in person in the hallways and locker rooms and classrooms.
It is the fault of the vile, hateful parents who fill their children with vitriol rather than acceptance, and teach them that there are certain groups of people who are somehow less than human.
It is the fault of the children, teens, and adults perpetrating the verbal and physical violence, because they have chosen to engage in behavior that they know very well isn't acceptable.
It is the fault of the politicians and other public speakers who encourage violence and hatred rather than tolerance and acceptance.
It is the fault of people who want to keep the status quo because change scares them.
And it needs to stop. And the "It Gets Better" campaign is not, as S. Bear Bergman says, nearly enough. It is not the best we can do. It's a start. And so is the We Got Your Back Project, which seeks to make sure that everyone's voice is heard.
RM is more eloquent than I am. She also includes links to organizations you can support. Please do. And speak out. Write and tell school administrators what you think of them, particularly when you see injustice and intolerance in action. Do what you can, with the spoons you've got. Every word makes a difference.
Seth Walsh was murdered.
Asher Brown was murdered.
Billy Lucas was murdered.
The Anoka-Hennepin School District condones murder by maintaining a "neutral" policy toward GLBTIQ students that tacitly condones their abuse.
Classmates gaybashed an 11-year-old male cheerleader, breaking his arm.
A Michigan assistant attorney general engages in a deranged campaign of blogging hate speech against a college student.
People keep calling it bullying, which minimizes and infantilizes it.
I call it murder.
I call it abuse.
I call it assault and battery.
I call it harassment.
I call it stalking.
I call it slander, libel, defamation, terrorism.
And these stories and articles don't even go into the abuse heaped upon the heads of those who don't feel that killing themselves is the only way to escape it.
I was first called a "lezzie" in fourth or fifth grade. Interestingly, that's when boys also started sexually harassing me about my looks, my body, my voice, my clothes, threatening to expose themselves to me. I never heard or heard of anything like it happening to my more conventionally feminine classmates. The harassment went on and on and on, through middle school, into high school, and on into college. My only respite was the two years I spent in a private high school, thanks to a scholarship and some luck, where no one knew me or cared that I was a baby butch.
The worst was in college, when the Theta Chi frat boys on the third floor decided I was sleeping with my neighbor across the hall, Cathy. They didn't go after me as much -- ruined my door decorations, knocked on my door and ran away a few times -- but they harassed the hell out of Cathy. Probably because she was smaller, frailer, and disabled. It got elevated to the residence hall manager, who was typically useless. Ironically, one of my best friends was being harassed by his hallmates at the same time, because they thought he was a black man daring to date a white woman -- me.
There was a flaming gay man living on the first floor of my dorm, who was also being harassed. Harassment involved screaming, shouting, kicking his door, throwing bottles and other objects at it, calling him homophobic names in the hallways, picking on him in the bathroom. He finally moved out of the dorm because it kept escalating, and no one was doing anything about it.
Note that I didn't even really begin to suspect I was gay until my freshman year of college. I didn't come out to anyone until the summer between my frosh and sophomore years.
And this was happening to me in the 1980s, but clearly this and worse is still happening, and continues to happen to children, teenagers, and adults too. And it isn't the fault of the queer young people, no matter how much the school administrators try to make it be.
It is the fault of the schools, the teachers, and the administrators who refuse to respond to complaints or stop it in person in the hallways and locker rooms and classrooms.
It is the fault of the vile, hateful parents who fill their children with vitriol rather than acceptance, and teach them that there are certain groups of people who are somehow less than human.
It is the fault of the children, teens, and adults perpetrating the verbal and physical violence, because they have chosen to engage in behavior that they know very well isn't acceptable.
It is the fault of the politicians and other public speakers who encourage violence and hatred rather than tolerance and acceptance.
It is the fault of people who want to keep the status quo because change scares them.
And it needs to stop. And the "It Gets Better" campaign is not, as S. Bear Bergman says, nearly enough. It is not the best we can do. It's a start. And so is the We Got Your Back Project, which seeks to make sure that everyone's voice is heard.
RM is more eloquent than I am. She also includes links to organizations you can support. Please do. And speak out. Write and tell school administrators what you think of them, particularly when you see injustice and intolerance in action. Do what you can, with the spoons you've got. Every word makes a difference.
