| "Critical Issues: Gay & Lesbian Youth" 05.01.2000 page 2 |
| The oppression of gay and lesbian people is not accidental. Keeping them invisible oppresses them. The symbolic annihilation of gay and lesbian youth from all forms of media is a way to ignore the issue and to oppress them. The gay and lesbian culture is adult oriented. Gay and lesbian youth do not have cultural supports as other minorities do. Due to legal, political, social, and financial barriers, gay and lesbian youth are kept from participating within the diverse gay and lesbian culture. Youth are powerless to support their own emotional needs in any way. The highly visible Boy Scouts of America with 4.5 million members openly discriminates against and rejects youth that are gay. Gay and lesbian youth have no or few social networks, cultural legitimacy, or political leverage. (Kielwasser, 1992, 350-356). Public discussion of homosexuality focuses on adults and most often ignores the reality that there are gay and lesbian youth. Gay and lesbian youth are ignored at all levels of society. They have an aura of quiet desperation. Their existence is excluded from mainstream culture. Society promotes homogeneity over difference and as a result rejects all forms of sexuality except for heterosexual or straight orientation. Gay and lesbian youth for the most part have been annihilated from free TV. This annihilation supports oppression and gives youth the false impression that they are alone. Gay and lesbian people are invisible which makes it hard for them to find each other. For youth it is very difficult. Gay and lesbian youth grow up isolated from their straight peers and from each other. It is difficult for gay and lesbian people to fight oppression because you can not tell who is homosexual by looking at someone. The feeling of isolation is real. Allen Young an activist of the former �gay lib� era remembers feeling an overwhelming sense of her abnormality because she did not have any support and at the time she did not realize that millions of other teenagers were going through the same thing. Journalist Darrell Yates Remembers telling a friend during a Chicago gay pride parade, �When I was a kid, I�d have been a hell of a lot happier�if I�d seen just one thing like this and learned that I wasn�t the only one like me alive�. Society�s stereo-types are inaccurate. The flaming boy may be straight and the macho man may in reality be gay. The tomboy may be straight and the dainty girl may be a lesbian. You can not tell. Gay and lesbian youth need a way to find each other so that they can support one another. (Kielwasser, 1992, 350-353). TV accounts for a large portion of teenage leisure time. For teenagers, TV bypasses the embarrassment to ask parents, friends, and teachers about sexual orientation and other important developmental issues. In a 1986 Harris survey of 1,000 adolescents TV was ranked fourth place for sex education and yet network TV treats gay and lesbian youth like they do not exist, when in reality they exist in large numbers. 10 to 13% of teenagers watching TV are gay or lesbian. Network TV is one of the most informative ways for gay and lesbian youth to get information about themselves. Straight youth are bombarded with positive information about their sexuality but gay and lesbian youth have little to no positive information. All TV is educational. TV is more than news it is society�s �story teller�. The stories of gay and lesbian youth need to be told. Gay and lesbian youth need role models and these models need to be presented on TV. (Kwielwasser, 1992, 350-356). The novelist Bette Greene wrote the young adult novel �The Drowning of Stephan Jones� because she is bothered by injustice towards other people, she hates hate, and she wanted to sensitize youth and adult views of gay and lesbian people (Alvine, 1994, 5). In order to write her book she interviewed 485 people in 8 states. Her subjects were victims and victimizers of gay bashing hate crimes. She found that the youth who committed these crimes believed that it was OK to bash and to kill gay people because of what they learned from listening to preachers within their churches. They often mentioned �Sodom and Gomorrah� which is a story about inhospitality within the bible. This story is often misinterpreted in order to promote discrimination against homosexuals. Bette Greene says that Christian Fundamentalist groups will often collect money from the pulpit to help murderers of gay and lesbian people. Christian Fundamentalists do not believe that murdering gay people is wrong, just as they believe that killing a physician who legally performs an abortion is OK. Christian Fundamentalists believe that only they speak for God. They have all the answers and they know how everyone else should live- just like they live. There is not any room for diversity in God�s plan according to Christian Fundamentalists. Bette says that the first thing we do to destroy another human being is verbal, and then we may or may not use physical violence. Bette believes that preachers can promote terrorism and murder and that no one will say anything because these preachers are perceived to be talking for God. She believes that the Religious Right preaches hate. She says that many abusers of gay and lesbian people are often confused about their own sexual orientation. She feels that it is very important for Americans to talk about homosexuality so that the acceptance of gay and lesbian people improves. Bette Greene gets positive comments from people who have read her book and negative comments from people who only hear about the book. (Alvine, 1994, 5-6). It is not necessary to be gay or lesbian to be persecuted like a gay or a lesbian (Greene, 1994, 3). Perceptions and stereotypes are all that matters to become the victim of discrimination. Many victims of persecution meant to be directed against gay and lesbian people are actually straight people (Greene, 1994, 3). Because a boy may enjoy gymnastics, fencing, acting, writing, or band practice and not football, he may be called a �faggot� and that�s just the beginning (Greene, 1994, 3). It appears that America wants a nation of linebackers in an age of technology. One of Bette Greenes high school friends committed suicide because he was a �designated victim� of verbal abuse. Bette Greene says that it is not just gay and lesbian people who are suffering. She says that any boy or girl who does not fit the mold of man made stereotypes is the potential victim for persecution. Any boy that is sensitive, shy, and slender can become a �designated victim� (Green, 1994, 3). One young man left his high school in Fort Collins, Colorado because he was the designated victim of verbal attacks (Bauman, 1998, 42). Students labeled him �a queer�, even though he was not gay or even bisexual (Bauman, 1998, 42). Bette Greene compares gay and lesbian persecution to the Salem witch trials in Massachusetts (Greene, 1994, 3). Bette Greene says, �haven�t we brutalized and buried enough gays? Haven�t we brutalized and buried enough of our creative young? Let us say no to oppression in the name of political expediency. Let us say no to oppression in the name of patriotism, and, for God�s sake, let us say no to oppression in the name of religion� (Greene, 1994, 3). |
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