LGBT Youth also Sexually Harassed More than Straight Youth. Quelle Surprise.

From ScienceDaily (Apr. 24, 2008)

James Gruber from the University of Michigan-Dearborn and Susan Fineran from the University of Southern Maine interviewed a sample of 522 middle and high school and found out that just over half the students had been bullied and just over a third were sexually harassed. Almost a third had been subject to both behaviors. Straight girls were bullied or harassed as frequently as straight boys, but lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgendered, intersex, queer and questioning youths were submitted to greater levels of both.

Gruber and Fineran found that sexual harassment causes greater harm than mere bullying in both boys and girls. Straight girls and LGBT(etc) youths appeared to be the most affected by sexual harassment, suffering from lower self-esteem, poorer mental and physical health, and more trauma symptoms (that is, thoughts and feelings arising from stressful experiences) than straight boys.

Springer (2008, April 24). Sexual Harassment At School -- More Harmful Than Bullying. ScienceDaily. Retrieved March 2, 2010, from http://www.sciencedaily.com­ /releases/2008/04/080423115922.htm

One would think the religious right would be on board with preventing sexual harassment. But once they catch wind that LGBT youth would be protected.....

LGBT Youth Bullied Three Times More than Straight Youth.

From Science Daily on February 1st:

In a nation wide study published in the Journal of Adolescent Health, it is reported that kesbian, gay, bisexual, transgendered and other sexual minority youths are bullied two to three times as often as heterosexual youths are. LGBT(etc.) youth are also more vulnerable to mental stresses such as suicidal thoughts. It is also interesting to note that older adolescents are also bullied. So the problem is in both Junior and Senior High, all the way up to senior year.

Which shows that work still needs to be done to create school environments that are supportive and accepting of all students regardless of the students' sexual orientation. At the very least, schools need to lay down rules that bullying will not be tolerated, period.

Nationwide Children's Hospital (2010, February 1). Sexual minority youth bullied more than heterosexual youth. ScienceDaily. Retrieved March 2, 2010, from http://www.sciencedaily.com­ /releases/2010/01/100127182503.htm

Problem is: it is always the religious right propagandists that oppose this. The most shameful being the "ex-gay" cult known as Exodus International.

Prop 8 Trial Re-Enactment, Day 2 Chapter 4

Therese Stewart, Attorney for the City of San Francisco, conducts the direct examination of Yale professor George Chauncey of Yale University, is the leading expert in the country on the history of gay life in America. Chauncey’s testimony will address factors previously treated as relevant to the level of scrutiny, that is, how deferential or skeptical courts will be toward government, certain kinds of discrimination receive under the 14th Amendment of our Constitution. It took two transcript paragraphs to list the prizes won by his book, “Gay New York,” (I read that, it's at the Boston Public Library) which included a trail-blazing analysis of how discrimination against homosexuals (especially gay men) developed alongside the repeal of Prohibition in the early 1930’s (the Hayes committee is one notorious example -- it eliminated gay visibility in the movies) and with the rise of McCarthyism after World War II (a Lavender Scare grew up and exceeded the Red Scare). So his testimony is about how lesbians and gay men were made a "suspect class" for benefit of the hetero majority only, and have suffered widespread and acute discrimination and fearmongering over the course of the 20th Century. He explains how more than just sodomy laws were used to try to keep gay and lesbian people even from patronizing and gathering in bars, how military anti-gay policy came about, persecution and purging of gay and lesbian government employees and even priivate sector employees and the enabling of hate crimes. The bloody discrimination reinforced enduring patterns of anti-gay prejudice and hostility, forcing lesbians and especially gay men to endure the toll of the closet. The closet made LGBT people utterly invisible and has perpetuated “demonic stereotypes” of gay people, including past and present themes of gay men and lesbians as threats to children starting in the '50s, the latest examples being the images of such threats presented in the media in support of Proposition 8. He explains thoroughly that which the plaintiffs are arguing: these scare tactics were a form of irrational prejudice deployed in the Yes on 8 campaign to secure passage of the proposition.

Chauncey has agreed with most modern historians that homosexuality as a category of humanity was discovered only in the late 19th Century. Before that, law and society focused on the acts themselves (sodomy, etc.) and assumed they would come and go in many peoples’ lives. So Thompson, cross-examining again, presses Chauncey to admit that the category “homosexual” is a fluid one with distinctions between acts and identities, and that it’s not exactly clear what it means. As the day ends, Thompson’s cross-examination of Professor Chauncey has only just begun.

What It's Like for a Gay Youth to Live in an Antigay Household.

I will let Joshua Scarpuzzi tell the story. It's here, beginning at Comment No. 38. He was commenting on the fifth installment of the Courage campaign's liveblog the second day of the Proposition 8 Federal trial in Federal Court in San Francisco, California.

I currently live at home with my family…and the closest description of my mother is Anita. I feel like I'm living in “prayers for Bobby” everyday. It hurts to hear these things, these statements that live off of the fear and ignorance of religious people all over our country. I am good with God, I made my peace years ago and I know where I'm going after this life, and being only 19 and out and in the spotlight of the gay community here in San Diego is rough at times but it makes my stomach churn when I see the young gays who take their rights and freedoms for granted, who haven't been through the hate and shame and isolation many of the older, wiser gays have. And I'm not saying they should go through it. No one should, but I honestly feel that losing Prop 8, and now having this battle in the public eye and discussing all of the shit we've gone through will open the eyes of other kids, families, and the public to see the truth. We have a long way to go and I wish the best for everyone in that court room. Thank you so much for blogging this to us on the outside, it is truly a blessing.

Actualy Joshua experienced a year-long concentrated dose of the hate and shame and isolation many of the older, wiser gays have gone through when his biological family sent him away and had him committed to an abusive, homophobic ex-gay cult.

In October of 2007 I was transported against my will to a behavioral modification camp in western Montana. My parents had me locked in this facility for exactly 365 days of which I spent doing labor, line drills, shock therapy, isolation therapy, among other things. I was starved at times, spit on, molested, called a faggot, and beat up by staff and other kids. These religious hypocritical leaders, and I hate to compare the two (because I would never want to minimize what the Jews went through), are the modern day Nazis of America. They want to govern everyone with their narrow minded bigotry and we have to fight! We have to come out of the closet and say enough is enough!!!!! I survived 365 days of abuse and humiliation because I knew one day I could share my story with the world. I've still not told anyone on this big of a scale but I hope that one person may read this and that one person more will take a stand. I've been out in the real world for a year and 3 months and I still, day to day, get the abuse from my family. We have to keep fighting! For my friends who are still in these camps, for our own future, and for the future of our children. :(

If only Joshua were in the Courtroom telling his story!

There are so many of these “camps”, and so many these that goes on behind the closed doors of Prop 8 supporters, churches, and religious organizations that we never hear about. I've tried a few times to contact gay newspapers, news stations, and magazines as well as police officials to try and bring light to these “camps” but no one has wanted to publish my story. People need to know about the cruelty and hypocrisy that goes on behind the God-following mask they wear!

Yes, the news must be promulgated far and wide that these ex-gay cults are a menace! They've even brought the bogus idea of "reparative therapy" to the shores of the United Kingdom (Great Britain) and much to the UK mainstream media's credit, these dangerous cults are being denounced and discredited over there!

Ugandan Kill The gays Bills is Worse Than You Could Possibly Imagine.

Anybody who knows of a sexually active OR romantically involved GLBT Ugandan would get caught up in this bill if it becomes law and if they commit more than one offense related to homosexuality, then they meet the Death Penalty once convicted! This means that for Ugandan gays, lying and hiding in the closet is no option. Their friends, relatives, employers, coworkers and ministers would have to give them up to the state. And the bill if enacted would have extraterritorial reach.

Link here: http://wakingupnow.com/blog/uganda-kill-everyone-video/comment-page-1#comment-1890

And even the antigay pastor Martin Ssemba could get caught up in this and get killed by the State if this bill were eneacted and he continues to show extreme gay porn in Ugandan churches. He's had two such presentations already and I doubt he'll stop! He appears to be a closet case to me. Still, we cannot allow this bill to become law! Kill the bill!

Utterly Disgusting and Insane Hate Video.

I found this at Joe.My.God. The original is at WorldNutDaily.

WARNING -- COARSE LANGUAGE ALERT.

Pardon my Fench but I am majorly pissed off and very angry.

Just fucking revolting. And twisting MLK's inspirational fight for freedom into killing human beings is beyond abhorrent.

The recent open talk about rounding us up should be seen as a RED ALERT.

The ramp-up of this type of vicious, violent rhetoric is truly disturbing -- it demands that we be more active, confrontational and vocal oursleves. Queer Rising and other groups who've started civil disobedience got it right; this has to be in your face, every day and a demand for no less than full equality -- and these morons publicized and confronted.

I'm sick of gay people who are too chickenshit to push back. You can't make a moral equivalence between hatred of the oppressor and hatred of the oppressed. We have no obligation to treat people like Molotov Mitchell with a shred of respect or even common politeness.

These people are classic bullies, and the only way their evil will be reigned in is if they have something to lose by bullying us.

Prop 8 Trial Re-Enactment, Day 1 Chapter 3

Today Paul Katami finished his testimony of how he was harmed by the Constitutional change and the worsened atmosphere against gay men generated by the passing of Proposition 8 and the Yes on 8 campaign's lies about the so-called "threat" posed to children by same-sex marriage, as well as his desire to marry his partner, Jeffrey Zarrillo. I was really, really angry when the Defense-Intervenor's attorney did his cross-examination of Mr. Katami. I felt he was hunting Mr. Katami, to back him into a corner and tear him apart. My blood was boiling! I wanted to jump into the computer screen and shake some sense into the attorney's head. then I had to remember: this is only a reenactment. Kristin Perry also testified of the harm done to her and about her desire to marry her partner, Nicole Kirk (do I have that correct?) Kristin's testimony broke my heart when she said she felt that "We weren't good enough to be married" when the State courts ruled in 2004 or 5 invalidating San Francisco's issuing of marriage licenses to same-sex couples and presiding over same-sex weddings.



But remember, Proposition 8 was stolen due to black box voting!

Don't Ask Don't Tell is Exhausting for GLBT Servicepeople.

Comment 143 from Prop 8 Trial Tracker, today's Prop. 8 and DADT thread:

A poster named Ozymandias said:

I think there’s a big misunderstanding concerning DADT with a lot of people who support it (but are at least reasonable about it). I have heard people say ‘Why overturn it? What happens in the bedroom shouldn’t be anyone’s business!’ Naturally I agree, but DADT is not about preventing us from hurling our ‘lifestyle’ about.

I asked someone once, ‘How many times a day do you mention your wife in casual conversation?’ He said that he didn’t know because he didn’t think about it. Exactly – he didn’t have to think about it because his relationship with his wife was universally accepted. Now, I asked him, imagine being in a place where he COULDN’T mention his marriage because his marriage could get him fired. How many conversations would he suddenly have to edit? What about conversations via e-mail with his wife, if the e-mail server was owned by the company with this policy? Going further, even if he used a 3rd-party e-mail platform, how would he feel if his monitor was facing the door to his office? What if the company had internet-monitoring software? Was there the possibility that the company could somehow ’see’ his e-mails? What about Instant Messaging?

Even more than that, what if you ran into a co-worker away from work with your wife by your side? How would you handle company functions, or even places where you know your co-workers go after work? What if someone ‘found out’ about your marriage and said he was supportive – how would you feel if you received instructions to reprimand that co-worker for something? Or have to give them a project that they might feel is unfair? Would the knowledge that he knew affect your dealings with him?

He looked at me with open horror and said, ‘My God, the amount of paranoia that kind of policy would create… in every part of my dealings with my co-workers – that would exhaust me completely! Gays and Lesbians in the Armed Forces have to deal with that?’

Every day, was my response.

And it is exhausting. Having to look over your shoulder every day -- which is absolutely necessary in a hostile environment in which you are being hunted by other human beings. This is exactly the environamt that Former Senator Sam Nunn and Former President Bill Clinton's "Don't Ask Don't Tell" promulgates. Superiors in the military, if they suspect any servicemember is gay / lesbian / etc., can ask other people including civilians how that servicemember exercised his / her liberties whilst off duty. Oftentimes the result is a dishonourable discharge which means the dischargee usually can't get a decent job. Servicemembers can't seek address for sexual or homophobic harassment because then they will be under increased suspicion! Oftentimes they have to defend themselves with no support whatsoever. Sometimes they're brutally murdered like Barry Wenchell, who was beaten to death with a baseball bat simply because he fell in love with a MTF transgender who had begun to present herself as a woman... yet he was otherwise straight.

It is past time to let our fellow GLBT servicepeople to serve their copuntry openly!

Prop 8 Trial Re-Enactment, Day 1 Chapter 2

In this installment we have the Defense-Intervenor's opening arguments and the first two Plaintiff's witnesses: Jeff Zarrilli and Paul Katami. Jeff and Paul describe the bloody discrimination they face every day because they are not married. Usually the everyday slights, misunderstandings and downright "why did you ask for a single kingsized bed for???" type of reprimand. All this does nothing except shame and humiliate gay men, lesbians and the like. Paul also tells of a queerbashing in which the bashers threw rocks and eggs over the perimeter fence of a gay-friendly establishment. He and Jeff, along with others, got hit by the eggs and rocks. No doubt that there was property damage and I'm convinced the eggs were rotten aas well. People do not accept same-sex couples unless we are legally married! Toward the end of the vid the DI's team try to prevent the "Stand Up" (freight train and commuter trains) video in which certain California religious right ministers manage to get the conservative Christian church membership all worked up in fear with POSSIBLE SCAREY OUTCOMES if they don't go out to the polls and "Stand Up for Jesus" by voting to take already-recognized same-sex marriage rights from GLBT people (and same-sex sham marriage rights from straight people) with only irrational prejudice and religion for justification.



Here is the stinkin' "Stand Up" video. By showing two COMMUTER TRAINS, it portrays us GLBT people as an unacceptable, dangerous threat. The real Jesus would have nothing to do with this, except to rebuke the producers, directors, crew and cast, especially the featured preachers!



BTW the black preacher, Ron Prentice, looks gay. Hahahahaha. Ouch. :'(

Prop 8 Trial Re-Enactment, Day 1 Chapter 1

This is a landmark case in which a mountain range of evidence has been built which shows that prejudice against us LGBTIQ people is irrational and based on religion, lies, mid/disinformation, myth and false assumption.

An Ex-Gay Survivor Speaks.

Today in San Francisco at the Proposition 8 Trial, Ryan Kendall testified to his own personal experience in an ex-gay cult called NARTH at their facility in Encino, CA, which is just north of San Diego. Despite our stories for over 40 years, gay kids are still joining these cults, whether by their own free will, manipulation, blackmail, or even force.

Plaintiffs' counsel Flynn led the direct investigation.

[Note: K = Kendall, F = Flynn]

K: I am an NCIC agent, it is a database maintained by the FBI. I have a secure clearance for this work.

Flynn: When were you born?
K: 1983.
F: 26 years old?
K: Yes.
F: School?
K: Evangelical Christian University.
F: How did you hear about homosexuality?
K: Proposition 2 in Colorado where I was raised.
F: Did your family talk about it?
K: Yes, it was very scare, homosexuality was wrong and evil and threatened our family, my parents said.
F: What is your sexual orientation?
K: I am a gay man.
F: How long have you known that?
K: Since I was 12 years old.
F: How did you feel when you realised you were gay?
K: ...and what your family and community did NOT like this concept, so I kept it a secret, hidden away from everyone.
F: What names were you called?
K: Homo, faggot, queer
[This shows that our natural comportment gives us away even if we don't tell a soul about our natural sexuality]
F: What else happened?
K: Played keep-away with my glasses and broke them.
F: What was it like being in that Christian School?
K: They were taunting me with a word that was so close to the truth. My parents changed schools.
F: When did your parents find out you were gay?
K: My parents discovered my journal when I was 13.
[His parents did not respect his privacy, nor his boundaries -- for they obviously read the journal.]
F: What happened?
K: My parents flipped out, they yelled, it was pretty scary the way they reacted.
F: Do you remember anything they said?
K: My mom said I was going to burn in Hell.
F: Was your family religious?
K: Yes, Church was a big part of our lives.
F: How did you feel when your mom said that?
K: I was totally stunned. I could not believe I was eternally damned.
F: What therapy did your parents send you to?
K: I was sent to a "Christian therapist" who would make me a heterosexual.
F: How many times did you go?
K: I went two or three times.
F: Did you recall much?
K: Inconsistent with Christian teachings, disapproved my parents, and that I was a bad person and evil.
F: How bad did you feel?
K: I always wanted to please my parents, now I was a bad and evil kid.
F: Was therapy successful? Did it make you heterosexual?
K: No, I was still gay.
F: Did you try to be straight?
K: No I knew I was gay the way I know I am short and half-Hispanic.
F: Next, where did you go?
K: NARTH: National Association of Reparative Therapy for Homosexuality, Encino, CA...
F: For how long?
K: Two, three years, 14 to 16.
F: How was your home life?
K: It was like night and day. My parents used to take me to school, make notes and put them in lunch, pick me up. Afterwards they called me names and that they hated me and that I was disgusting. My mom told me she wishes she'd had an abortion instead of a gay son, or Down's Syndrome or a retarded kid... instead of a gay son, me.
[Interesting, how the parents' unconditional love turned to unadulterated hate. They should be ashamed of themselves.]
F: Who at NARTH?
K: Joseph Nicolosi, Executive Director of NARTH.
F: Where did you meet with him?
K: Over the phone, an hour, 90 minutes. Then travelled to California.
F: What did you talk about?
K: Homosexuality is incompatible with Christian teachings, and not what your parents want for you.
F: Advice how to repress homosexuality?
K: No specific advice, just general admonishments.
[Just like my experience in the Boston Church of Christ! "Homosexuality will lead you to a bad lifestyle, you'll catch diseases and AIDS, you'll meet an early demise blah blah blah and then you're going to hell!" The only so-called "advice" they gave me was to pray, "Lord deliver me from these lusts!," and the like. Fat lot of good that did. I almost became an Atheist because of them.]
F: How did your NARTH experience help you reconcile your gayness and your faith?
K: At NARTH I was told I was dirty and bad, the therapy played no role in making me better or healthier.
F: Were you straight when you were done?
K: Just as gay as when I started.
F: Why did you stop going?
K: My life had fallen apart: my faith, my family, everything. If I did not stop going to NARTH, I wouldn't survive. I would kill myself.
[And by suiciding, he could have exiled himself into the Outer Darkness!]
F: How were you able to stop?
K: At 16 I surrendered myself to the Colorado Department of Children.
F: How does that work?
K: I told a social worker I was going to kill myself if I didn't leave my parents. They strated an abuse and neglect proceeding against my parents.
F: How was that?
K: I was incredibly suicidal, I turned to drugs to escape reality, things did not get better, I had lost everything.
F: How long did this period last?
K: Four to five years.
F: How did you support yourself?
K: It was a struggle.
F: On Public benefits?
K: I had to go to the emergency room for health care.
[This is why we need a National Health Service with a network of clinics for the uninsured. Instead we get Obama-Romneycare! But that's a different subject.]
F: How long have you worked for the Denver Police Department?
K: two to three years now.
F: Are you stable and can you support yourself?
K: Yes, it has been really hard, but I have been able to do that.
F: Just a couple more questions. Are you aware of organisations that are supportive of gay rights?
K: Yes. I am a member of Log Cabin Republicans, and a member of Denver Commission on LGBT Rights.
F: Are you testifying for them or you?
K: For myself, Ryan Kendall.
F: Have these organisations shaped your testimony?
K: No.
F: No more questions.

[Cross examination]
Campbell for the Defendant-Intervenor
C: Do you live in California?
K: No.
[But he went to the NARTH cult facility in Encino and even if he didn't, this is relevant.]
C: Did you participate in No on Proposition 8?
K: No.
C: Were you contacted by the San Francisco City Attorney's Office, yes?
[So Ryan Kendall knows someone in San Fran! (-: ]
K: Yes, in October.
C: Have you studied human sexuality?
K: No.
C: Have you known people who profess to have changed their sexual orientation?
K: In public, yes.
C: Were you compelled by your parents to go to conversion therapy?
K: Yes.
C: It was all your parents, without your consent?
K: Yes.
C: You told your parents your objections.
K: I told my parents and my therapist.
C: But that did not matter?
K: Yes, it did not.
C: Did you have the goal of changing your sexual attraction?
K: Yes, I just wanted to survive it.
C: But your goal was not to change.
K: No.
C: You talked about things your parents said to you?
K: Yes.
C: But your family experience was just as damaging as the therapy itself?
K: Yes, I said that.
[Of course it would be! What do people expect, when unconditional love turns to unadulterated hate?]
C: At some point your parents lost custody with you?
K: Yes.
C: After that, did you go back to live with your parents when you were 18?
K: Yes, briefly.
C: Some people volunteer and choose to go into conversion therapy?
K: That's not my experience.
C: So no one has ever gone to conversion therapy voluntarily?
K: I don't know EVERYONE; but in my experience, no.
C: But you have acknowledged that some people have success with conversion therapy?
K: I don't know that.

REDIRECT:
F: Have you met anyone who succeeded in conversion therapy?
K: Yes, Nicolosi trotted out his perfect patient, named Kelly, who (when the doctor left the room) told me he was going to a gay bar that night and was pretending success in conversion for his family.
[HA! So not only are these ex-gay ministries cults, they are scams.]
F: You said you went back to our parents when you were 18?
K: Briefly.
F: And do you talk to your parents now?
K: No.
[Why should he? They proved to him that they were horrible parents after discovering his sexuality.]
No more questions.

Proposition 8 - Stolen and Turned to H8

Turns out that there was a huge discrepancy between the exit polls for Proposition 8 and the vote counting results. A swing of 4% from one direction to the other. And a group in Los Angeles did their own exit polling with safeguards inaugurated to minimize lying to the exit pollsters: i.e., filling out printed informal ballots anonymously and inserting them into a locked box. They found even wider swings!

Links: Bradblog.com , WasProp8Straight.org

Not only were we LGBT America citizens queerbashed, so were the majority of California's voters, their state's constitution and the US Constitution!

And it looks like SCOTUS may pull a Conservative Judicial Activist stunt, like they did with Bowers v. Hardwick. :(