Marco 13 - Takes on Bullies

After seeing the video of the Ohio high school supporters taunting the opposition with anti gay slurs, I was so happy to see this story via my twitter account.

Marco says he's been bullied since the school year began. Mostly verbal assaults, but once he was pushed down and hit his head. Marco said, "It makes me upset ... not that upset to where I want to kill myself ... but upset to where I want to make a difference to help people who are getting bullied and keeping quiet and to the people who are the bulliers."

Its amazing what each of us can do on our own.  This 13 year old boy with the support of his parents is taking direct action. It would be a good idea if others in his area went out to help him.  Marco Melgoza goes to Desmond Middle School in Madera County California.


Here is a video of an interview he did with KFSN, the local ABC affiliate.

Ohio - Powder Blue faggots

High schools are dangerous places for many young people. Especially if you are gay. Watch the video below. Its a high school football game and some 300 students are taunting the opposition team, chanting Powder Blue Faggots.



The game officials did nothing. The chant went unchallenged. The school says they students have learned a life lesson, that is until they are at the next game.
Former North High student Heather Ike took the video. "I sat there for a little bit thinking it would stop, and it happened again, and it happened three times," Ike said, adding that she left the game after a few minutes, disgusted.

All of this occurred after world wide attention on the suicides of several teenagers caused because they were being bullied because they were gay and or perceived to be gay.

Its clear to me, after three separate chants, the school has decided to do nothing. The game should have been halted. The offending students evicted. If it kept up, then the team they are supporting should be banned from playing football for the rest of the year.

Get serious. Adults are abandoning their responsibilities here. Teenagers are bullying because they know nothing will happen. And just maybe, they know some of the adults like what they hear...

Memories to share with 13 year old

I was really moved by this "It Gets Better" video. A local councillor in Fort Worth Texas, Joel Burns talks about the many young boys that have taken their lives due to bullying. These boys were gay or perceived to be gay. Its a very touching speech. He touches much about my life. I will write about that in a post in the next few days. I hope you can watch this video. I hope you can reflect on this and just maybe, you can help another young person survive. to see that It Gets Better.

"High school was difficult, coming out was painful," he said. "I want to tell any teen who is watching this, life will get better. ... Life will get so, so, so much better."

Burns' sometimes tearful comments drew praise from his fellow council members.

"So very proud of my friend and colleague Joel Burns for his stance against bullying of gay youth and those perceived to be gay," Councilwoman Kathleen Hicks wrote on Facebook during the meeting. "I am sure he saved many tonight."

Councilman Sal Espino echoed Hicks' thoughts.

"Burns displayed tremendous personal courage today in speaking out against bullying against youth and children particularly gay youth in light of the recent tragedies," he also posted on Facebook. "Fort Worth is a diverse community and we believe that all of God's children should be treated with dignity, compassion, and love."

Read more: http://www.star-telegram.com/2010/10/12/2542148/fort-worth-councilman-offers-hope.html#ixzz12LEtf3Tl

Let me, a gay man, hold the purse strings to the City

Do you need another reason not to vote for Rob Ford?

Vigils - Lives Lost to Homophobia

Vigils are planned across Canada this month, for lives lost due to homophobic bullying:

Toronto - Oct 6, 8pm - Church & Wellesley
Kingston - Oct 6, 8pm - JDUC, University & Union
Montreal - Oct 6, 8pm - Parc de l'Espoir, Beaudry Metro
Ajax - Oct 20, 8:30pm - Heritage Square, Ajax Town Hall

more info at Xtra Canada  

When I learn of additional vigils, I will post them here.

You are not alone. #stayalive

Shamelessly take from the Youth Blog and reposted here

From Lesbian Gay Bi Trans Youth Line

I’m not sure if folks are aware of this, but in the past month, five teenage boys in the United Stats have committed suicide related to anti-gay bullying.

On September 9th, Billy Lucas, a 15 year old from Indiana killed himself over anti-gay bulling.
September 13th, Cody Barker. He was 17, in Wisconsin. Again – over anti-gay bullying.
September 18th, Seth Walsh, from California. 13 years old. He hanged himself over anti-gay bullying and was pronounced dead on September 26 after ten days on life support.

On September 23rd, Asher Brown, 13, from Texas, killed himself over anti-gay bulling.
And on September 29th, Tyler Clementi. He was 18 from New Jersey, and is presumed dead after jumping from the George Washington Bridge after being humiliated online for his sexual orientation.
That’s 5 since school started in the beginning of September.

Five.

Now, I know this is happened in America, which may seem ‘way over there’ to some, but it affects all of us in the LGBTQ community and it’s definitely an issue in Canada, too. Many of us have also faced bullying due to our gender or sexual orientation (or just bullying, for whatever the reason); we’ve all faced isolation and feeling alone. We all know what it’s like to be queer without support systems in place.

Call the number above if you need help or know someone that does. The blog is here

It gets better - for all lgbt youth

Here is a good video from the "It gets better" project

13 year old boy dies after bullying

Another boy takes his life due to bullying. Seth Walsh, the Tehachapi 13-year-old who hanged himself from a tree in his back yard after years of being bullied, died Tuesday afternoon after nine days on life support. See story here.


Here is a video posted shortly after Seth was taken to hospital, made by one of his friends...

Homophobia killed Asher Brown

Have a look at this face. You see a boy. I see a boy... He should be thinking about meeting up with friends, going camping, maybe dinner tonight with his parents

He was bullied to death. He is dead.

Asher Brown, a 13-year-old eighth grader at Hamilton Middle School outside Houston Texas.

He was bullied because he was small, because he was gay.

The story is here

11 year old cheerleader called "sissy" and has his arm broke

A young boy gets beaten by two boys who end up breaking his arm.  The boy is 11 years old.  He was beaten after being taunted and bullied for joining a cheer leading squad for a local football team.  The boys in his school called him a sissy and queer. 

This really pisses me off.  The boys who did this were not just being "boys".  They purposely bullied their classmate.  For all of those people out there that say we don't need strong and effective anti-bullying programs along with anti-homophobia instruction have a look at the video below.

This boy likely does not know if he is gay or not.  His arm was broken because some boys thought it was okay to beat the crap out of another boy they assumed to be gay.  Homophobia does not only affect queers, it affects all of us.

Due to many advancements in legal protections for gays, many people think its much easier in school today.  This story says otherwise.  Kids that appear different or do different things are cast out by those that feel its their right to do so.

These kids are not doing it on their own.  They are being taught these behaviours.  They may be modelling their parents, siblings, or their church preacher when they attack someone that does not appear to conform to the norm as they have learned it to be.

From grade 10 on I was the victim of bullying and homophobia, much before I learned myself that I was gay.  It was okay then to beat the crap out of a homo, queer, or fag.  Its still okay today as you can see.  We have a long way to go before every child is afforded a safe healthy experience in a public school.



Link to Fox 8 News story - Findlay Ohio

"Be proud of who you are."

Harry Potter says, "Be proud of who you are."

Daniel Radcliffe's PSA For LBGT Help Line Debuts 'If you're feeling helpless or hopeless, there's always a safe place to turn,' he says in the Trevor Project PSA.

The Trevor Project is the leading national organization focused on crisis and suicide prevention efforts among lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and questioning (LGBTQ) youth.

Can I have this dance

Commercials, supporting queer youth are popping up all over the world it seems except Canada. When was the last time you saw an ad on Canadian TV about queer teens. This one is Norwegian though this has English text added.

Call me silly, but I was that boy in school, I would have loved to walk up to a boy like this boy does. That would have been said to have "taken a lot of courage" and or "You are NUTS!" when I was in school. The ad suggests that differing attitudes are in place today, though the ad also says its still a problem.

Ephebophilia

Ephebophilia!

a sexual orientation or preference in which an adult's primary sexual attraction is towards pubescent or postpubescent adolescents

Thanks to Bruce over at Canuck Attitude, I learned a new word. Ephebophilia is apparently what Catholic priests practice, but not only Catholics do this, it is apparently just as common in other denominations... according to the Holy See.

I think there is value in being a Catholic, I mean you get to say sorry every time you do something you shouldn't...

Bruce has a good piece on this, go have a look.

They didn't know Matthew, John and Joel.

"I watched The 700 Club sometimes with Pat Robertson -- they're constantly talking about gays."

Those are the words of a confessed killer, Jay Johnson. Johnson's father was VP of Bethel College and Seminary and often spoke openly against homosexuality. He was raised in a strict, religious household.

Johnson learned to hate gays and himself. He was gay himself and felt what he was doing was wrong. To deal with his feelings of guilt and remorse he killed two gay men and attacked another.

Jay Thomas Johnson plead guilty to the murder of former State Sen. John Chenoweth, 48, and Joel Larson, 21. That was 17 years ago on September 30, 1992. Since then the anti gay rhetoric has gone up a few notches.

You can't convince me that the words of "moral" leaders don't lead to acts such as those exhibited by Jay. These moral leaders have instilled a deep hatred and a sense of responsibility or obligation to act, among many that listen to them.

In this case three lives were sadly taken, the two men Jay killed and his own. Jay has admitted to being gay himself and according to this website, has accepted himself now. Its an outrage that these murders, inspired by words of the demonizing Christian fundamentalist leadership and supported by stupid people like the one guy I mentioned in the post below, happen at all.

These murders happened before Matthew Shepard. Who said words will never hurt me? They didn't know Matthew, John and Joel.

Gay man attacked, wasn't Flaunting IT!

It seems there are no shortages of new stories about gay men being attacked by straight men. This story out of London ON is just the latest.

Brandon Wright had a choice -- jump from a moving pickup truck, or stay and possibly be beaten to death.

"I don't know if it was bravery or fear that motivated me to jump," said the 22-year-old Londoner, who says he was the victim of an anti-gay hate crime last Tuesday when he was forced to leap from the moving pickup on Kipps Lane in north London. - London Free Press, September 15, 2009

Is this a copy cat of the Thunder Bay attack, is it the hard economic times that brings this out more, or are we just seeing what happens regularly and its being reported more?

Whatever it is its intolerable. It made me sick to my stomach. Its sharp pang inside me that can't be eased. I want to lash out at those that refuse to act in our schools, every time a member of the glbttq community is assaulted. So much for all we claim to have achieved in this pink "friendly" country.

And then it angers me further when Branden's mother adds, "When you're a mother and you walk in that hospital room and see the damage that was done to him, it's just appalling," said Wright, who described her son as a "good guy" who doesn't flaunt his sexuality, and never bothers anyone."

Just what does "flaunting it" mean? What has that got to do with anything? I know she is not meaning any harm, she is just trying to add to description, but what she is really saying is, Branden always takes a seat at the back of the bus.

Flaunting it means he was asking for it. That's like saying the woman dressed very nicely was begging to be raped. Just think about this when its your son, brother, nephew, sister, daughter, niece attacked for who they are.

see Gay man savagely attacked in London

Recalling a "fag" beating in highschool

Warning, Not a "fun" read...

My own story of school is not unlike the topic in which Simon in Montreal posts about on his blog and the post below this one.

I have mentioned a few times what happened to me as a teen in high school. It was pretty much hell a lot of the time. That's not to say I did not experience good times as well, I just wonder how many others were faced with having to hide behind pillars so bullies wouldn't see me, or wait for the bell to ring and the halls were empty to go to my locker. That made me a couple minutes late for class and often a lecture from the teacher.

As awful as being called out in front of the whole class for being late again, it was better than the likelihood of being caught out in the hall and called fag or dicksucker or worse by people that had no reason to think such things of me. I didn't even know I was gay myself.

I had excelled in high school early on, I was a good athlete in soccer and rugby despite being the smallest guy in school. I didn't like gym, climbing ropes, chin-ups etc. I did them but not without a great deal of fear of failing at them.

In grade ten I became more than someone that was "simply" the subject of name calling and being pushed around, tripped or pushed. I was attacked in an ambush.

Ten boys from my school stood and waited for me and my friend to walk down town for lunch through a church yard. As we approached the end of the church property they stepped out from behind the trees and blocked our path. They asked me where I was going. I told them and started to walk around them. They blocked us.

They were only interested in me, my friend was the high school basketball star. One guy grabbed me and started pushing me to the ground. I refused to be pushed and that is when he hit me. He swung his open hand and slapped me in the face, telling me I was a faggot. My nose was bleeding and my friend said cool it guys but was held back by two or three of them.

I kicked from behind. It was unexpected and caused me to fall. When I fell a guy jumped on me to keep me on the ground. He was slapping my face, demanding I admit I was a fag. Each time he would demand it, I kept my mouth shut. When I did not respond he started slapping me on my face, the back of my head, sometimes pulling my hair, raising my head off the ground.

This went on for several minutes and those around me started yelling insults. Some were not satisfied. They started kicking me in the side, on my legs. One guy kicked me in the jaw. They were laughing, demanding I tell them I was a fag. All this time they held my friend back.

I did not know I was a gay, I wondered what made them think I was. The attack kept up, until the lunch hour was almost over. They left us there, me bleeding from the nose, mouth and cuts on my head, arms and soon to be bruised all over.

We made it back to the school. I went to a washroom and cleaned up as best I could. I felt embarrassed that this happened to me. I needed to be tough. I knew that if I had admitted I was a Fag, these boys would never let up on me. I admitted nothing, said nothing. In the classroom after i was cleaned up, bruises started to appear and my face swelled up. My teacher was very concerned and asked what happened.

I refused to talk. I felt i was inferior for some reason, I could have avoided the beating some how. The teacher was persistent, I told him I was beat up by some guys. He wanted to know why, I said I didn't know.

No more attacks like that happened to me in school. It made me very weary of those around me. I was always watching out for those that had attacked me. I became very good at staying out of sight, out of the way. Nothing happened to these boys as a result of attacking me. Several of them turned out to be decent people when they became adults, three of them had problems with the law for years to come. Four of the attackers I know nothing more about.

I went to the library to look up Homosexual. I found it in a dictionary. It said something like "Homosexuals were sexual deviants, a psychological disorder." I don't recall exactly what it said today. The school had no place for me to go, no one to talk to about this. I certainly wasn't going to talk to a school counselor if he would think I was a pervert.

The word fag is used as a put down for anything bad. It is used to degrade, to hurt others gay and straight. Today some schools have GSA's. Gay Straight Alliances. Places youth can go for support. Not all schools have them. In fact most schools do not have them. Why no pressure from government to make it happen?

Homophobia is alive and thriving in our schools. As long as authorities and peers allow this behavior, all the rights in the world will not keep youth safe. More stories like mine will occur, and sadly, worse things will happen.

In the interim, the boys and girls that live through each assault lose a little more of themselves every time.

Are Queers too tired to address Homophobia

We may have won some battles on the gay rights front, we still have much to do as This Magazine points out here...

If queers were going to advocate for something more—and Canada, pink as it is, is still not quite a gay utopia—activists would have to look beyond changing discriminatory laws. But the transition from wartime to peacetime has not been easy. At the height of the marriage debate, Egale’s annual operating budget peaked at $538,000; now it’s about $160,000, plus donated office space in Ottawa and Toronto. This year the Coalition for Lesbian and Gay Rights in Ontario packed up shop after more than 33 years, during which time it had successfully advocated to include gay and lesbian people in Ontario’s Human Rights Code and get the Toronto District School Board to adopt a non-discrimination policy that included LGBT people. - This Magazine

Canadian schools are another example of what's left to be done. A ground breaking survey was begun last year of schools across the country. That survey found may GLBTQ students were often on the receiving end of verbal and physical assaults and found many locations in schools unsafe. Prof. Catherine Taylor is continuing her research of homophobia in schools in phase two of the study.

The first-phase report of The National Climate Survey on Homophobia in Canadian Schools can be found here.

All that plus the recent case in Thunder Bay where a brutal example of Homophobia resulted in one man being severely beaten.

Maybe we queer activists are burnt out, or maybe for many the fight was just for marriage. I hate to think that is where it is at.

ThunderBay homophobia attack

Doubtless you have seen this story already. It is horrific.

Jake Raynard was attacked in Port Arthur, part of what is now Thunder Bay Ontario. The initial reaction is that this attack was motivated by hate, homophobia in this case.

Thunder Bay, ON -- On Friday night, a violent attack in the Port Arthur downtown core put a man in hospital with serious injuries. Jake Raynard states, "So the facts. I was assaulted by a gang outside the pier. I managed to get some other people to safety, but not myself. I had bricks thrown at my head, shattering my cheek, eyesocket, and resulting in a broken jaw".

Montreal Simon has been on this story as has been Queer Liberal. Xtra is on it too.

Im more than a little ticked at this right now...

We are Non-dispensational, except for Homos

We are Non-dispensational, except for Homos

They should be dispatched...

I'm not sure if I can actually post this material in Canada. I feel queasy about doing it. I decided you needed to hear this. If you are in the USA, this guy could be your neighbour. Especially if you are in Tempe AZ.


This family is growing up to hate others. This man is a Father, someone who is entrusted with nurturing, protecting and introducing these children to the world.

Baptist preacher Steven L. Anderson can be found here on the web. Ironically he is from Arizona, the same state that allows people to carry semi automatic rifles designed to kill people.

The audio below is very offensive, do not listen if you find extreme homophobia even mildly offends you.

You can find more of his deplorable speech here.


And if those sermons don't get you, look at the Doctrinal Statement.

H/T to Good as You ( not according to the good pastor you're not!)

note: i distorted the faces of these kids, though the pastor has them on full display on his website.

Six gay men killed in Iraq

Six gay men killed in Iraq

Its more than disturbing... Perverts and Puppies

Six gay men were shot dead by members of their tribe in two separate incidents in the past 10 days, an official with Iraq's Interior ministry said. In the most recent attack, two men were killed Thursday in Sadr City area of Baghdad after they were disowned by relatives, the official said. The shootings came after a tribal meeting was held and the members decided to go after the victims.

On March 26, four additional men were fatally shot in the same city, the official said, adding that the victims had also been disowned by their relatives. The official declined to be identified because he is not authorized to speak to the media. - CNN.com

So in Afghanistan a new law says that a woman must submit to her husband for sex at least once every four days. The West is horrified and rightly so. The law goes much further in stating the women must also have a good reason for being outside the home (read, she has to have her husband's permission).

"Two young men were killed on Thursday. They were sexual deviants. Their tribes killed them to restore their family honor," a Sadr City official who declined to be named said.

The police source who declined to be named said the bodies of four gay men were unearthed in Sadr City on March 25, each bearing a sign reading "pervert" in Arabic on their chests. - Reuters UK

According to PINK News UK the grave with four men in it was unearthed. They found the words Pervert and Puppy written on the bodies of the dead gay men.

I'm waiting to hear the righteous indignation of the west over these killings of gay men in Iraq.

Don't hold my breath you say...