Gay Children Bullied to Suicide

I haven't found these stories on here and it's severely disturbing it hasn't been recognized on here.

As for the deaths and bullying, this of course is not new but it is an epidemic. It's a human rights issue in this country and it needs to be recognized. It's time to wake up and realize gay children are being emotionally tortured to death. This is an epidemic of cruelty and hatred.

Tyler Clementi, the 18-year-old American violinist at Rutgers University driven to suicide after two of his fellow students secretly filmed him having gay sex in his residence room, had a gentle face, open and trusting.

But I don’t want to see his face more than once, as it hurts my heart. Clementi jumped off the George Washington Bridge. As reported in a 2003 New Yorker piece about water jumpers, he would have hit the water at 75 m.p.h., his broken ribs ripping inward and tearing all his organs. “It’s as if someone [takes] an egg beater to the organs of the body and [grinds] everything up,” a coast guard officer said of such cases.

Source

Candles were lit on Tuesday night in remembrance of Tehachapi teen, Seth Walsh and eight others who recently committed suicide after being bullied for their sexual orientation. A local gay-straight alliance club put on the vigil at Almondale Park in northwest Bakersfield.

Kimberly Henry says, "It's not fair to them that they're being judged. You don't see them going out there and judging everybody else." Holly Watt notes, "All they needed is love and support and that would have saved their lives." "I'm proud to say that I'm gay. And I'm 15 years old. But if you bully people, you tell them that, to hell with you, you don't matter," says Christian Martinez.

Source


I could go on and on but I feel the issue itself needs to be noticed and taken seriously. This is a situation where children are dying because they are being who they are.

[sarcasm] Yeah... well it's their own fault for CHOOSING to be gay. They should CHOOSE to be straight like other normal people as nature intended. [/sarcasm]

reply to post by SeventhSeal


You're right. It should be recognized.

My problem is primarily with these educators who are allowing this to happen. A responsible adult is intelligent enough to recognize when a student is either being bullied or harassed at school. At least I would like to think they would be.

This doesn't apply to only gay children mind you. Bullying in itself is an epidemic, and it gets very little attention for the problem it's become for our youth.

It's very sad to see that young people are still separating and labeling themselves into boxes, which they expect others to conform to. This is what our current world teaches our children.

All of this bickering by us "adults" over these non issues is affecting our children.

~Keeper

Originally posted by tothetenthpower
This doesn't apply to only gay children mind you. Bullying in itself is an epidemic, and it gets very little attention for the problem it's become for our youth.

Widening the debate? The thread 'Gay Children Bullied to Suicide' specifically. I am not saying it was your intention, but the title thread is clear. It is the attitude of others towards perfectly normal people that cause this to happen. There is nothing that the individuals concerned are at fault of here.

kids from ALL backgrounds, races, and orientations are being bullied to death, it's dangerous to focus on just the ones bullied for being gay, gay isn't the cause of the bullying just the reason settled on in the bullies head in that case.

Originally posted by Pentothal

Originally posted by tothetenthpower
This doesn't apply to only gay children mind you. Bullying in itself is an epidemic, and it gets very little attention for the problem it's become for our youth.

Widening the debate? The thread 'Gay Children Bullied to Suicide' specifically. I am not saying it was your intention, but the title thread is clear. It is the attitude of others towards perfectly normal people that cause this to happen. There is nothing that the individuals concerned are at fault of here.

No, not widening the debate.

The fact that bullying is a problem across all different types of teenagers isn't debatable.

~Keeper

Originally posted by abe froman
kids from ALL backgrounds, races, and orientations are being bullied to death, it's dangerous to focus on just the ones bullied for being gay, gay isn't the cause of the bullying just the reason settled on in the bullies head in that case.

The bully thought that being gay was unnatural, bad, a negative, therefore they attack. It is the attitude that is wrong. It is the self-rightious judgemental attitudes of others that deem themselves to understand that they know how things should be and therefore try to impose this false paradigm.

Originally posted by Pentothal

Originally posted by abe froman
kids from ALL backgrounds, races, and orientations are being bullied to death, it's dangerous to focus on just the ones bullied for being gay, gay isn't the cause of the bullying just the reason settled on in the bullies head in that case.

The bully thought that being gay was unnatural, bad, a negative, therefore they attack. It is the attitude that is wrong. It is the self-rightious judgemental attitudes of others that deem themselves to understand that they know how things should be and therefore try to impose this false paradigm.

edit on 6-10-2010 by Pentothal because: (no reason given)

And whose fault do you think it is that our children are like this, and that it's getting worse?

~Keeper

reply to post by tothetenthpower


The thread title reads 'Gay Children Bullied to Suicide'. Therefore it is as a direct result of their orientation they were bullied.

reply to post by Pentothal


I wasn't implying that it wasn't the reason they were being bullied.

I simply made a broader statement about the subject at hand. It actually applies quite well. Obviously getting rid of bullying is something important. Discussing it's origins if very on topic IMO.

~Keeper

Originally posted by tothetenthpower

And whose fault do you think it is that our children are like this, and that it's getting worse?

~Keeper

The fault of all that hold the view that it is unnatural, bad, negative etc..etc... to be gay. That it is some sort of choice they made and they should be educated, usually in the ways of a set of writings made thousands of years ago. It is the fault of ignorant judemental people who do not understand the effect they have on others. It is the fault of people who do not like anything that is not like them.

reply to post by Pentothal


You're not grasping the bigger picture here.

Our children are influenced by their environment. Who are the primary group of people who are bickering about this nonsense?

Adults.

Where do children learn behavior? By watching adults interact.

~Keeper

reply to post by Pentothal
It's bad parenting, there is no difference between a kid being bullied to death for being too poor to wear the right clothes,bad acne,or whatever, the problem at it's core is bad parents passing on abuse, intolerence, and bigotry to their children.

Sorry but gay or not... If you kill yourself because people torment you then you shouldn't be alive anyway. Life is a precious gift to have and ANYONE that takes their own is selfish and a moron.... I feel no remorse for these idiots that would remove themselves from this world just because they cared too much of what people thought of them. All these emo kids need to quit being so dumb. Life gets better as you get older!

reply to post by abe froman


Thank you!

That's exactly what it is.

I'm not the best dad in the world, but I've realized over the years that my behavior and my faults directly affect the person that my children will eventually turn out to be.

~Keeper

Originally posted by tothetenthpower
And whose fault do you think it is that our children are like this, and that it's getting worse?

How says it is getting worse? Worse then what? People were bullied at all times, it's not something new. Kids at school were bullied in the 50's or in the 19th Century.
Why do people think that all bad things are "new" or "getting worse"? Is it hate against younger generations combined with "everything was fine back in the old day"?

I mean, i can remember stories from older people, how after the war they were bullied, for example the german people in eastern europe or for example the german-russians who fled to germany and then where bullied because they weren't "real germans". Kids were bullied for there clothes all the time. It's not something that happened only after Nike or Dolce & Gabbana opened their businesses.

In my oppinion and i guess i will get a lot of flak for it: The main differences between now and then is:
- TV, Internet they report everything these days. Back then such a message would be a short blurp on the newspaper nobody really cares about. I think it was better that way. It's unbelievable how every crap is made into a news story.
- Most kids back then were stronger and had a stronger will. They wouldn't allow to be bullied, they would fight back or at least don't take every #. While the kids of today are mostly emo's, cry about everything and are so weak-minded that it is no wonder they instantly commit suicide if something doesn't go the way they want it or hear a "bad word" from someone.

reply to post by Reign02
If more people were as compassionate as you we could all live together in peace and harmony. Lack of compassion leads to this very kind of bullying.

Originally posted by tothetenthpower
reply to post by Pentothal

 

You're not grasping the bigger picture here.

Our children are influenced by their environment. Who are the primary group of people who are bickering about this nonsense?

Adults.

Where do children learn behavior? By watching adults interact.

~Keeper

I said:
It is the fault of all that hold the view that it is unnatural, bad, negative etc..etc... to be gay.
That it is some sort of choice they made and they should be educated, usually in the ways of a set of writings made thousands of years ago.
It is the fault of ignorant judemental people who do not understand the effect they have on others.
It is the fault of people who do not like anything that is not like them.

And you say I am not seeing the bigger picture because it is the fault of adults?

reply to post by ShadowAngel85


I don't really think you can say that "all children are emos". Or most of them even. Children are just as incredibly diverse as adults, they are just more easily influenced. Group think is almost a primal thing among young people.

There are far more challenges to deal with as a teenager or a young adult, today, then when I was that age. We aren't talking very far back either.

~Keeper

reply to post by Pentothal


The specific situation that occurs during bullying is the fault of the child of course. The reason for the behavior in general however is a learnt one. And children are learning it from adults.

~Keeper