Bullying =/= Gay Teen Suicide?

Channizard

Channizard

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So lately the news has been flogged with all these teen suicides that are a cause of bullying. About 70% of the time (recently anyway) it's had something to do with being gay. I can only assume that these are young boys, as being a lesbian (or even bi-curious girl) is definately not frowned upon, and is infact encouraged among peers.

Anyway, these young boys (presumably) are commiting suicide because they're getting bullied and teased for being gay. And I have to ask... why? Why are the gays suddenly getting all this attention? Why are they suddenly just giving up? I don't quite understand where this sudden flood in the last year or so that "Oh, bullying is bad."

Bullying has been going on for generations. For years people have had reasons to pick on other people. Back in my day, we picked on each other's looks. I was the token fat kid, so I was the butt of many many MANY jokes. For years, several in fact. By my peers, by kids older than me, and even by kids younger than me. Levels of immaturity knows no bounds and bullying runs rampant over any subject, be it fat, gay, handicap or even just big nose or ears.

So why is it suddenly just now brought to the attention of the public? Just because these kids are gay? Or because these kids are actually killing themselves? (Not to be disrespectful for sounding so abrasive)

Why these kids are just commiting suicide is also beyond me. Yes, people are making fun of you, and yes I know it's hard but if your life means anything to you, you pick yourself up and you move on. You move past it. I've endured years of bullying for something that I would have never probably given a second thougt about, and I never commited suicide. This isn't to say that I haven't thought about it, because Lord knows I have, it's the simplest way out. But it's also the cowards way out.

With a lot of these Gay kids commiting suicide it almost paints apicture that their specific breed is weak. You can beat down the Gays and they'll just go crawl into a hole and let you win. Which pretty much goes against all the hardcore that the gay community as worked up to try and take pride in.

I've gone into a whole bunch of different circles here.. :hmmm: I guess... What's your opinion on bullying and gay suicides? One is obviously affected by the other but is it a justifiable reason?
 
as much as I don't like suicide you can't really ask why they are doing it. Sometimes its because they have self esteem issues, sometimes they have mental issues like a disease of some sort and sometimes the bullying is just so bad that they think fuck it, death is the better option.
Their parents might be treating them shit at home for being gay, then they cop it at school too and have no where to go. maybe they don't have any friends to turn to? who knows.
Although people these days like to think we're more open about it... most really aren't and I doubt unfortunately that we will see the end of gay people being bullied for a while... same with racism.

Also I don't think everythings just now being focused on gay children.
I think its been a focus for a while and they only bring it up when it needs to be brought up. Atm there are a large number of gay suicides due to bullying so its gonna be in the news.
 
It's just being brought up now because homosexuality being out in the open is just recently starting to become acceptable, and even more so for young adult males. In addition, especially in high school, there is a preponderence of passive-aggressive gay bashing. I work in a high school and with high school kids, and everything that they don't like is "gay," and everyone that they don't like is a "faggot." So if what they are is being equated as a negative thing to everyone else, sometimes it's hard to know who you can turn to when things go bad.

And kids are vicious. I mean downright terrible. Yes, everyone is bullied to some extent. I certainly was. But it does seem that gay teens get more than their fair share of it. Matthew Shepard, as an example.

As for why gay teens tend to commit suicide at what seems to be a higher rate than straight teens, that would be an interesting topic to research. I think Squid touched on it a little when she said that gay teens often have underlying self-esteem issues, which are just compounded by the bullying.
 
The thing is, the phrase tomboy is used affectionately a lot of the time. A tomboy, though I don't really care for the term, is accepted. The stereotype of a lesbian is a rather masculine woman, and that's not the case most of the time.

But the thing is, since that stereotype exists, and women aren't really expectecd to be particularly "feminine," these days, the stereotype loosely connects with the term lesbian, and people accept it, if that made any sense at all.

Boys are still expected to be by and large masculine, and those that aren't masculine can be isolated. I know I wasn't somebody who was particularly masculine before I was 12, and that affected me. Not in a life altering way, but I was treated differently nonetheless.

The moniker "boys don't cry," is thrown around a lot as well, even in this day and age. This again connects with the image of a gay man as effeminate, "camp", and the like, and because of this, the stereotype once again reflects the treatment.

To add to this, it's rare to find a girl with no friends. Not to isolate females, but there's usually at least one friend to every girl. Girls stick together in a way men don't, if you catch my drift (nonsensical though it may be.)

To rope history into it, men never had to really protest for their rights. Men have always had that more dominating side, and it was easily visible until the last 50-80 years, when women started demanding equality.

Women before the 50s were portrayed as silent, meek home-makers, who never raised their voice, never spoke back to their husbands, and never even raised their voice most of the time. They were portrayed as faceless carbon copies of one another.

When women started protesting about the unfair treatment they received, a lot of women who joined these feminist movements realised that they had rights, that they weren't tied to their husbands, preferred what they saw in other women, and basically showed this other side to themselves that had been repressed before.

Many leaders of the radical feminist movements in particular were lesbians or became lesbians, and they were role models for the thousands that were members of these groups. As such, people were intimidated and in awe of these radical feminists, who were lesbian and proud of it. I think somewhere down the line, lesbians became more acceptable than gay men.

Gay men kinda broke this image of masculinity, this strong, emotionless barrier that took control and liked things just so. Men had never really had to protest for their rights as men before, because they'd gotten them without question, just because they were men. That, combined with the fact that men just can't express their emotions all that well, made being a gay men somehow less acceptable.

And like Jesse said; Kids are cruel.

I dunno if this made any sense, and got a little off the point, but I'm typing on no sleep at almost 10AM. Bear with me. :wacky: if anyone wants to make sense of my post, go ahead.
 
This is just another media deal. The media likes to take it upon themselves to do "investigative reporting", and draw conclusions on what they find. "Well, the percentage of teen suicides of gay young men is very high, so that must be the reason." Take my advice, don't listen to what the media tells you, they'll say whatever they think will raise suspense, which in turn brings higher ratings.

The fact of the matter is, bullying has been around for a long time, and it won't ever go away. If it's not for a dude being homosexual, they'll bully him for another reason. Bully's will find anything that they see as a flaw, and exploit it to no end. If anything, the ones who are bullied need to find a better solution to deal with the abuse than to kill themselves. Their ability to shrug it off is really bad. Back when I was in school, the trend for kids that were getting bullied was to make a hit list and plan to kill these bully's in the future, whether in the near or distant future. The good thing is, they aren't killing themselves. The bad thing is, someone else is being killed, or Columbine happens.

If I have to do my "investigative reporting", I'd say the reason there are so many suicides is because, sadly, it's become a trend to kill yourself if you're "damaged" from relentless bullying. Being openly gay in high school is a new trend that's developed, that may or may not have led to a bullying attraction. But high school kids always follow trends, and this is no different. Independence and individuality is a very rare sight in such an environment, always has been, always will be. The suicide trend will go away in a few years, when a new trend takes place.
 
I'm not speaking of all gays, but I am pretty sure there are contributing factors to a small percentage of teens being gay- one of them being generally depressed to begin with.
Nonetheless, bullying is never as bad as the media portrays it to be. In this modern age, 'bullying' is more or less a verbal montage, and usually comes from a current drama at hand.
The suicide could have been caused from a number of things, even school drama perhaps, but 'bullying' is not the correct word. The media likes to mislead people into thinking something that is far from the truth to gain intrigue. To prove it, ask yourself this question: any dumb ass could see the truth for what it is given the chance, why can't the media?
Anyways, if the gay teen grabbed a pistol and murdered his classmates, the media would paint him as a psychopath. Then everyone trusts the media because they told you an obvious truth, even when they tell you Marylin Manson contributed to it.
Vicious cycle, my friends, viscous cycle.
 
....errr of course the media would say the kid is a psycho if he pulled a gun on all his class mates...what normal person would do that??
and Bullying is as bad as people make it out to be. No one should be bullied and I don't think the media over plays it because it is a big issue that needs dealing with!
 
o0PinkSquid0o said:
....errr of course the media would say the kid is a psycho if he pulled a gun on all his class mates...what normal person would do that??
and Bullying is as bad as people make it out to be. No one should be bullied and I don't think the media over plays it because it is a big issue that needs dealing with!
Click to expand...

Totally missed my point on the psycho thing but ok..

Anyways, bullying is not a big deal. It's played out to be some huge school tragedy, but seriously, when did you see it in high school? And if you did, was it so, so terrible that someone would kill their self? The very idea is absurd.
The only bullying I could see is if a kid went to a city school and got roughed up because he's white or something. As far as the media goes with 'bullying', it's bullshit.
 
Bullying is one of the worst things I ever went through during primary school and high school, and i think if I wasn't strong willed I would have probably killed myself...I can't even imagine how much worse it would have been if I was gay...
 
Bah, I just don't understand why being gay is the new posterchild for bullying, or why it's the main reason bullying gets attention. Like you said squids, it's been going on for ages, we all (at one point I'm sure) dealt with it at some point. Some of us had to deal with it longer than others, like I've dealt with it my whole life nearly. I never killed myself. I don't think I ever could kill myself, because that's just giving them the satisfaction of winning.
 
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