Doug PollardDon’t let them kill the kids
July 24th 2008 07:59
Gay Straight Alliances Save Lives
And now this, which really has me infuriated.
Parents & Friends of Ex-Gays (PFOX), the evil twin of that magnificent organization Parents & Friends of Lesbians & Gays (PFLAG), are totally distorting scientific research to claim that gay straight alliances and the like make kids more likely to commit suicide. The truth is exactly the opposite.
In fact, all reputable research (i.e., not the twisted disreputable gimcrack stuff emanating from shonky propaganda outfits like Focus on the Family, Family Research Council and the like) shows the exact opposite. It’s the isolation gay kids suffer from that kills them.
I recently assisted at a presentation to the Victorian Country Football League board on this very issue.
Anne Mitchell, of the Australian Research Centre on Sex Health & Society (ARCSHS) at LaTrobe university had some heartbreaking statistics about the horrendous suicide and self-harm rates among gay and lesbian teens, because there’s nowhere they feel safe – not at school, at home, at the footy club – nowhere.
I especially recommend you take a look at two reports, Writing themselves in, and it's update Writing themselves in again – they’re available on the website.
The shoals of adolescence are perilous enough for any kid, but for a gay kid they’re twice as dangerous. The one thing that saves them is somewhere to belong, which is where gay-straight alliances and other such clubs come in. They save lives. They connect isolated gay teens back into society.
It’s a time when all kids are experimenting with sex and sexuality. Some of the kids will decide, eventually, that they are in fact bisexual, or straight, or gay – but a supportive school environment and gay-straight alliances help guide them safely through these years. THEY SAVE LIVES.
By spreading misinformation and opposing proper sex education and gay-straight alliances, these people are killing kids. Perhaps they believe, like one spruiker for the equally shonky and discredited witch-doctor crap known as conversion therapy said, that they’re better off dead than gay.
They’re entitled to their opinion. But don't tell me they're Christians.
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