I'm 17 years old and a high school student I'm passionate about LGBTQ issues, safer sex issues and much more. I love to empower others and make a difference in my community. Changing the world one sequin at a time. Too many condoms is still not enough.
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I sit in my room looking out the window, getting a beautiful glimpse of the Cleveland skyline in the distance. Tower City (a major Cleveland landmark) is lit up a beautiful shade of red for World AIDS Day. Today is World AIDS Day and we use this day to share awareness and celebrate how far the community has come with the AIDS cause as well as remember those who have been victims of the viruses. HIV and AIDS is finally being given the proper amount of publicity it deserves. From advertisements on TV for new HIV medications to the drag queens from RuPaul’s Drag Race doing a commercial promoting testing and condom use
View the drag queens here.
HIV is being talked about more. However I don’t think from personal standpoint that HIV and AIDS awareness has properly reached young people. In my opinion most of the teens I have observed at school and personally have this ‘don’t worry it won’t happen to me’’ view about HIV and AIDS. I feel this is because that young people have this idea especially around sexual activity that they are invincible, and because young people do not know enough about the virus other than the stigma surrounding it and the myths that society continually perpetuates. Myths like ‘you can get HIV from tears’ and ‘you can get HIV from a toilet seat’ to the classic one ‘ only gay people get HIV’. The truth is that they just don’t see it as an issue that pertains to them. I think the most important step here would be to raise awareness among youth, when we hear someone spreading one of the many myths, debunk it and let that person know that they have been misinformed, perhaps the most important thing we can do if we wish for a future without HIV and AIDS is to make sure young people know the truth about this virus.
My World AIDS Day this year was one of the most memorable, I spent the school day handing out condoms to people and explaining that it was World AIDS Day, I also reminded people to get tested and told them the dates and times for the LGBT Center in Cleveland’s HIV Testing and urged people to get themselves tested and know their status. Even if you don’t have a ‘scare’ or something that makes you need to get tested it’s good to get tested anyway so that when you do have an emergency need to get tested you know how the process is and it will be less scary for you. I also attended one of the most beautifully put together activism related events, sponsored by the AIDS Taskforce of Greater Cleveland taking place in downtown Cleveland and had a really great time.
In closing please remember that HIV and AIDS are still here, and we will not forget, and please take the initiative to get tested and know your status as well as always practicing safer sex.
“I suffer mornings most of all,I feel so powerless and small By ten o’clock I’m back in bed
Fighting the jury in my head”-Amanda Palmer, Have To Drive.
Suicide. One word to describe one thing no one ever expects having to deal with in their lifetime. It’s also one of the hardest things to deal with for a family, Suicide causes an unimaginable, indescribable feeling of loss and only leads to questions and more hurt. 20% of Ohio’s high school students have considered suicide and 14% have made a plan to attempt suicide The scariest thing to me at least is that Suicide is almost completely preventable by schools, family, friends, and the community if only we took the time to look out for others and recognize the signs of depression. To help prevent Suicide I attended the Into The Light Walk sponsored by the Suicide Prevention Education Alliance (SPEA) with the Dare2Care team from Human Rights Campaign. The focus of the event was to raise awareness and create a healing and understanding atmosphere for all of those who have been affected by suicide
Suicide is a serious issue, and it affects almost all of us in some way shape or form, and suicide is a one-hundred percent preventable cause of death. “Suicide is not the answer, it only leads to more questions, more people asking Why?” Suicide is the leading cause of death among teenagers, “more teenagers die from suicide than from cancer, heart disease, AIDS, birth defects, stroke, pneumonia, influenza, and chronic lung disease combined: (National Strategy for Suicide Prevention: Goals and Objectives for Action, 2001). Bullying, Mental-Illness (such as depression) and sexual abuse all can lead to suicide. Here are some GLSEN studies done in 2009 and 2010 on bullying and harassment in schools which show that “two thirds of teenagers (65%) have reported being verbally harassed or physically assaulted because of their appearance, gender, sexual orientation, gender expression, race/ethnicity, disability or religion” 39% of students say that they have been harassed based on their body or their looks the most. and 33% say they are harassed because of their sexual orientation or gender identity.
The walk moved me emotionally and spiritually, once our group started walking on the dimly lit path of the Cleveland Metroparks Zoo, I felt a soft and quiet reflecting calmness come over me. I spoke with another walker about their experience and how suicide has touched and affected her life and it came to me. All of this is part of my calling in life, I believe we all have callings in life to do certain things for the world around us, and I believe social justice is my calling. The walk brought about absolute peace and a pure healing and powerful emotion. After returning home I immediately felt restored and rejuvenated. It was as if the walk put my life into perspective for me, helped me realize my purpose, and really showed me the demographics I was trying to help.
The SPEA’s objective is to bring recognition of depression and suicidal tendencies to schools and teenagers, to enable teachers and students to speak up in order to help more young people. With speaking up we must also remember not to be silent about bullying and harassment, if we are silent about it we are just as guilty as the perpetrators. This ‘no-snitch’ rule among young people has to stop, for the sake of protecting the lives and well-being of young people. It’s not ‘snitching’ if you’re doing the right thing. If you know of anyone suffering from depression or other debilitating mental illness, or someone being harassed and bullied for any aspect of themselves whether it be their weight, height, race, sexual orientation or identity please be courageous enough to speak up you may save a life or prevent suicide.
In Conclusion the Into the Light Walk taught me about how I can help others through my field of Activism, it again struck me emotionally with how real and how terrible to deal with suicide is, both for the victim and their family and friends left behind. Everyone deserves a chance to live a full and wholesome life, no amount of hate or bullying or depression should take anyone away from their family or friends. We must help those suffering from the invisible illness of depression and those who are victimized by bullying and harassment come back into the light and out of the darkness.
"And my running feet could fly,
Each breath screaming, 'We are all too young to die' " -Florence and the Machine, Between Two Lungs
These past few weeks during and since Urban Retreat have been an emotional spiral for me. From being at Urban Retreat and feeling all the love and inspiration from the other youth and adults there. To the sadness and lament over the LGBT youth who have committed suicide over the past year and thinking about how much we are currently doing to try and support them and create change. We remember them all no matter how young or old who have come and gone before us, who have been killed and taken down by hate. We think about those who have been bullied to the point of taking their own lives and those who have been murdered by others for being themselves. This past Monday, September 19th the LGBT community saw another tragic teen suicide, the young victim being Jamey Rodemeyer aged 14 of Buffalo, New York.
Upon hearing the news the morning of September 21st I was speechless. I had been shaken up by the suicides of 2010 pretty badly already and remembering those has shaken me up this year, I began to think about how much I’d done with the help of others to help change the suicide rates and this recent suicide has me thinking how effective is the ‘It Gets Better’ Campaign? Jamey Rodemeyer himself posted an it gets better video, in which he states how he’s felt so much better because of Lady GaGa telling people it’s okay to be gay and if anyone is having trouble loving themselves to remember ‘they were born this way’ and ‘hold their head high’. However in a post on September 9th he states "I always say how bullied I am, but no one listens," "What do I have to do so people will listen to me?" and that is the problem, there are very few adults inside and outside of schools willing to listen. The response of principals and teachers often is ‘maybe if he didn’t act so different no one would bully him’, ‘maybe if he wasn’t so gay’. This idea that gay is ‘wrong’ and must be ‘fixed’ or ‘corrected’ must be stopped before it spreads any further for the sake of the lives of young LGBT men and women. Back to the question before how effective is It Gets Better alone by itself?
Is ‘It Gets Better’ merely a rallying ground for us to show our solidarity? is it actually helping as many people as we want it to? I personally love the It Gets Better campaign for helping us show our solidarity and support for LGBT youth who are being bullied in schools but I fear that we’ve still gone too long without direct outreach to help these young people and eradicate the problems they face. Simply saying ‘Don’t worry it’s going to get better’ is not solving the problem, we need to be directing these young people to outlets where they can be themselves and support others going through the same situations they are, they need to know they are being heard.
What can schools and other authority figures actually do now? The bullying even extends to our computers and phones with bullying through text messaging and social media which makes it even more easier for someone to harass another anonymously. Cyber-bullying is more harmful because anonymity makes it harder to catch the perpetrators but nonetheless we must do our best to catch and punish the culprits of this serious harassment and punish exactly as we would normally punish harassment regardless of whether it is a child or an adult doing the harassing.
The final point I am going to make here is that these young deaths were and are extremely preventable. Take it from someone who has been bullied and who has considered suicide as an option, Bullying is damaging regardless of whether the victim commits suicide or not. Bullying victims will take years to get over the trauma caused by their tormentors and will most likely in many cases have life-long issues with self esteem it is the job of the parents, teachers, school boards, and police to make sure that young people are protected and safe and when not enough is being done it will leave the victim feeling helpless and hopeless. So to all of my fellow activists, I implore you to join me in this fight, to stop the killing of our young adults because of senseless hate,prejudice, homophobia, and transphobia, do what you can to provide a safe space for the youth in your life and community and listen to what they have to say, because without them who will carry on our work? where will we be in the future? I'm going to post the link to my It Gets Better video made in October 2010, its contents are still as relevant to today's anti-bullying cause, are we still in the same position we were last year?
