Because it gets better…
Justin Aaberg. Billy Lucas. Cody Barker. Asher Brown. Seth Walsh. Raymond Chase. Tyler Clementi.
What do they have in common? They didn't think it would get better. And they killed themselves. They were excluded, bullied, degraded, humiliated, even tortured. Why? Because they were gay, or suspected to be gay by their peers. An upcoming term for this seems to be bullycide – and statistics seem to prove that schoolkids being bullied are more likely to commit suicide. They didn't belief in a positive future anymore, and they didn't have any support or gay role models showing them that they can get through and that it gets better. After this series of suicides, Dan Savage and his partner Terry created a YouTube video to tell LGBT youth everywhere that it indeed gets better.
According to the NY Times, Dan had the idea after he blogged about the suicides and a reader commented: 'I wish I could have told you [talking to the boy that killed himself] that things get better.' Dan felt the same way. He regularly speaks at colleges, but wouldn't get permission to do so at middle and high schools. But not to leave those kids to 'parents, preachers and teachers' who 'believe they can terrorize gay children out of being gay as they grow up', he did the first video. Inspired by this initiative, the It gets better project was founded, first on YouTube and later on its own website, after it reached the YouTube video limit in the second week. It's a worldwide movement against harassment, with 5000 users and more than 15 million views. On the homepage young people can listen to the stories of people who had similar problems, and how – and most importantly THAT it got better, and that they can have the same in their future. People sharing their stories and people seeking help.
There's a lot of interesting contributions, like for example openly gay lance corporal Wharton from the British military, also a number of celebrities like Janet Jackson. As well as a lot of politicians contributed to the project, even Barack Obama:
Whatever it may be, the only advice is to stick it out, to get through – it will get better. After graduation things will change rapidly, popularity contests, peer pressure, bullying drops off (basically you never have to see the people from school again if you don't want to), you can leave the small and conservative little town, you can find a working place where you'll be accepted and you can be yourself openly, you'll get more independent from your family, and they might even learn to accept it.
Hold out – it gets better!
