Gay kids are g out earlier — sometim middle school — and many are fdg acceptance. But some parents and teachers wonr if the kids are too young to really know their sexual orientatn.
Contents:
- 12-YEAR-OLD'S IENDS DIDN'T CELEBRATE AFTER HE ME OUT AS GAY. SO A PARK FULL OF STRANGERS DID
- GAY KIDS COMG OUT YOUNGER, BUT PARENTS ASK "HOW DO YOU KNOW?"
- IS YOUR CHILD GAY?
- WHAT TO DO WHEN YOUR CHILD SAYS: "I'M GAY"
- 12-YO DI BY SUICI AFTER BULLI SAY HE’D GO TO HELL FOR BEG GAY
- 12-YEAR-OLD DI BY SUICI AFTER BULLI SAY HE’D GO TO HELL FOR BEG GAY
12-YEAR-OLD'S IENDS DIDN'T CELEBRATE AFTER HE ME OUT AS GAY. SO A PARK FULL OF STRANGERS DID
'It's outrageoly amazg that this ltle kid, even wh all this adversy, n still be out here'Surprise birthday party shows gay youth he's not Neville lost iends after he me out, so his mom asked others to show support for her 12-year-old son. A crowd full of strangers filled a northwt Calgary park to celebrate a boy's rabow-themed birthday durg Pri O'Donnell says when her son Brody Neville me out as gay this sprg, the 12-year-old lost many of his ma the prospect of celebratg his birthday this year a sad one.
"I was askg him what he wanted to do for his birthday and he was tears and said sce he me out as gay he lost all his iends, so he didn't even have people who uld e, " O'Donnell said. But providg support isn't always easy — pecially if you are the parent of a lbian, gay, bisexual, transgenr or qutng (LGBTQ) child.
Advote for a gay-straight alliance (GSA), which has been shown to make schools safer and boost amic performance among LGBTQ stunts.
GAY KIDS COMG OUT YOUNGER, BUT PARENTS ASK "HOW DO YOU KNOW?"
Team up wh a pediatrician, a unselor at school, close fay members and even muny anizatns — for example, Parents, Fai and Friends of Lbians and Gays (PFLAG) — if you’re havg trouble gog alone. Parents, Fai and Friends of Lbian and Gays (PFLAG).
IS YOUR CHILD GAY?
The problem is, even many of those articl are really jt a llectn of stance the Calgary Journal, an article entled, "When do most homosexuals know they're gay? Until you read on and disver that the source for their data is "many the homosexual muny.
"And then went on wh even more actual facts as they ced a natnal survey of 1, 752 llege stunts:* 48% of self-intified gay and bisexual llege stunts beme aware of their sexual preference high school while 26% found their te sexualy llege. * 20% of self-intified gay and bisexual men knew that they were gay or bisexual junr high school, and 17% said they knew gra school.
* 6% of self-intified gay or bisexual women knew that they were gay or bisexual junr high school, and 11% knew gra school. Gay kids are g out earlier — sometim middle school — and many are fdg acceptance.
WHAT TO DO WHEN YOUR CHILD SAYS: "I'M GAY"
Enuraggly, beg young and openly gay seems to be gettg easier. Denizet-Lewis wr that when he started workg for the gay men's magaze XY 1998, "we received dozens of letters each week om teenagers the pths of spair. " Three years later, he says, "a new kd of gay adolcent was appearg on the page - proud, rilient, sometim even happy.
12-YO DI BY SUICI AFTER BULLI SAY HE’D GO TO HELL FOR BEG GAY
" He explas, That's not to say that gay teenagers didn't still suffer harassment at school or rejectn at home, but many seemed ls burned wh shame and self-loathg than their olr gay peers. Not only were there creasgly accurate and posive portrayals of gays and lbians popular culture, but most teenagers were by then regular Inter ers.
Gog onle broke through the isolatn that had been a hallmark of beg young and gay, and allowed gay teenagers to fd rmatn to refute what their fai or church sometim still told them - namely, that they would never fd happs and to the Inter and to creasg cultural acceptance of homosexualy (an crease marred, we should note, by measur like Proposn 8), kids who might once have waed until high school or even llege to e out are now dog so earlier.
12-YEAR-OLD DI BY SUICI AFTER BULLI SAY HE’D GO TO HELL FOR BEG GAY
At least 120 middle schools the untry have gay-straight alliance groups, and others let stunts observe the natnal Day of Silence prott agast anti-gay harassment. " They were not, however, silent: "Good luck gettg middle-schoolers not to talk, " the school unselor youth of the Webster kids and other gay middle-schoolers is a sign of how far gay rights have e — but 's also the kids' biggt obstacle to acceptance.
A tellg anecdote om Nadia, the mom of a gay 15-year-old named At. " But she had actually asked At if he was gay when she found out he had lled a gay chat le. The irony of a parent spectg her kid is gay and then refg to believe he uld know his own orientatn highlights how much more difficulty some parents have wh burgeong gay sexualy than they would wh a straight kid's of this may have to do wh the misnceptn that you have to have gay terurse to be gay, or that homosexualy is somehow a more "sexual" orientatn than heterosexualy.
'Eileen Ross, director of a Mounta View, CA program for gay youth, says that when a 12-year-old boy says he lik girls, "No one says to them: 'Are you sure? A lawyer Florida argued that gay-straight allianc promote the "premature sexualizatn of the stunts, " and when At started a gay-straight alliance, his Michigan school ma him ll somethg "ls ntroversial" (he chose "Peace Alliance"). Denizet-Lewis reports the hopeful words of velopmental psychologist Rch Sav-Williams: "This is the first generatn of gay kids who have the great joy of beg able to argue wh their parents about datg, jt like their straight peers do.