Kids Openly Gay At Earlier Ages

This story from the Los Angeles Daily news (http://www.dailynews.com/news/ci_8709749) looks at a phenomenon that is easily seen even in places like Norfolk and the rest of Hampton Roads – hardly a hotbed of liberalism. Last night, going to The Wave to dance and get my weekly shot of aerobic exercise, I find that it is comforting to see young boy next door and girl next door type gay couples that seem totally at ease with their sexual orientation. I can assure you, such was not the case when I was 18 or 20. In fact, I was 21 when the APA declassified homosexuality as a mental illness, not that such action had much impact on the societal negative view of gays in conservative Central New York where I lived at the time. Going to college in Charlottesville, Virginia, things were not any better.

It truly is a different world from back in that day – as I found out when my ex-wife and I told my son I was gay nearly five years ago and his response was that it was OK and that one of his high school friends was gay. The he gave me a big hug. Hopefully, this new generation will see the end of anti-gay bigotry. Next weekend, I will be meeting with some of the leaders of some local GSA’s who are working to become more organized and who have asked HRBOR members for input and possible mentoring as successful role models for gay students. Here are some story highlights:

When a gay teenager was gunned down earlier this year at an Oxnard school, the violence resulted in the unexpected: Young people, gay and straight, rallied across the nation for civil rights. And even at an age when they're grappling with their own fragile sexuality, teens weren't afraid to stand up for the classmate who had been different.

"In middle school, you don't think about your own sexuality so much as you think of what society thinks is normal for kids, and you try to blend in," said 18-year-old Luis Roman, a gay community college student and youth leader for the Gay-Straight Alliance, an advocacy group active on high school and middle school campuses. "So for these kids to come out and say that just because he was gay, that isn't a reason to get shot, that was mind-blowing to see that courage, for kids to stand up.

"While there is increasing acceptance, the world's still a hostile place for gay teenagers," said Virginia Uribe, a retired LAUSD counselor and founder of the district's Project 10, a support program for gay students. "They deal with hostile families, hostile churches, if they're involved, and they deal with hostile schools. "Certainly the (school) administrators should be at the top of the food chain, making the charge against discrimination. Many times they're reluctant to take a stand with regard to gay kids until something terrible happens."

Gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender students are coming out of the closet younger and younger. Roman told his parents he was gay when he was 15 - younger than his counterparts who spoke up a decade earlier, but older than the middle-schoolers coming out today, he said. Many find their courage in a changing society that includes openly gay celebrities, from news anchors to sit-com stars, Uribe said. "I think some students are feeling more comfortable coming out, feeling empowered in the sense they are aware they have certain rights," said Uribe, now executive director of the nonprofit Friends of Project 10, which supports the LAUSD program.

Project 10 sponsors 46 Gay-Straight Alliance chapters on LAUSD campuses, and in recent months two middle schools have formed chapters, said Stephen Jimenez, who works in the district's Education Equity Compliance office and oversees the program. "All our clubs are student-centered, usually started by gay students and their straight friends," he said. "The students themselves come forward and say, we want to start a club."