Gay Teens Get Harsher Punishments Than Straights

Sadly, I cannot say that I am shocked by the findings of a new study that found that gay and lesbian teens in the United States are about 40 percent more likely than their straight peers to be punished by schools, police and the courts. Not after my personal experience in my divorce - and those of a number of friends - where the judges seemed particularly vengeful against gays for "choosing to be gay." Shockingly, in my own divorce a conservative judge nominated by former Governor George Allen described being gay as a "choice." As this study revealed, this same anti-gay, religious based discrimination is falling on LGBT teens. The full study results can be found here in Pediatrics, the official journal of the American Academy of Pediatrics (a legitimate organization unlike the faux group cited by FRC). The Washington Post has a story on these unfortunate findings. Here are highlights:
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The research, described as the first national look at sexual orientation and teen punishment, comes as a spate of high-profile bullying and suicide cases across the country have focused attention on the sometimes hidden cruelties of teen life.
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The study, from Yale University, adds another layer, finding substantial disparities between gay and straight teens in school expulsions, arrests, convictions and police stops. The harsher approach is not explained by differences in misconduct, the study says.
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"The most striking difference was for lesbian and bisexual girls, and they were two to three times as likely as girls with similar behavior to be punished," said Kathryn Himmelstein, lead author of the study, published in the journal Pediatrics.
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Stacey Horn, an associate professor of educational psychology at the University of Illinois at Chicago, called the study important and compared the findings to racial disparities in criminal sentencing. "To me, it is saying there is some kind of internal bias that adults are not aware of that is impacting the punishment of this group," she said.
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The results showed that, for similar misconduct, gay adolescents were roughly 1.25 to 3 times more likely to be sanctioned than their straight peers. The sexual-orientation disparity was greatest for girls. Girls who identified themselves as lesbian or bisexual experienced 50 percent more police stops and reported more than twice as many juvenile arrests and convictions as other teen girls in similar trouble, the study said.
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"This is a symptom of school administrators, teachers, court officials, police officers - anyone who works with youth - not necessarily being equipped to handle the challenges" faced by the teens in their care, he said. "It's much easier to punish the youth than to work with them and figure out why they may keep getting in fights and what is leading to this behavior."
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Jody Marksamer, a staff attorney and youth project director at the National Center for Lesbian Rights in San Francisco, said the study brings data to what advocates have seen for years: that biases, overt and subtle, often play out in courts, in schools and with police.