As the San Francisco Chronicle and other outlets are reporting, a new study published in the Journal of School Health, the journal of the American School Health Association, has confirmed what many of us in the LGBT community already knew: high levels of anti-gay bullying increase the levels of depression, suicide attempts that require medical care, STD's and risk for HIV in LGBT teens and young adults. The report also underscores the importance of addressing and preventing anti-LGBT victimization at the structural or school level to reduce health disparities among LGBT young people. Here are some highlights from the Chronicle article:They found that LGBT young adults who were victimized in school because of their LGBT identity reported much higher health and adjustment problems, while students with low levels of school victimization had higher self-esteem and life satisfaction as young adults.
*"We now have evidence of the lasting personal and social cost of failing to make our schools safe for all students. Prior studies have shown that school victimization of LGBT adolescents affects their health and mental health. In our study we see the effects of school victimization up to a decade later or more. It is clear that there are public health costs to LGBT-based bullying over the long-term," said lead author, Stephen T. Russell, Ph.D., Distinguished Professor, University of Arizona.
*Director of the Family Acceptance Project at San Francisco State University and study co-author Caitlin Ryan, Ph.D., pointed out, "The pervasiveness of bullying and lack of research on outcomes in adulthood have masked the serious long-term health costs for LGBT children and youth.
*LGBT young adults who reported high levels of LGBT school victimization during adolescence were 5.6 times more likely to report having attempted suicide, 5.6 times more likely to report a suicide attempt that required medical care, 2.6 times more likely to report clinical levels of depression, and more than twice as likely to have been diagnosed with a sexually transmitted disease and to report risk for HIV infection, compared with peers who reported low levels of school victimization.
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So who/what is responsible for the continued bullying of LGBT individuals with utter disregard for the real and serious consequences? To me, the answer is blatantly obvious: religion and its extremist adherents who are only happy when trashing others and making the lives of others a living Hell. A column in the Capetown Mail & Guardian (influenced no doubt by the "corrective rape" of area lesbians) supports this conclusion. Here are some highlights:
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As regards the claim that I unfairly and inaccurately blame religion for hate crimes against gays and lesbians in South Africa, let me reiterate what I wrote in the previous post: I do not exclusively blame religion. My point is more nuanced. It is that organised religion (or some prevalent fanatical religious preaching, then) has a role to play in and therefore a responsibility for the perpetration of hate crimes against homosexuals.
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Organised religion’s role in and responsibility for hate crimes ensues as a direct result of its dogmatic teachings according to which homosexuality is an abomination. In 1986, the Catholic Church, on the basis of the above belief, officially opposed extending civil rights protection to homosexual people. It does not take the intellect of a rocket scientist to see that the flipside of the coin amounted to the condonation of anti-gay violence.
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No one can deny that, with very few exceptions, religion condemns homosexuality. When one condemns a practice as wrong, the logical implication is that the practice stands in need of punishment and correction. And the truth is that (having been told by their church that homosexuality is sinful and abominable) some people take the punishment and correction into their own hands, justifying their actions on the basis that they were acting as God’s committed soldiers. Against the background of the atrocious violence that has, in the modern age, been perpetrated in the name of religion all over the world, it is simply naive to assert that religion consistently teaches peace and tranquility.
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It is interesting that none of the outraged commentators refer to (let alone problematise) the separation of church and state in South Africa. It is simply ignored, almost as if it never took place.
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Lest there be any doubt as to the direct responsibility religious based discrimination - something illegal under both the USA and South African Constitutions - a pastor at New York State Senator Ruben Diaz' hate rally in the Bronx yesterday made the connection perfectly clear. Think Progress reports as follows:
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[J]ust minutes before Diaz took to the microphone to stress his respect for gay people, Rev. Ariel Torres Ortega of Radio Visión Cristiana said that the gay people are “worthy of death”:
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Committing sexual acts between man and man. And receiving the retribution of the things that they have done from straying away. And because they did not take God in count. God gave them over to reprimand their mind to do things that are not right, being against all justice, fornication, perversity, aberrations, malignity…those who practice such things are worthy to death, not only do they do it, but those who also practice it. God bless this earth. That is the word of God.
*
Here's a clip of the hate filled batshittery:
*
*
So who/what is responsible for the continued bullying of LGBT individuals with utter disregard for the real and serious consequences? To me, the answer is blatantly obvious: religion and its extremist adherents who are only happy when trashing others and making the lives of others a living Hell. A column in the Capetown Mail & Guardian (influenced no doubt by the "corrective rape" of area lesbians) supports this conclusion. Here are some highlights:
*
As regards the claim that I unfairly and inaccurately blame religion for hate crimes against gays and lesbians in South Africa, let me reiterate what I wrote in the previous post: I do not exclusively blame religion. My point is more nuanced. It is that organised religion (or some prevalent fanatical religious preaching, then) has a role to play in and therefore a responsibility for the perpetration of hate crimes against homosexuals.
*
Organised religion’s role in and responsibility for hate crimes ensues as a direct result of its dogmatic teachings according to which homosexuality is an abomination. In 1986, the Catholic Church, on the basis of the above belief, officially opposed extending civil rights protection to homosexual people. It does not take the intellect of a rocket scientist to see that the flipside of the coin amounted to the condonation of anti-gay violence.
*
No one can deny that, with very few exceptions, religion condemns homosexuality. When one condemns a practice as wrong, the logical implication is that the practice stands in need of punishment and correction. And the truth is that (having been told by their church that homosexuality is sinful and abominable) some people take the punishment and correction into their own hands, justifying their actions on the basis that they were acting as God’s committed soldiers. Against the background of the atrocious violence that has, in the modern age, been perpetrated in the name of religion all over the world, it is simply naive to assert that religion consistently teaches peace and tranquility.
*
It is interesting that none of the outraged commentators refer to (let alone problematise) the separation of church and state in South Africa. It is simply ignored, almost as if it never took place.
*
Lest there be any doubt as to the direct responsibility religious based discrimination - something illegal under both the USA and South African Constitutions - a pastor at New York State Senator Ruben Diaz' hate rally in the Bronx yesterday made the connection perfectly clear. Think Progress reports as follows:
*
[J]ust minutes before Diaz took to the microphone to stress his respect for gay people, Rev. Ariel Torres Ortega of Radio Visión Cristiana said that the gay people are “worthy of death”:
*
Committing sexual acts between man and man. And receiving the retribution of the things that they have done from straying away. And because they did not take God in count. God gave them over to reprimand their mind to do things that are not right, being against all justice, fornication, perversity, aberrations, malignity…those who practice such things are worthy to death, not only do they do it, but those who also practice it. God bless this earth. That is the word of God.
*
Here's a clip of the hate filled batshittery:
*
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