Dan Savage Tells GLBTQ Youth "It Gets Better"

[MysticSang'ha]

I love this man. Seriously, I love this man for all he does and for his message here.

Dan Savage Tells LGBT Youth "It Gets Better"

Chicago-born Savage Love columnist and author Dan Savage and his husband Terry Miller have a message for all the gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender youth out there: Whatever you're experiencing now, be it family rejection, bullying and harassment in schools or even thoughts of suicide, it gets better.

Yesterday, Savage and Miller launched a campaign called the It Gets Better Project with an eight-minute YouTube video (embedded below) discussing their experiences as gay youth, segueing into a glimpse into their lives today including how they first met - introduced by a mutual drag queen buddy at a bar - and their decision to adopt a son, DJ, and start a family together.

In Minnesota and Indiana, a pair of 15-year-old boys have in recent months taken their own lives as the result of anti-gay bullying and harassment. Upon reading that news, Savage has borrowed a page from pioneering LGBT activist Harvey Milk, who famously said, "You gotta give 'em hope." He hopes others will also create videos for the project, sharing messages of optimism about their own adult lives as open, proud queer people.

"Today we have the power to give these kids hope. We have the tools to reach out to them and tell our stories and let them know that it does get better," Savage wrote of the project. "[M]any LGBT youth can't picture what their lives might be like as openly gay adults. They can't imagine a future for themselves. So let's show them what our lives are like, let's show them what the future may hold in store for them."
The Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network (GLSEN)'s latest National School Climate Survey, released earlier this month, reports nearly nine out of 10 LGBT students experience harassment and nearly two-thirds of them felt unsafe in school. Only 11 states - Illinois included - currently specify LGBT students as a protected class in anti-bullying and harassment legislation.

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Source

Check it out. Watch some of the stories. Feel free to shed some tears.​

 

[Duck]

I love this man. Seriously, I love this man for all he does and for his message here.



Source

Check it out. Watch some of the stories. Feel free to shed some tears.​

I completely agree with your sentiments Mystic. I also like Dan's plain speaking when it comes to the right wing. I read an article on slog the other day where Dan completely eviscerated an emailer who was whining about Dan's treatment of the right wingers.

I would totally gay marry Dan if he wasn't married all ready.

 

[Reverend Rick]

I agree, you have to give these kids hope. Suicide is a permanent solution to a temporary problem.

 

[MysticSang'ha]

I completely agree with your sentiments Mystic. I also like Dan's plain speaking when it comes to the right wing. I read an article on slog the other day where Dan completely eviscerated an emailer who was whining about Dan's treatment of the right wingers.

I would totally gay marry Dan if he wasn't married all ready.

Dan and his husband make such an attractive couple. :yes:

I read his weekly column regularly, too. Love love love his mind and his wit!

I agree, you have to give these kids hope. Suicide is a permanent solution to a temporary problem.

Hope is a start, and specifically from the queer community. I think hope followed by sound protection and resources is even better. For now, though, this is the best we can offer our youth.

 

[Rainbow Mage]

Good for Dan.

 

[Midnight Pete]

Dan and his husband make such an attractive couple. :yes:

I read his weekly column regularly, too. Love love love his mind and his wit!


Hope is a start, and specifically from the queer community. I think hope followed by sound protection and resources is even better. For now, though, this is the best we can offer our youth.

Do you think LGBTQ should be a protected class?
I don't necessarily agree or disagree with that.

 

[MysticSang'ha]

Do you think LGBTQ should be a protected class?
I don't necessarily agree or disagree with that.

We should have the same rights and protections as everybody else. For a long time, those of us in the queer community have either to live a closeted life or to live being the target of open season from bigots. Both don't offer too much outside of a central attitude of fear and/or self-loathing.

 

[poseur]

Once I became an adult, and out of the closet, I have experienced very little persistent bigotry. Sometimes when I go to an urban area while wearing goth clothes and makeup someone will say something as they drive by, and little kids might say stuff, but nothing particularly troubling, and I live in rural Kentucky.

It definitely does get better.