rivers_bend

I have been repeatedly heartbroken this week by the seemingly daily news reports of yet another gay young person committing suicide. Seth Walsh was only thirteen. So was Asher Brown. Billy Lucas was only fifteen. Tyler Clementi was just a freshman in college. All of them were bullied and harassed. Even more tragically, they are only a small sample of the kids who feel like they just can't live with being taunted for being queer. Usually these things don't make the news.

I've often felt helpless to do anything about the numbers of suicidal queer youth in this world. I have worked going in to schools talking to classes, and I have lived my life as out as possible, but there are only so many people I can come into contact with. And only a percentage of those people can relate to my story. But thanks to an internet video project started by Dan Savage, more people can get the word out to the kids who need to hear it most. The It Gets Better project is hosted on YouTube, and is a collection of videos made by people who know how hard it can be, and who know it does get better. I have only watched a small sampling, but so far I've seen vids from men and women, younger people and older people, singles and couples, people of a variety of cultural and racial backgrounds, Muslims and Christians, people from England and from Australia, people with money and people without. I hope that there is even more diversity represented than I have stumbled across. There can never be too many stories of hope.

Today my mom sent me a link to a video made by a whole group in San Francisco.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bnev14XfUjY&feature=player_embedded

It's moving, and it's wonderful, but it also made me think that we need videos like this from small towns, and towns where you don't see more same-sex couples than opposite-sex couples walking down the street holding hands. Not every kid in Indiana or Texas can envision a future where it's possible to move to San Francisco. It would be great if the project got collective videos from other cities. I hope very much that it does.

If you think this is a project that you could get involved with, I encourage you to do so. Make a video if you can. Get the word out. Boost the signal. Share it with the young people in your life. We need to stop losing our young people to hatred.

eta A message from Ellen about this subject