How Many Suicides Have to Happen?

by Michael Jones · 2009-04-21 07:16:00 UTC
Topics:

suicide

Another week, another suicide of a child because of bullying over his perceived sexual orientation.  Just over two weeks ago, an 11-year-old Massachusetts boy took his own life, after continuous taunts at school by students (bullies) who thought he was gay.  Now comes word that another 11-year-old child - this time in Georgia - took his own life because he was bullied at school by students who thought he was gay.

This is ridiculous.  Last Friday marked the Day of Silence campaign, where schools across the country pledged to take a moment of silence to call attention to LGBT bullying.  Conservative organizations, including the American Family Association, the Campaign for Children and Families, Concerned Women for America, the Liberty Council, and Parents and Friends of Ex-Gays all protested the day because they thought it was an effort to infiltrate schools with homosexuals.  Make no mistake: these organizations are contributing to LGBT bullying, and are in turn killing kids.

The mother of the Georgia boy who killed himself last Thursday told Channel 2 News in Atlanta that her son was being consistently bullied at school, and that bullies at school had called her son “gay” and had taunted him about his accent.  She had alerted school officials at her son's elementary school at least a half dozen times, but administrators never addressed the problem.

And now another 11-year-old child is dead.

How many more suicides and acts of violence will it take before school administrators and wingnut groups like the American Family Association get that LGBT bullying is a epidemic in this country?

Michael Jones is a Change.org Editor. He has worked in the field of human rights communications for a decade, most recently for Harvard Law School.
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