LGBT topics

Health and safety concerns for LGBT youth

By Kris Wells. Reprinted with permission.

Some lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgendered (LGBT) youth face greater difficulties in their school environments than their heterosexual peers. Some of these difficulties may appear when LGBT or questioning students challenge school authority figures as they struggle to adapt to an environment where their identities are often silenced or devalued. Other LGBT and questioning youth try to adjust to these primarily heterosexual (and often homophobic) environments by blending in with the crowd in the hopes that they will not be noticed or ridiculed for their actual or perceived differences. Still other LGBT and questioning students attempt to become the best and the brightest students in the school.

Because you can't always see the LGBT students in your school does not mean that they are not present. LGBT students are everywhere. They are the overachievers, underachievers and middle-of-the-road students. The following health and safety concerns are representative of some of the experiences, thoughts and feelings that many LGBT and questioning youth face when they are a part of school and community environments that fail to reflect their unique concerns, needs and experiences.

It is important to remember that the stress associated with the stigmatization of being (or being perceived as being) an LGBT youth places many adolescents at risk for suicide (See Bringing youth voices out of the closet: Are you asking the right questions to prevent suicide?, school-related problems, homelessness, violence and substance abuse. It is the culture of homophobia and heterosexism that is the problem, not simply being an LGBT youth. As concerned educators, it is important that we are aware of the health and safety concerns that many LGBT and questioning youth face.

LGBT students face greater "risks" of being

• perfectionistic "A" students
• scholarship winners
• doctors, lawyers, professors, artists, musicians
• high-performance athletes

LGBT persons often have grown up with feelings that being an LGBT person is wrong or bad and, in turn, have learned that they must hide their identity.

As a result, they may often try to be perfect in everything else that they do to cover up what society deems to be an "imperfection".

Perhaps, as one research psychologist (Herek 1993) suggests, we need to adjust our view of LGBT youth to one of gifted children who, by virtue of their extraordinarily powerful and creative resilience, survive adolescence and make their way into the world of adulthood.

Maybe one day we will think of LGBT students not as "at-risk youth" or as "overachievers" but simply as ordinary youth who accept life's challenges n a daily basis. But until that day, many LGBT and questioning youth will continue to struggle to survive in school and community environments that fail to recognize, embrace and affirm their identities.

Suicide

• "Canada has one of the highest youth suicide rates in the world… of all teens who commit suicide, about one third appear to be homosexual in orientation" (Kroll and Warneke, The Dynamics of Sexual Orientation and Adolescent Suicide, 1995).
• Gay male and bisexual youth in Alberta are 14 times more at risk for a serious suicide attempt than heterosexual male youth (Bagley & Tremblay, 1997, Calgary Study).
• Forty-six percent of the gay and lesbian youth questioned have attempted suicide at least once. Average age at first suicide attempt was 13 years (Being OUT—Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Youth in B.C.: An Adolescent Health Survey, 1999).
• In the United States, gay and lesbian youth represent 30 percent of all completed teen suicide: extrapolation shows this means a successful suicide attempt by a gay teen every five hours and 48 minutes (Paul Gibson, "U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Secretary's Task Force on Youth Suicide Report," 1989. See also Gary Remafedi, "Death by Denial: Studies of Gay and Lesbian Youth Suicide," Boston: Alyson Publications, 1995.)
• Lesbian and gay persons who did not attempt suicide differed in two ways from those who did attempt suicide: they experienced less stress in coming out to their parents/family they experienced less ridicule for their sexual orientation (Ryan & Futterman, 1988).

From Bobby's Diary:

"I can't let anyone find out that I'm not straight. It would be so humiliating. My friends would hate me. They might even want to beat me up. And my family? I've overheard them. … They've said they hate gays, and even God hates gays, too. Gays are bad, and God sends bad people to hell. It really scares me when they talk that way because now they are talking about me" (Aarons 1995).

Surrey BC, March 11, 2000

Dear Mom and Dad:

The first thing is, I love you Mom and Dad, but you didn't understand why I had to commit suicide. There was so much going on, and I tried to cope with it, but I couldn't take it anymore. … It was horrible. Every day, I was teased and teased, everyone calling me gay, fag, queer, and I would always act like it didn't bug me. … But I was crying inside me. It hurt me so bad, because I wasn't gay. And when people said it, my own friends never backed me up. They just laughed. I would pray to God every night for everyone to stop saying that.

I know that you are going to miss me and that you will never forgive me, but you will never understand. You weren't living my life. I hate myself for doing this to you. I really, really hate myself, but there is no other way out for me.

Sure, I could have taken a gun and shot everyone in the head … but what would the point be?

I love you Dad and Mom. Please, please tell the people at the school why I did this. I don't want somebody else to do what I have done.

Mom, after my death, please, please go to schools and talk to kids that bullying and teasing has big consequences. Please visit my grave often, so I'm not lonely."

— Hamed Nastoh, age 14

(Garth Kirby, Xtra West, 8 February 2001)

Ruth, the mother of a lesbian student who committed suicide, shares the following testimonial:

"A wonderful child with an incredible mind is gone because our society can't accept people who are different from the norm. What an awful waste. I will miss my daughter for the rest of my life. I'll never see her beautiful smile or hear her glorious laugh. I'll never see her play with her sister again. All because of hatred and ignorance. I strongly believe that the seeds of hate are sown early in life. Let's replace them with love, understanding, and compassion." (Perrotti and Westheimer 2001)

School-related problems

• Two-thirds of gay and lesbian students heard homophobic remarks made by other students at school (Being OUT—Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Youth in B.C.: An Adolescent Health Survey, 1999).
• Thirty-seven percent of gay and lesbian youth questioned feel like outsiders at school (Being OUT—Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Youth in B.C.: An Adolescent Health Survey, 1999).
• Almost 40 percent of gay and lesbian youth surveyed have dramatically low self-esteem (Being OUT—Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Youth in B.C.: An Adolescent Health Survey, 1999).
• Thirty-nine percent of participants told a teacher or school counselor that they are gay or lesbian (Being OUT—Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Youth in B.C.: An Adolescent Health Survey, 1999).

Kathryn, a lesbian high school student who was living in a safe house at the time of this interview, describes her school experience in Edmonton, Alberta:

"The high school I went to in grade 10 and 11 was awful. It was very, very homophobic. … If I ever did hear a queer-related topic, it was always something negative. So I always had to shut up because I was too scared. … I remember when we were going over the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms in class. When our teacher was going through it, and reading it and telling us our rights, I just wish that he talked about gay rights as much as he talked about the other rights. I just feel that if teachers are open to this issue than kids also will be. … After I had my depression in Grade 11, I ended up being in the hospital for half of the school year. So that was it for that school. Other kids who are also queer go to that school, and they also weren't out. Sometimes I see them in the community, and they are just so out and everything. But when they are in the school, they are just like the straightest kids." (Grace and Wells 2001)

Homelessness

Between 20 and 40 percent of homeless youth are LGBT. These rates are probably under-reported since LGBT youth are unlikely to reveal their sexual identity or gender orientation to authorities. Many LGBT youth are forced out of their homes when they disclose their sexual orientation (Ryan and Futterman 1998).

Violence and physical safety

• One in five gay and lesbian youth has been physically assaulted in the past year (Being OUT—Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Youth in B.C.: An Adolescent Health Survey, 1999).
• A 1999 Safe Schools Coalition study of Seattle public schools found LGBT youth were five times more likely than their heterosexual peers to be targets of violence and/or harassment, almost three times more likely to be injured in a fight severely enough to need medical attention and nearly two times more likely to be threatened or injured by someone with a weapon. Since the study's inception in 1993, seven young people have reported being gang-raped in public schools because of their sexual orientation (They Don't Even Know Me: Understanding Anti-Gay Harassment and Violence in Schools, January 1999).

Substance Use and Abuse

"[LGBT] youth often internalize society's negative messages regarding sexual orientation; many suffer from self-hatred as well as social and emotional isolation. Substance abuse can be motivated by [LGBT] youth attempts to manage stigma and shame, to deny same-sex feelings or as a defence against ridicule and anti-gay violence" (Ryan and Futterman 1998).

LGBT Youth of Color Face Additional Challenges

"We are not only lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgendered. We are also white, black, aboriginal, sons, daughters, brothers, sisters, students, and friends. Educators need to understand that we are more than our sexual identity" (Ryan and Futterman 1998).

• "Unlike racial stereotypes, which are often positively re-framed by family and ethnic community, negative cultural perceptions of homosexuality are often reinforced for LGBT youth of color. As within mainstream culture, homophobia within ethnic minority communities is high" (Advocates for Youth 2002; Ryan and Futterman 1998).
• Even though past traditions often affirmed homosexuality, many LGBT youth in modern aboriginal communities face humiliation and violence because of their sexual orientation. Numerous LGBT aboriginal organizations are working to reclaim the value previously placed on homosexuals (Advocates for Youth 2002; Roscoe 1998; Day 1995).
• "Asian-Canadian LGBT individuals diverge from cultural expectations of marriage and children. By not fulfilling those expectations, shame is often brought to the individual and the family name" (Advocates for Youth 2002; Wade, Watt and Mo 1991).
• African-Canadian LGBT youth often face additional pressure because of discrimination from the larger society, including white gay communities and homophobic black communities (Advocates for Youth 2002; Pittman, Witman and Adams-Taylor 1992). To maintain acceptance in their black communities many youth felt that they had to down play their homosexuality and to fit into the gay community many felt that they had to downplay their blackness (Sears 1995).
• "Ethnic minority [lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgendered persons] are required to interact with three separate cultures, which have different and often conflicting values. This interaction increases stress and vulnerability particularly during adolescence when identity is formed" (Ryan and Futterman 1998).