![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rmMy roommate freshman year of college1 was conservative. On move-in day she put up big anti-abortion posters on her walls. But she was Italian-American! Oh, me too! Maybe we could be friends! I made the mistake of telling her I was Sicilian (and seriously, her family was from Naples, so I'm not sure why she thought her origins were so much more classy than mine). But mostly, I made the mistake of being queer and having queer friends.
She and the other people on my floor systematically harassed me. Talked about me behind my back so I'd be sure to hear, hissed things at me under their breath when they passed in the hall. Her boyfriend came to visit, and I'd be locked out of our room. Her brother threatened to break my arm because I was queer. Later, I heard people in her family had threatened to kill me.
I moved out of the dorms and in with a guy I knew from the club scene. He was gay, and I shared his tiny bed at Georgetown and he would berate me when I wouldn't stay up all night designing club fliers for him.
Eventually, the university, which blamed me for everything that happened to me, assigned me a new room in a different dorm. This meant I might have to drop out of two of my courses, since I was no longer on the "living and learning" floor about the Roots of Western Civilization and was thus not completing the special requirements of the hard to get into program I applied for along with the honors program on my initial application. I fought to stay, and was allowed, but walked in head bowed, shamed and afraid every day, because all those people knew I was filth.
My professors thought I was a trouble-maker and told me I was wrong when I attempted to do my final paper on the way Alexander the Great, being an outsider in his own culture for one set of reasons, was subsequently adopted by other marginalized cultures/people across time and place for entirely other reasons as a symbol of their own potential.
My professors were okay with everything in my paper other than the homosexual/gay community's fascination with Alexander in the 20th and late 19th centuries, despite the fact that I had primary sources on this covering the entire time period. I would come into advising sessions and dump dozens of books on the professors' desks. Eventually they let me write the paper. I tell you Alexander the Great it a personal subject for me. This is why. Because he was ugly and small and conquered the world and failed anyway.2
My new roommates were all right. They didn't mind I was queer. One didn't mind so much she wrote an editorial for the school paper full of identifying information about how just because her roommate was bisexual, it didn't mean she was. I was supposed to be grateful. Instead, I had to steal the stack of outgoing papers to be sent to the parents who subscribed from the newspaper office so that my parents wouldn't find out I was queer.
Do you have any idea what it's like to be the a subject of debate and editorial in your school's newspaper?
Meanwhile, friends of my old roommate continued to harass me. They called me impersonating people I worked with in campus organizations and tried to dupe me into thinking these boys desired me. They called me and threatened to rape me to show me what I really needed. They called me and told me I was disgracing the school and would file complaints against me because I was seen holding hands with my girlfriend in the lobby when campus tours came through and I was driving people away from the school.
My friends Nik and Carlis were jumped on a street corner. We sat with Nik in the ER while he got stitches. I had to have campus security posted outside my door.
When I went to a GLBT student activist conference at another school, the cops were called on our conference, because the religious conference in the hotel felt threatened by us and people threw beer bottles at my girlfriend and I.
I lost my scholarship, because I couldn't concentrate on school. I couldn't tell my parents why -- lesbianism was an unfortunate birth defect they could live with; bisexuality would mean I was just a whore.3 They didn't think I should go back to college; clearly, I was lazy and mentally ill.
I spent the summer working and staying late at the office to write letters in secret to the campus administration begging to get my scholarship back. I would be denied it for one semester, but if I did well enough, I could have it back. I was out of the honors program though, and I should be grateful because the school was under no obligation to protect me from incidents that had happened because of something that was my own fault -- being gay and harming another student's studies by the stress it caused them to be exposed to my lifestyle.
I worked full-time to finish my degree, going to school at night and during the summers. When I would visit my parents they would accuse me of being a drug addict, because I would sleep for 24 hours, having never had time for sleep at school. My parents and I had a terrible relationship for years after this, in part, because of the lies I had to tell and the reasons I had to tell them.
My university is liberal now, and includes sexual orientation in its anti-discrimination clause. I don't care. I will never give them money, I will never go back for a reunion.
I didn't happen to kill myself because I didn't happen to have brain chemistry that made that seem like a logical thing to do. That's a fluke. But I did feel like I was dying every day.
Lots of people aren't as lucky as I was. As I am.
Tyler Clementi killed himself after his roommate broadcast his private, intimate moments with another person of the same gender on the Internet.
These things aren't pranks. They're violence. They're murder. They're hate. Even if the perpetrators are too fucking entertained by their own viciousness to know it.
Please support4 the organizations and projects below if you can. They save lives. If you have more to add to this list, please post in comments.
http://www.glsen.org
http://www.thetrevorproject.org
http://www.safeschoolscoalition.org
http://www.beatbullying.org
http://wegotyourbackproject.wordpress.com
http://www.youtube.com/itgetsbetterproject5
http://www.imfromdriftwood.com
--
1 1990 - 1991. So, a long time ago. I'm good now. But this is sort of a thing.
2 I'm still angry about that Oliver Stone movie, too.
3 My parents and I have a much better relationship now, although I don't really know where they stand on these topics. They love me, they love Patty. We're all right. But I can't forget.
4 Support doesn't just mean money. Volunteer if you can. Link. There's lots of good you can do with whatever resources you have.
5 Yes, Dan Savage has been and continues to be a problematic figure on a number of issues (although he's been improving on some), including trans stuff, race stuff, body size stuff, and misogyny at female politicians who deserve ire, but not for their gender. However, I believe this project is worthwhile and will be participating.
She and the other people on my floor systematically harassed me. Talked about me behind my back so I'd be sure to hear, hissed things at me under their breath when they passed in the hall. Her boyfriend came to visit, and I'd be locked out of our room. Her brother threatened to break my arm because I was queer. Later, I heard people in her family had threatened to kill me.
I moved out of the dorms and in with a guy I knew from the club scene. He was gay, and I shared his tiny bed at Georgetown and he would berate me when I wouldn't stay up all night designing club fliers for him.
Eventually, the university, which blamed me for everything that happened to me, assigned me a new room in a different dorm. This meant I might have to drop out of two of my courses, since I was no longer on the "living and learning" floor about the Roots of Western Civilization and was thus not completing the special requirements of the hard to get into program I applied for along with the honors program on my initial application. I fought to stay, and was allowed, but walked in head bowed, shamed and afraid every day, because all those people knew I was filth.
My professors thought I was a trouble-maker and told me I was wrong when I attempted to do my final paper on the way Alexander the Great, being an outsider in his own culture for one set of reasons, was subsequently adopted by other marginalized cultures/people across time and place for entirely other reasons as a symbol of their own potential.
My professors were okay with everything in my paper other than the homosexual/gay community's fascination with Alexander in the 20th and late 19th centuries, despite the fact that I had primary sources on this covering the entire time period. I would come into advising sessions and dump dozens of books on the professors' desks. Eventually they let me write the paper. I tell you Alexander the Great it a personal subject for me. This is why. Because he was ugly and small and conquered the world and failed anyway.2
My new roommates were all right. They didn't mind I was queer. One didn't mind so much she wrote an editorial for the school paper full of identifying information about how just because her roommate was bisexual, it didn't mean she was. I was supposed to be grateful. Instead, I had to steal the stack of outgoing papers to be sent to the parents who subscribed from the newspaper office so that my parents wouldn't find out I was queer.
Do you have any idea what it's like to be the a subject of debate and editorial in your school's newspaper?
Meanwhile, friends of my old roommate continued to harass me. They called me impersonating people I worked with in campus organizations and tried to dupe me into thinking these boys desired me. They called me and threatened to rape me to show me what I really needed. They called me and told me I was disgracing the school and would file complaints against me because I was seen holding hands with my girlfriend in the lobby when campus tours came through and I was driving people away from the school.
My friends Nik and Carlis were jumped on a street corner. We sat with Nik in the ER while he got stitches. I had to have campus security posted outside my door.
When I went to a GLBT student activist conference at another school, the cops were called on our conference, because the religious conference in the hotel felt threatened by us and people threw beer bottles at my girlfriend and I.
I lost my scholarship, because I couldn't concentrate on school. I couldn't tell my parents why -- lesbianism was an unfortunate birth defect they could live with; bisexuality would mean I was just a whore.3 They didn't think I should go back to college; clearly, I was lazy and mentally ill.
I spent the summer working and staying late at the office to write letters in secret to the campus administration begging to get my scholarship back. I would be denied it for one semester, but if I did well enough, I could have it back. I was out of the honors program though, and I should be grateful because the school was under no obligation to protect me from incidents that had happened because of something that was my own fault -- being gay and harming another student's studies by the stress it caused them to be exposed to my lifestyle.
I worked full-time to finish my degree, going to school at night and during the summers. When I would visit my parents they would accuse me of being a drug addict, because I would sleep for 24 hours, having never had time for sleep at school. My parents and I had a terrible relationship for years after this, in part, because of the lies I had to tell and the reasons I had to tell them.
My university is liberal now, and includes sexual orientation in its anti-discrimination clause. I don't care. I will never give them money, I will never go back for a reunion.
I didn't happen to kill myself because I didn't happen to have brain chemistry that made that seem like a logical thing to do. That's a fluke. But I did feel like I was dying every day.
Lots of people aren't as lucky as I was. As I am.
Tyler Clementi killed himself after his roommate broadcast his private, intimate moments with another person of the same gender on the Internet.
These things aren't pranks. They're violence. They're murder. They're hate. Even if the perpetrators are too fucking entertained by their own viciousness to know it.
Please support4 the organizations and projects below if you can. They save lives. If you have more to add to this list, please post in comments.
http://www.glsen.org
http://www.thetrevorproject.org
http://www.safeschoolscoalition.org
http://www.beatbullying.org
http://wegotyourbackproject.wordpress.com
http://www.youtube.com/itgetsbetterproject5
http://www.imfromdriftwood.com
--
1 1990 - 1991. So, a long time ago. I'm good now. But this is sort of a thing.
2 I'm still angry about that Oliver Stone movie, too.
3 My parents and I have a much better relationship now, although I don't really know where they stand on these topics. They love me, they love Patty. We're all right. But I can't forget.
4 Support doesn't just mean money. Volunteer if you can. Link. There's lots of good you can do with whatever resources you have.
5 Yes, Dan Savage has been and continues to be a problematic figure on a number of issues (although he's been improving on some), including trans stuff, race stuff, body size stuff, and misogyny at female politicians who deserve ire, but not for their gender. However, I believe this project is worthwhile and will be participating.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2010-09-30 03:34 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-09-30 03:37 pm (UTC)I am deeply, deeply horrified and ashamed of the university that employs me, today, even though they're -- responding fairly well, as giant state universities go.
no subject
Date: 2010-09-30 03:38 pm (UTC)I'm so, so sorry :(
no subject
Date: 2010-09-30 03:46 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-09-30 03:48 pm (UTC)I was very saddened by the news.
no subject
Date: 2010-09-30 03:49 pm (UTC)Thank you for sharing this with us. May I share it with my flist?
no subject
Date: 2010-09-30 03:49 pm (UTC)(no subject)
From:(no subject)
From:(no subject)
From:(no subject)
From:(no subject)
From:no subject
Date: 2010-09-30 03:53 pm (UTC)I can't even say anything about it.
no subject
Date: 2010-09-30 03:55 pm (UTC)And silly me, to think that this kind of bigotry was at least more subdued in the Northeast.
Wow.
Date: 2010-09-30 03:56 pm (UTC)I really wish that this kind of thing was no longer happening.
Damn.
no subject
Date: 2010-09-30 03:58 pm (UTC)It makes me want to cry and rage at the perpetrators and hug all my friends very tightly and say to them, "I love you as you are! I don't care who you are attracted to."
This is why when I talk to my daughter about sexuality I say, "If you figure out that you are gay, it's okay. You can bring your girlfriend home. We love you." I don't want her to ever think that we won't love her because of who she loves. I don't want her to ever feel that hopeless.
no subject
Date: 2010-09-30 04:41 pm (UTC)(no subject)
From:no subject
Date: 2010-09-30 04:01 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-09-30 04:05 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-09-30 04:06 pm (UTC)When I broke down in the res-life office, the man who worked there said that since he and I were both "quiet people" sometimes things like this happened to us.
The roommate was African-American If my parents had called and asked to switch me over that we would have been being horrible people
no subject
Date: 2010-09-30 04:16 pm (UTC)(no subject)
From:(no subject)
From:no subject
Date: 2010-09-30 04:15 pm (UTC)I wonder if in Tyler Clementi's case the most important factor was that he was shy and introverted. I suspect that his roommate might have done the same if he had discovered Clementi being intimate with a girl - it would still have been something that he felt he could mock Clementi for.
It's still unacceptable, of course. Bullying always is.
no subject
Date: 2010-10-02 02:42 am (UTC)Teachers and administrators--whether they are in grammar school, in junior high, in high school or college--tend to be lickspittle cowards who would rather side with the bullies rather than the bullied. Even the ones who are sympathetic offer nothing beyond the sympathy. I don't recall a single one, all through school, who ever had the guts to stand up and say, "This is wrong, this is unacceptable, and if you treat other people like this, you will be punished."
And yeah, I was bullied all through school. How dare I have been short, intelligent and disabled, right?
I can't imagine how horrible it would be to endure twelve years of this shit and then to find the bullying continuing in college. You'd feel like it was never going to end. There are murderers who don't serve twelve years to sixteen years of hard time.
IT GETS BETTER
Date: 2010-09-30 04:19 pm (UTC)http://www.youtube.com/itgetsbetterproject
and Savage's original column (3rd entry) here:
http://www.thestranger.com/seattle/SavageLove?oid=4940874
Re: IT GETS BETTER
Date: 2010-09-30 04:20 pm (UTC)Re: IT GETS BETTER
From:no subject
Date: 2010-09-30 04:22 pm (UTC)We're strong supporters of GLSEN here. Elder Monster is the co-founder and current president of his school's Gay/Straight Alliance. He has organized his school's Day of Silence activities for three (and about to be four) years running, and even successfully lobbied to have the organization called by its correct name in the school yearbook. Prior to last year, it was listed as "Diversity Club", to avoid hurting the feelings of the bigots in the community. Alexander would have none of that, and took his fight all the way to the school board. (No, I'm not proud of him at all. Why do you ask?)
The GLSEN is a terrific organization, and one that really helps high school kids - GLBT kids and Allies alike - navigate all the shit-flinging our dumbfuck society does.
no subject
Date: 2010-09-30 04:51 pm (UTC)Your son sounds awesome.
(no subject)
From:(no subject)
From:no subject
Date: 2010-09-30 04:24 pm (UTC)That society allowed, and still does allow, the mistreatment of people because of fear.
Fear is such a major factor in the actions of so many people and I so wish instead of hurting another people would ask them selves what they fear.
I always wonder how many people hate because they can't hold hands with their boyfriend/girlfriend.
Is it because they deny who they are or even worse have no idea who they are - and never will.
I feel so badly for Tyler.
He must have felt so desperate and alone.
I am so sorry you had to lie to your parents but YAY YOU! for not letting the whole situation be one that you felt needed resolution via death.
That poor kid!
no subject
Date: 2010-09-30 04:25 pm (UTC)Which is to say, I sympathise with your experiences, although being a coward and a liar served me rather well in hiding when I wanted to be hidden. But this is not shit that should be destroying the lives of people his age. We are supposed to be better than this now.
Survivor
Date: 2010-09-30 04:27 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-09-30 04:34 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-09-30 04:35 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-09-30 04:41 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-09-30 04:43 pm (UTC)I've just got a job teaching med students (it'll start in my second year of doctoring, so a while away yet, but still, yay!) and I promise that I will stomp so hard on anti-LGTB bullying if I see it in my classes. xxx
no subject
Date: 2010-09-30 04:52 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-09-30 04:55 pm (UTC)