July 13, 2011

  • What Its Like

    Imagine you are a teenager with all the normal struggles and bullshit that comes with being a teenager. You have the pressures of school and pressures from parents and siblings and friends and maybe a job. Being a teenager you have your typical teen angst and typical teen emotions. You are moody and you don't know why. Everything seems to get blown way out of proportion. Life is just generally miserable from time to time. Now imagine you are gay.

    Perhaps you have always known or perhaps you realize at the onset of puberty that something isn't right or at least not the same right that you have been taught to believe ever since you were in diapers. You are in the gym locker room at school and the other boys turn you on. You don't know why. You don't want them to turn you on but you can't help it. As you change your clothes, you try to hid your slight erection from seeing the other boys. You are worried that one of them might see this and beat the shit out of you. What is worse is that many of the other boys in the very same locker room routinely use the words fag, faggots, or homo or use the word gay to describe things they don't like.

    Now imagine yourself at home. Your parents are the Christian conservative types who not only believe being gay is wrong and gays go to Hell, but also have long said that no child of theirs would ever choose to be gay and if so, they will be kicked out and disowned from the family. Yet, you know being gay is no more a choice then your height or skin color. You know that while everybody in your life is telling you it's wrong and you will go to Hell, you can't help but be turned on by other guys. You try to suppress it and even fake an interest in girls, but it only makes you sick to your stomach tying to force something that just is not natural for you. You know for you, being gay is right and to live any other way would be to live a lie. Yet, you can't tell anybody for fear of being ostracized, hated, or bullied just for being what everybody can be: yourself.

    So on top of all of the other pressures of being a teen, you have to deal with being gay in a not so gay friendly world. Life is agony; being forced to suppress who you are eats you up inside. There are many sleepless nights; sometimes you stare aimlessly up at the ceiling wondering, hoping you can change what you are; sometimes you lay awake crying because you have nobody that you can  go to in hopes of unburdening  this powerful, life changing secret. You dread going to school in the morning because you see how those fuckers torment and bully the other gay teens who are not so fortunate enough to be able to conceal their homosexuality under a thick veil of masculinity the way you can. Yet, you fear that one day you will become one of them: bullied for being gay. Your heart bleeds for these other victims and you want so bad to stand with them and say "you are not alone, I'm gay too, now let's pull ourselves up, get strong, and fight back against those evil bastards." But you can't. People finding out the truth means you lose everything: your friends, your family, even a place to live. You suffer in silence, wondering when your own personal hell ends.

    Sounds awful doesn't it? Well, lucky for teens, it gets better. Look, high school fucking blows for everybody. But you know what, eventually, it ends and you don't have to see those motherfuckers again until you see them being hauled into a police car on the evening news. And meanwhile, you turn into the rousing success you always knew you would become; successful in life and happily in a relationship with the man of your dreams.

    And as fellow human beings, we can all help kids overcome such hell by visiting  http://www.itgetsbetter.org/ and either making a video or donating or just spreading the word. Even the Chicago Cubs made a video, which is ironic since it never gets better for the Cubs; only progressively worse. Been 66 years since they last went to the World Series and 103 since they last won one? Well no problem, it gets worse by being damn near the worst team in baseball. But even the Cubs realize that things can get better. The Cubs, who's co-owner, Laura Rickets, is quite possibly the only openly gay owner in the history of professional sports. So go and help make a difference, I did and I will soon be sporting my brand new It Gets Better t-shirt just by donating.

    Here is the link one more time:

    http://www.itgetsbetter.org/

Comments (9)

  • You're right, it's hard enough being a teen...but being a teen AND being gay, wow.... No wonder the suicide rate is so high for gay teens...very sad. Have you heard that Bachman chick running for President? Apparently she believes you can cure being gay through therapy. Just what we need, another crazy person helping to push our country several steps back. I think she's worse than Palin!

  • yeah ive been following that nutjob for a while. The ironic part is that her husband is more than likely gay as hell. As for curing gays, that is par for the course when it comes to these conservative Christian types.

  • That would be like sending me to therapy to turn me gay...wouldn't happen. What the hell are these people thinking? Oh yeah, i bet her husband is gay. It always seems like the ones that are most against gays are the ones who are gay themselves. I don't understand why they can't just let people live the life they want to if they aren't hurting anyone.

  • This is a beautiful post. It reminded me much of that speech that Matthew McConaughey gives to win his case in A Time To Kill. Imagine all this and that, now, imagine she is white. Very good. and when teens realize that high school is just a short part of their lives that really doesn't mean anything at all, they will ALL be happier... gay or not.

    I will be going to this site. Thank you. :)

  • OH... and have you seen that movie that's pretty "B" but its a spoof on the therapy to "fix" gays? Its something like, "But I'm a Cheerleader" or something? My Monkey told me to watch it, and at first I was sorta offended, but then the twists started and it was pretty hilarious.

  • Some of the Red Sox did a It Gets Better video.

    @BubblysLife - Lol. I loved that movie! And yes, that's what it's called.

  • I've not seen that movie. A few years back I wrote a post about finding a way to cure one's Christianity. I was so pissed off at the time because I kept on reading about these fuckers that wanted to cure homosexuality.

  • yeah it actually started with the Giants, then the Cubs, then the Red Sox. If only it would help eliminate much of the homophobia in sports.

  • thank you, I certainly do appreciate the compliment.

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