So it never stops does it......

[PreTTy PeTe]

While some people here are fighting over a cake and the right to buy it an Oregon teen died.

Jadin Bell Dead: Gay Oregon Teen Who Hanged Himself Dies After Being Taken Off Life Support.

When I was young I was beat up for being different but fuck it we are living in the 21st century and this shit has to stop.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/0...#slide=2041238

[loveguys72]

What a shame. Poor kid.

[johaninsc]

another one..

[mitchymo]

Its tragic. Its a shame that this sort of thing is not going to stop until bigotry is tackled head-on, and where society provides protection within the law to make it abundantly clear that homophobia cannot and will not be tolerated.

The alternative is to do nothing more than what has been done thus far, and hope that in time, attitudes will change. Of course, that approach works slower than having the law guiding you in the right direction.

I know some members think that i am pretty anti-american when it comes to the way things work in the US in relation to its rights, but that's not true. It is far more so, to say i am sorry for America. I wish the US had the power to punish hate speech, but instead you are stuck with having to hear it, over and over. Its no wonder that some kids can't take it. I know that its not hate speech that is just at fault, and that bullying is a problem in its own right, where kids who don't know any better behave in an immature way where perhaps they would grow out of it in time. Maybe some of the kids who bullied this lad may grow up to feel some shame when they look back on the past.

[PreTTy PeTe]

Do you what baffles me about this board there 288 responses to a lesbian couple refused a wedding cake and only 3 to a young gay boy who committed suicide.

fight the right battles folks.

[ronboy]

Another senseless tragedy.....

and a big for our PeTe.....because he's the best!

EDIT...it's senseless because this kid felt all alone, that he had nobody to reach out to...Nobody should have to be alone.......

[gsdx]

I guess it's easier to deal with wedding cakes than it is with 'just another teen death'. Sadly, we've become acclimatised to kids offing themselves. Each one is little more than a headline on the evening news these days.

[PreTTy PeTe]

I guess it's easier to deal with wedding cakes than it is with 'just another teen death'. Sadly, we've become acclimatised to kids offing themselves. Each one is little more than a headline on the evening news these days.

but should it be.

all kids deserve to be safe in school and all kids deserve to comfortable with who they are.

what is wrong with the parents of the bullies that they teach their kids hate?

[G-Lexington]

It's a lot easier to provide suggestions and opinions for a lesbian wedding cake than it is for a teenage suicide. Other than "that's too bad", of course. You know I spend a lot of time reaching out and offering advice on the sister site. My non-participation in this thread doesn't mean I don't care, or that my priorities are screwed up.

Lex

[diamondstar]

Another good one bites the dust. It's truly discouraging. If bullying isn't gotten under control, I think gay teens are going to avoid going to school altogether.

[Hard-up1]

Although no human is irrelevant, a single death may be. Are teen suicides increasing or decreasing among LGBT populations in the West?

What are the comparative teen suicide rates in the Western countries?

[bankside]

Do you what baffles me about this board there 288 responses to a lesbian couple refused a wedding cake and only 3 to a young gay boy who committed suicide.

fight the right battles folks.

It baffles me that people don't see the connection. To endure everyday cruelty is hard enough. To tell a kid he gets to find a way to survive that cruelty so he can grow up to always be a second-class citizen is not how to give someone hope.

[PreTTy PeTe]

It baffles me that people don't see the connection. To endure everyday cruelty is hard enough. To tell a kid he gets to find a way to survive that cruelty so he can grow up to always be a second-class citizen is not how to give someone hope.

I don't understand your post at all please post more.

[gsdx]

but should it be.

Of course it shouldn't be. It happens so seldom here in Canada that it makes the front page, but it happens regularly enough in the States that it gets little more than a mention. As for the bullies, it's always easier to ignore them than it is to deal with them, and parents are usually just in denial. The kids say "I didn't do it" and the parents believe them, especially when they end up on People's Court or Judge Judy.

[G-Lexington]

I see the connection.

By accepting "I don't make cakes for gays", they would be accepting second-class status. And the message to the kid would be "when you grow up, some people will refuse you service and stuff, and that's just the way it is". Instead, by fighting for equal treatment, it would send the message that you don't have to accept that sort of thing.

Lex

[PreTTy PeTe]

I see the connection.

By accepting "I don't make cakes for gays", they would be accepting second-class status. And the message to the kid would be "when you grow up, some people will refuse you service and stuff, and that's just the way it is". Instead, by fighting for equal treatment, it would send the message that you don't have to accept that sort of thing.

Lex

the kids are being bullied and hated because they are gay and they don't give a flying fuck about this cake. they need help now.

honestly what the fuck

[PreTTy PeTe]

Of course it shouldn't be. It happens so seldom here in Canada that it makes the front page, but it happens regularly enough in the States that it gets little more than a mention. As for the bullies, it's always easier to ignore them than it is to deal with them, and parents are usually just in denial. The kids say "I didn't do it" and the parents believe them, especially when they end up on People's Court or Judge Judy.

it happens here.

[gsdx]

it happens here.

I didn't say it didn't. I said it happens with great rarity.

[G-Lexington]

the kids are being bullied and hated because they are gay and they don't give a flying fuck about this cake. they need help now.

honestly what the fuck

Yeah, which is why I'm an online advisor and mentor to LGBTQ youth, and try to be a high-profile gay person who speaks out for LGBTQ youth, and take part in fundraisers for programs for LGBTQ youth, while you start threads on gay porn messageboards saying somebody should do something.

Honestly, what the fuck.

Lex

[Hard-up1]

I cannot find good comparative data on the teen suicide rates, much less by LGBT grouping, but here is a table that implies the U.S. and Canada are experiencing similar rates in the general population. Because the U.S. has 10 times the population of Canada, that means that the occurrence is much more frequent here, even if at the same rate. By logic, suicides, and therefore suicides of teens, SHOULD occur ten times less frequently in Canada. That's not virtue -- that's demographics.

http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/20...und-the-world/

[DigitalFudge]

Just to think of the lonely gays in the world and all the ones committing suicide who if they just stuck around could of probably saved and been a hero to so many.


RIP

[PreTTy PeTe]

Yeah, which is why I'm an online advisor and mentor to LGBTQ youth, and try to be a high-profile gay person who speaks out for LGBTQ youth, and take part in fundraisers for programs for LGBTQ youth, while you start threads on gay porn messageboards saying somebody should do something.

Honestly, what the fuck.

Lex

I apologize for my words.

I get really into the issue because I sent in a proposal to an organization here that does work for the community and I suggested they might want to have an lgbt home for homeless youths.. I am still working on it. I've met with them once and they're concerned with the legal stuff.

so we are both fighting the same battle.

[SLOPPYSECONDS]

it alway a thnag millions a ( people ) world ova not a sucide in a face da wot is call civlization operations in every land planet earth

just say dat not it new fa eons

thankyou

[menRsexii]

oh, man. horrible. Not again. my thoughts are with his family and friends.

RIP

[GamerBear]

Not surprised Oregon is full of homophobia and lack of gay support for teenagers.

[Rolyo85]

It's a tragedy... I take those particularly personally for some reason. The Schools of Hate article in Rolling Stone makes me cry every time I read it...


That said, it bothers me that the OP makes the comparison with the cake topic. The cake topic is not about cake, and in a way, that situation should be no less important than the fact that schools make children - not even just LGBT - see no alternative but to kill themselves...

[dereperez]

Do you what baffles me about this board there 288 responses to a lesbian couple refused a wedding cake and only 3 to a young gay boy who committed suicide.

fight the right battles folks.

This is nothing about cake versus suicide, let's not make it be one.

Shame that bullying continues because being gay is supposedly "wrong", or "broken" or "needs fixing". It is sad that even on that site with people showing support, there are still people that see being homosexual as a physical ailment. They mask their contempt and ignorance with "nice words".

[csb999]

being brutalized at home or school or generally as I was has only the most tenuous connection to being of any sexual identification at all .

[csb999]

a 7 year-old is not "gay" . And I bet committing suicide at 18 or 21 is the last of a lifetime of these things .

[BrianPGH]

Every time I read that another LGBT youth took his life, it tears me up inside. And I can't help thinking, "I could have easily been that boy." I don't know -- and probably never will -- what saved me from sharing their ending, but I'm glad something did. I only wish they had been so lucky. Each one of these boys had a bright future, and had so much to offer this world. It's a fucking shame that hate, fear, ignorance and violence has destroyed so many lives.

Rest in peace, Jadin. I wish the world had been kinder to you.
"The beautiful, and the sensitive, and the, oh, so very young...."

[Daximus]

Very sad. I can't imagine what gay youth go through with todays technology. Teasing and bullying are much more intense with everyone being connected. RIP young man. I hope you find in death what life could not give you.

[Hard-up1]

What we often think of as compassion is actually self-love, but that isn't necessarily a bad thing:

“Spring and Fall”
(1880) Gerard Manley Hopkins

To a young child

Margaret, are you grieving
Over Goldengrove unleaving?
Leaves, like the things of man, you
With your fresh thoughts care for, can you?
Ah! as the heart grows older
It will come to such sights colder
By and by, nor spare a sigh
Though worlds of wanwood leafmeal lie;
And yet you will weep know why.
Now no matter, child, the name:
Sorrow’s springs are the same.
Nor mouth had, no nor mind, expressed
What heart heard of, ghost guessed:
It is the blight man was born for,
It is Margaret you mourn for.

[freefall]

Fuck. Not another one. Geez.

[PreTTy PeTe]

[ChickenGuy]

What schools need are well-funded counselling and support services with emphasis on bullying - all these kids should have a warm and friendly person they know they can speak to in confidence who will listen and take action while reassuring them that they're not alone.

Whether this is true for schools in the U.S. I'm not sure - I'm assuming it will depend on the particular state what provisions they have for counsellors in schools? I wonder if a survey has ever been done on whether these suicides are more common in certain states than in others?

[alphaxxx]

This is such sad news.
The boy was just 15 and had a whole life ahead of him.

I only hope that homophobia will one day become a thing of the past and kids like him wont have to
contemplate suicide as a way of escaping bullying.

[Rolyo85]

a 7 year-old is not "gay" . And I bet committing suicide at 18 or 21 is the last of a lifetime of these things .

False. A 7-year old is just as gay as a 20-year old.

[mitchymo]

False. A 7-year old is just as gay as a 20-year old.

I'd have to disagree. Whilst there are some 7yr olds who may be aware of their sexuality, for the most part, kids haven't got 'that' on their minds. Sexuality really kicks in with adolescence. Until you discover yourself, you're not aware you are gay.

[rareboy]

I am always saddened by this senseless waste of a person.

We have to do better in convincing kids around the world that it does get better.

[Rolyo85]

I'd have to disagree. Whilst there are some 7yr olds who may be aware of their sexuality, for the most part, kids haven't got 'that' on their minds. Sexuality really kicks in with adolescence. Until you discover yourself, you're not aware you are gay.

I didn't mean awareness. Just that you are already what you are sexually, whether it's on your mind yet, or not. But we're getting off-topic.

[sixthson]

It's not enough to tell young people that it gets better. We need to make it better for them. That is one of our jobs as adults, to protect the young. The majority of kids do not bully, so these kids need to be taught to come to the defense of the bullied.
Just showing solidarity and support is probably all that will be needed. Physical intervention might not even be needed. Peer pressure can be a good thing, especially in cases like this. Peer pressure against a bully and peer pressure for the bullied can be learned.

In the words of Edmund Burke: All that is required for evil to prevail is for good men to do nothing.

[umjreon88]

My condolences to the kid and his family. If only there can be openness and doing away with traditions and beliefs that endanger people's lives...

[EuroSoccer]

That's really sad. Schools needs to start doing something about this shit.

[youngoutlaw]

The sad thing here is a young person felt they had no alternative but to end their life because of bullying. In this case it was homophobia but anyone, especially a child, ending their life because of bullying is completely wrong.

I'm lucky and work in a workplace were everyone is accepting of gays, lesbians, people from minorities etc. However I do see a growing trend, in teenage boys in particular, of people "acting gay" like there is something wrong with it. They almost want to be told off for their actions and for me that does not help the matter. To me this isn't direct in your face bullying but very much a darker version of homophobia as they aren't directly targeting one person but gays in general through mimicry of how they see gays.

I wish I could say I see this stuff stopping but I fear, like racism, it will never stop as it is an endless cycle. For every tolerant person there is an equally intolerant person who is passing their views on.