by Howard J. Ross, Chief Learning Officer
This morning I watched a story on the news about the death of Tyler Clementi, an 18-year-old Rutgers University freshman who committed suicide after his roommate secretly filmed him having an encounter with another male student and then broadcast it on the Internet. The story focused on the fact that we live in a time when our privacy is easily violated. We are all vulnerable to having our private lives broadcast to the world because of the access that exists to video technology and the means to distribute images and sound to the public.
But that is not why Tyler Clementi died.
Imagine for a minute that a male college freshman was secretly filmed having such an encounter with a female student, and that encounter was similarly broadcast. What would happen? In the world that I see, it would perhaps have been embarrassing, but also would likely to have been followed by "high fives" for the videoed student from men all over campus. (How it would have impacted the woman's reputation is another story that exposes a great deal of hypocrisy.)
After all, boys will be boys.
But not, please, with other boys. And please, don’t ask and don’t tell me about that.
Four times as many gay young people commit suicide than heterosexuals. In Texas, within the same week that Tyler Clementi ended his life because he apparently couldn’t deal with the societally inflicted shame of being himself, a 13-year-old child, Asher Brown, committed suicide after being bullied for being gay.
But please, don’t ask and don’t tell me about that either.
These are hate crimes.
We do not live in a vacuum. The messages that we send out in one place in our society fill our “airwaves” and let us know what we consider “normal, decent, right, and healthy,” or “depraved, sick, sinful, and wrong.” The messages don’t stop at the doors of school classrooms, or the locked doors of college dormitories, or the halls of our hospitals, businesses, or governmental institutions.
Or in our military barracks or battlefields.
Our individual and collective silence in the face of the vilest forms of homophobia signals our complicity with the hatred. We accept that it is somehow alright for men and women to give their lives to the service of our country, to put themselves in harms way in far away lands, and even to die, “in the defense of freedom.” At the same time, we ask our troops to not tell us who they really are. When we encourage our public institutions to shame our fellow citizens into hiding their fundamental humanity, we are complicit in the thousands of needless suicides, deaths, and hate crimes that occur each year. We are complicit in the outsized numbers of LGBT who suffer from depression, drug and alcohol abuse, and countless other predictable outcomes of societal rejection.
Last week the U.S. Senate refused to overturn the military’s “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy. This failure of our lawmakers occurred despite the fact that in a May 2010 CNN/Opinion Research Poll, 78% of Americans approve of allowing Lesbian and Gay soldiers to serve openly.
It is time to reach out with the loudest voice you have to tell your Member of Congress or Senator, “Enough is enough. End this outrage!”
Last week, my client and friend Gaye Williams reminded me of the Dr. Seuss story, “Horton Hears a Who.” For those of you who don’t remember, Horton, the elephant, finds a whole civilization of people in a speck of dust, and in order to save them must get them to shout so that others can hear them:
Through the town rushed the Mayor, From the east to the west.
But everyone seemed to be doing his best.
Everyone seemed to be yapping or yipping!
Everyone seemed to be beeping or bipping!
But it wasn’t enough, all this ruckus and roar!
He HAD to find someone to help him make more.
He raced through each building! He searched floor-to-floor!
And, just as he felt he was getting nowhere,
And almost about to give up in despair,
He suddenly burst through a door and that Mayor
Discovered one shirker! Quite hidden away
In the Fairfax Apartments (Apartment 12-J)
A very small, very small shirker named Jo-Jo
was standing, just standing, and bouncing a Yo-Yo!
Not making a sound! Not a yipp! Not a chirp!
And the Mayor rushed inside and he grabbed the young twerp!
And he climbed with the lad up the Eiffelberg Tower.
“This,” cried the Mayor, “is your town’s darkest hour!
The time for all Whos who have blood that is red
To come to the aid of their country!” he said.
“We’ve GOT to make noises in greater amounts!
So, open your mouth, lad! For every voice counts!”
Thus he spoke as he climbed. When they got to the top,
The lad cleared his throat and he shouted out, “YOPP!”
And that Yopp…that one small, extra Yopp put it over!
Finally, at last! From that speck on that clover
Their voices were heard! They rang out clear and clean.
And the elephant smiled. “Do you see what I mean?…
They’ve proved they ARE persons, no matter how small.
And their whole world was saved by the smallest of All!”
“How true! Yes, how true,” said the big kangaroo.
“And, from now on, you know what I’m planning to do?…
From now on, I’m going to protect them with you!”
And the young kangaroo in her pouch said…“…ME, TOO!”
“From the sun in the summer. From rain when it’s fall-ish,
I’m going to protect them. No matter how small-ish!”
It is way past time for all of us “To come to the aid of our country.” Gay and Straight (especially straight!). No matter whether you think your voice is large or small, begin today shouting it out: “Enough is Enough! End Don’t Ask Don’t Tell Now!”
Maybe yours will be the little voice that puts it over the top.
