Thomas

McKenzie Thomas
Jennifer Rodrick
English 115
17 October 2016
LGBT People and the Space Around Them
The LGBT community has become a main focus in America and various other parts of
the world recently. After decades of fighting for their rights, gay people finally won the right to
marry in all states in the United States on June 26, 2015. Other countries such as France and
Ireland have legalized it as well. LGBT people have also been represented in the media in the
past decade more than ever before in shows such as How to Get Away with Murder, Sense 8,
Modern Family, Orange is the New Black, The Real ONeils, and many more. In addition to
television characters, numerous actors themselves have come out as well. On social media sites,
such as Instagram, Facebook, and Tumblr, many users have started accounts to promote the
awareness and equal treatment of the LGBT community. Although our society has clearly
evolved into a far more accepting one, there are still parts of it that have serious work to do in
order to further the rights of this community. The fact that people still have to come out and
tell everyone who they prefer to be with in a relationship or how they need to portray themselves
in terms of their gender identity is proof in itself that people still see being LGBT as not
normal. I believe that the space and the people surrounding individuals has a more profoundly
negative rather than positive effect on people who identify as LGBT because as supportive as
some people may be, the damaging effects that unaccepting churches, schools, and families can
have on a person can interfere with the development of their identities.

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LGBT people are greatly affected by the communities that surround them. Churches are
some of the places that can have an extremely strong influence on the lives of these particular
people. For example, the Mormon church is one of the worst offenders. They have even gone as
far as to condemn the children of same-sex couples. In the article Behind the Mormon Churchs
Ironic Defense of Discrimination, C. Brian Smith describes how the new LDS handbook bars
children of same-sex couples from joining the church or being blessed or baptized until and
unless they turn 18, move out of their parents home, and disavow all same-sex relationships
(Smith, Behind the Mormon Churchs Ironic Defense of Discrimination). By doing this, the
church is sending a message of hate to LBGT people. The fact that even their kids are punished
is a way to make them feel ashamed for being who they are and raising children. It is terrible that
the church makes the parents feel as though they are being unfair to their children for something
that is completely out of the kids hands.

Many churches advertise that everyone is welcome to their services. However, what they mean
by this is that everyone is welcome to come, but it does not mean they will be accepted as they
are. My fathers church was one that liked to advertise their accepting nature. However, when I

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was 11 years old, I got a taste of my churchs true colors. Proposition 8, the one that would
decide if same-sex marriage would continue to be illegal in the state of California, was the topic
of this particular Sunday prayer. The pastor began by speaking about the tragedy that is marriage
equality, and directed us to form small prayer circles. Apparently LGBT people are an especially
hot topic, as we had never formed prayer circles, let alone get out of our seats. As I walked with
my stepmom to our circle, I asked why are gay people bad? She replied that being gay is a sin,
and gay people are not a part of Gods plan. When we had huddled into our groups, Pastor Steve
began his prayer: homosexuality is a sin, this is not Gods plan, society is straying from the Lord
every day, etc. When I realized that I was gay a year later, I though back on that day at church.
Even though I was not ashamed of who I was, I knew that my identity would be shaped based
upon what others believed. It was not up to me to be myself, but instead it was up to others the
way in which I would portray who I am. I hid this huge part of my identity for many years
because I did not want to deal with the repercussions of the church members discovering the real
me. These were people who adored me, and it hurt badly knowing that they would drop me
because of the way I naturally am. Because of the church space that surrounded me and the
people within it, I did not represent myself in a genuine light.
Another space that can have a dehumanizing effect on the LGBT community is school.
Schools are filled with kids from many backgrounds and many races and many cultures.
However, there seems to be another aspect of diversity that many kids find weird, silly, or
shameful: once again, belonging to the LGBT acronym. When I was in junior high and high
school, thats gay was by far the most popular way of expressing ones feelings towards
something they believed to be incredibly stupid. We are running the mile today, the PE teacher
would tell us. Thats gay, the kids would mutter. Your essays are due are Monday, the

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English teacher would remind us. Gay, whined the students. I felt awful every single time I
heard this. It felt as if all of the kids using this phrase were personally calling me the equivalent
of stupid, not worth their time. One time at lunch, one of my friends said that if she ever had a
gay son, she would disown him at 18. This comment hurt me more than I even thought possible.
I desperately asked another friend if she, too, was enraged by this comment. She replied I
guess, and walked away. Things for me got better after high school. I came out to my friends
after knowing most of them for five to ten years already, and they completely accepted me, even
becoming more accepting over the past year. The girl who made the hurtful comment is now
someone I can fully rely on to support me. I may have changed some peoples minds about
LGBT individuals, but the harsh school environment does not go as easy on some kids as it did
on me. For example, NoBullying.com reports that one study revealed that 82 per cent of LGBT
youth had problems during the previous year with bullying about sexual orientation (LGBT
Bullying Statistics). It also recounts the story of a transgender girl who, after enduring two
years of bullying at school, tells the principal about her problem and receives no assistance.
When a fight breaks out between her and a couple other students, she, the victim, is the only one
to be charged with assault (LGBT Bullying Statistics). Unlike me, some students come out of
the closet while still in school, or are presumed to be LGBT. In this case, the same website
reveals that LGBT students constantly received bigoted verbal abuse such as name-calling like
homo, fag or sissy more than two dozen times per day (LGBT Bullying Statistics). Like many
others, I constantly lived in fear of being discovered at school, for fear that I, too, would
become one of the above statistics. When LGBT kids are continuously terrorized for simply
being who they are, there is a serious toll taken on the lives of these students. The identities of
these kids are warped by the false perceptions and cruel name-calling that takes place at school.

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Instead of embracing who they are, LGBT kids will learn the rituals of deceit, impersonation,
and appearance (Sullivan, 128). By impersonating, kids are being the exact opposite of who
they are. They are acting like someone else, and this completely invalidates their true identities.
Lastly, families of LGBT people can often be the worst offenders. Parents, grandparents,
aunts, uncles, siblings, etc. always have certain expectations of their relatives, along with holding
their own beliefs and morals as well. Many gay, bisexual, or transgender individuals have to hide
their true identities for years and years before, if ever, revealing their genuine selves to their
families. Once these people finally build up the courage to come out to their families, they are
many times

rejected by their

own kin.

Because of this,

LGBTQ

youth represent as

much as 40

percent of the

homeless

youth population.

Of those 40

percent, studies

indicate that

as many as 60

percent are

likely to attempt

suicide

(Family

Acceptance

and
Homelessness).

This is an

astounding number

of children. Most kids never have to worry about being thrown out of the house or reprimanded
by their own parents just for being themselves. By being rejected like this, kids are taught to be
someone they are not. This occurrence is also very common in religious families. For example, I

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grew up for part of the time with my dad. He and my stepmother are both very devout Christians.
A few years ago on Christmas Day, I was riding in the backseat of my fathers car on the way to
dinner with my grandpa. I noticed that the car in front of us had a NOH8 sticker on the back. I
sat there repeating over and over in my head please dont say anything. Just when I thought I
did not have to hear some snide remark come out of my dads mouth, he opened it right up and
told my stepmom about a video he saw with a man who had a H8Gay sticker on his car. My
dad did one of his this is really hilarious laughs, and my stepmom joined in. It is the comments
like these ones that very cut deep for LGBT family members. Even worse than the comments my
dad would make is the fact that he treated the word gay like a bad word. When someone else
would say that word, his smile would fade quickly, his face would turn red with anger, and he
would fall silent. Another time, he told me how he found the thought of gay people to be
repulsive. Therefore, I was not surprised that he abandoned me when I told him about myself.
All of the rude things he said over the years caused me to never, and I mean never, feel relaxed
around him. I involuntarily used a gentler voice, filtered my words and my actions, and wore a
certain type of clothing around him. I was not myself when I was there, and it caused me to be
shy and to have low self-confidence for much of my life. It is extremely damaging to peoples
views of themselves when their own parents see them as unacceptable. Again, all of this was due
to the fact that my dad and stepmom were extremely unaccepting of LGBT people. My identity
was not really my own, and I am still trying to recover from the feelings my father caused me to
have about who I am.
In conclusion, it will take many, many years to weed out the anti-LGBT sentiment in the
space around us. However, because of the severely damaging effects of churches, schools,
families, and more on LGBT people, change is not optional. Awareness and personal stories must

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be brought to the attention of the public so that people can see how their actions may be hurting
people beyond what they could even imagine. Individuality is supposedly valued in the space
that surrounds most of us, and this needs to be reinforced so that people, no matter who they are,
can shape an identity that actually reflects their true selves. No one will reach their full potential
if they are pretending to be someone else in fear of rejection and persecution by the ones they
love the most.

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Work Cited
"Family Acceptance and Homelessness." The Trevor Project. The Trevor Project, n.d. Web. 17
Oct. 2016.
LGBT Bullying Statistics infographic. Digital image. No Bullying.com. No Bullying. Web. 17
Oct. 2016.
"LGBT Bullying Statistics." NoBullying.com. No Bullying, 12 Sept. 2016. Web. 17 Oct. 2016.
Protest of the Mormon Church. Digital image. Advocate. Advocate. Web. 17 Oct. 2016.
Smith, C. Brian. "Behind the Mormon Church's Ironic Defense of Discrimination." Gay News,
LGBT Rights, Politics, Entertainment. Advocate, 06 Jan. 2016. Web. 17 Oct. 2016.
Sullivan, Andrew. What Is a Homosexual? The Norton reader: an anthology of nonfiction. Ed.
Linda Peterson, John Brereton, Joseph Bizup, Anne Fernald, Melissa Goldthwaite. 13th
ed. New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 2012. 128.