I am distressed, crying bitterly, and full of guilty questions like where did we go wrong. What did we do, or fail to do? I cannot close my eyes at night without crying out loud and wondering and worrying about him. How can we relieve this situation?

We have not discussed the issue with friends, although some close relations are aware of it. We feel we have to sell our small business and move away from here. I don’t think I can bear this any longer. Yes, we think of the anguish our son must have gone through/must still be going through, his loneliness and isolation. Yet he is happy to visit gay clubs and meet with other men.

We have talked, insofar as we are able. Yet he seems to jolly the whole thing along as if it were the ‘hip’ thing to do to be homosexual. It’s almost as if he’s delighted to say “I’m gay”.

Patricia responds:

You’ve reached an uncomfortable milestone in your life. Deal with it, like adults. This is your son you’re talking about. Irrespective of how he’s handling it — and it sounds like he has gone the somewhat brazen route — he needs his parents to be mature. It’s not just your dignity that’s at stake. Your son needs intelligent support.

This is no time for social philosophy either. We’ll talk some other time about the broader issues around homosexuality. The shock is surely receding now. Get a grip. Put your arms around your son and talk to him. His brazenness after all may well be no more than a defiant and desperate attempt to stay afloat.

via Devastated because our only son says he’s homosexual – Lifestyle, Frontpage – Independent.ie.

A Gay Man in the Military: First Post

It’s hard for people to understand why a gay man would join the military. In Clay’s case, he had been a civilian for many years and then rejoined in his thirties. We were out working in the yard one afternoon and he told me he wanted to enlist again. I thought he was crazy. We had been together for 10 years then.

via Diary of a Gay Soldier’s Husband: A Gay Man in the Military: First Post.

When Dr Justin Varney started out in his medical career he was advised to become a GP, not because his skills were better suited to this particular branch of medicine, but because he was gay.

His tutors felt that a career in paediatrics, the area he was interested in at the time, would be inappropriate because of his sexuality.

Tutors said parents might not like him working with their children, nor might other staff.

Today, more than a decade later, attitudes have changed greatly and Dr Varney is a consultant in public health medicine with responsibility for the health of 40,000 children in the Barking and Dagenham area of London.

via BBC NEWS | Health | ‘It’s much easier to be open now’.

Ryan Kelley in "Prayers for Bobby"

Actor Ryan Kelley, star of the new Lifetime Television film Prayers for Bobby, will join the Dayton chapter of Parents, Families and Friends of Lesbians and Gays (PFLAG) on Sunday, January 25 in an event to celebrate the film’s release and talk about his own experience bringing the acclaimed novel to the screen.

“We are extraordinarily excited to welcome Kelley to Ohio for this special PFLAG event,” said Jan Couchman, the chapter’s president. “Prayers is a unique opportunity to show the role PFLAG plays in so many parents’ lives, and Kelley’s visit underscores the priority that both PFLAG and the film’s cast have placed on changing hearts in the heartland. Though Prayers is a Hollywood production, its impact will be felt most in places like Dayton, where families turn to PFLAG as they learn to embrace and celebrate their lesbian and gay children.”

via Actor Ryan Kelley to Join Dayton Parents to Celebrate the Premiere of New Film Prayers for Bobby.

Leroy Aarons

If Leroy Aarons were still alive, he’d probably feel very proud to see his book “Prayers for Bobby” finally turned into a film for Lifetime TV. Aarons, who is listed as one of the film’s co-producers, accomplished much before his death in 2004, but he took special pride in his 1995 book about the real-life tragedy of a boy from Walnut Creek who wasn’t allowed to be himself.

Who was Roy Aarons? First, a consummate journalist who started his career at the New Haven (Conn.) Journal-Courier and went on to the Washington Post, where he stayed for 14 years during the very heady times of the 1960s and early ’70s…

But there came a time when work became personal. In 1990, Aarons, then a senior vice president of the Tribune, headed up a survey of gays and lesbians working in the media for the American Society of Newspaper Editors, which found that those journalists often encountered hostility in the newsroom and that media coverage of gay and lesbian issues was “at best, mediocre.”

Aarons delivered the study’s findings at an ASNE meeting in Washington, D.C., and then added a personal note: “I, as an editor and a gay man, am proud of ASNE.”

Recalling the dramatic coming-out moment in a column for the Tribune, Aarons wrote that his voice may have been shaky as he uttered that sentence, “but it was not from anxiety or fear. It was the welling up of emotion. It said, ‘Here I am, world, at last. All of me.’ ”

Within four months, Aarons and other gay and lesbian reporters met to found the National Lesbian & Gay Journalists Association, which continues his legacy today in newsrooms across the country.

via Leroy Aarons: consummate journalist

Sigourney Weaver marches with P-FLAG in "Prayers for Bobby"

Parents in Kalamazoo, MI, whose city commission was recently pressured into repealing a gay rights ordinance, are inviting the public into their homes to watch Prayers for Bobby.

In “Prayers,” to premiere at 9 p.m. Saturday on Lifetime, (Sigourney) Weaver plays Mary Griffith, a devoutly religious woman whose son Bobby (Ryan Kelley, “Smallville”) reveals he’s gay. She tries to help him become heterosexual through prayer. After Bobby commits suicide, Mary questions her religious beliefs and becomes a gay-rights advocate.

“I just felt it was very important to make this movie, because I felt it was a story to save lives and to open minds,” said Weaver, 59, during a phone interview. “I love stories that are about something more than the people in them. It seems to me what’s begun to happen is that television is more interested in those stories sometimes more than studios are because studios are trying to make a lot of money. Television takes more risks.”

…Western Michigan University student Adam Taylor, 20, was an extra in “Prayers.” Taylor is the director of Kalamazoo-based Project Light, a resource of the Kalamazoo Gay/Lesbian Resource Center. Founded in January 2008, Project Light provides an educational forum on the mental health of lesbian, bisexual, gay and transgendered (GLBT) youths.

“One in three gay, lesbian or bisexual youth between the ages of 14 and 24 contemplate, plan, attempt or complete suicide. One in two transgendered youth do (the same),” Taylor said. “About 83 percent of transgendered youth will attempt suicide in their lifetimes, which is 20 times higher — not 20 percent, but 20 times higher — than the standard population of their heterosexual peers. It’s not nationally proven, but it is definitely in one of the highest categories when dealing with suicide.”

Taylor, who is openly gay, said he tried to commit suicide at 16 when “dealing with my sexual-orientation issues.”

Public invited to viewings of film about gay issues – Kalamazoo News

In Prayers for Bobby, Sigourney Weaver plays Mary Griffith, mother of Bobby Griffith, who committed suicide August 27, 1983, after his mother spent years trying to cure his homosexuality with religion. The movie “may be the best TV movie on gay issues ever” says Brent Hartinger at After Elton.

The movie is based on the book by Leroy (Roy) Aarons, who at 56 years old came out to his peers at a convention of the American Society of Newspaper Editors (ASNE), and then founded the National Lesbian and Gay Journalists Association (NLJGA).

From the Daily Express (UK):

Ryan Kelley plays Bobby in Lifetime’s ‘Prayers for Bobby.’

Weaver claims Leroy Aaron’s (sic) book of the same name, from which her new film was adapted, has become a tool some gay youngsters use to help their parents come to terms with their child’s sexuality – and she hopes her movie also helps.

She tells TV Guide magazine, “Prayers For Bobby is the book kids give their parents when they come out. This (film) will be another way for them to sit down with your family and say, ‘I have something to talk to you about. Let’s watch a Sigourney Weaver movie.’

“There are no aliens in it, there are no ghostbusters, but it gets them in the room.”

Daily Express | Showbiz :: Weaver hopes new movie becomes a tool for gay teens.

Labour MP Chris Bryant

In 2003 the tabloid press published pictures of Mr Bryant posing in his underwear, which they procured from his Gaydar profile, alongside transcripts of sexually explicit messages he sent to other site users.

In his exclusive interview with Attitude he described the experience as “very, very, very, very unpleasant.”

“I didn’t sleep much for about three months.

“Friends of mine were phoned and abused and had their sexuality revealed to their families.

“My family had journalists turning up on their doorsteps.

“It was very, very, very horrible at the time.

“We had a general election since then and I increased my majority, so my constituents … they certainly know everything there is to know about me.”

Chris Bryant speaks publicly about “horrible”Gaydar photo controversy – from Pink News – all the latest gay news from the gay community – Pink News.

Obama Press Secretary Pledges Repeal of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell”  |  Advocate.com

When the press secretary for the new administration answers the question “Is the new administration going to get rid of the ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’ policy?” with a one word answer: “Yes,” commenters still doubt the administration wants it to happen.

It amazes me how because so many people have been hurt for so long by politicians, they are unwilling to give the new president any chance. LGBT people were disappointed by the results of the Clinton years and have been bashed to second-class citizenship under Bush & Co.

Is this a form of internalized homophobia? Instead of expecting to be the victim and the castaway, these people should be standing up and saying “Good! Tell us Robert, What can we do to help make this happen?” I’m afraid these complainers instead will be the ones who do nothing to put pressure on the congress, nothing to pressure hate groups, nothing to support the incoming administration who supports us. Then they will look for every potential hurdle or setback and call it a betrayal by the Obama team and look for some cave to crawl in to to lick their wounds.

I say enough of that! We have a new administration who has made commitments to us, and we need to follow through with our commitment to them. We need to pressure the legislature directly. We need to pressure hate groups directly. We need to come out! Why!? Why is it that so many of us are afraid?

I know how it is. I know how a small or medium sized town has only one bar with all of the people in the community hating and loving one another at the same time. I know how even in large towns a community exists from the bars, where we struggle because the alcohol is plentiful, the hustlers take advantage of lonely old men (or the other way around), the meth is contagious, and the sex is seductive. We live in these worlds because they give us some sense of belonging to something, because we feel we don’t belong any where else. I know why we hide in these places.

Too many people hide in this environment and think that is what “the gay community” is all about. This is not limited to small or medium sized towns either. New young people come to DC to escape from home and live an out lifestyle. Good. That’s what the cities are for. Our communities in the cities will continue to thrive. We need to continue to gay it forward. But we can’t allow the cities to be a gay ghetto where we can escape from our families and let them forget us.

Don’t you dare tell your parents you have a new “roommate!” Grab that phone and call your parents and say, “Mom, you know while I was here I met someone and I think I’m falling in love. We are going to move in together.” Mom will likely not be as surprised as you think and may only be waiting for you to tell her. She may be shocked, horrified and disgusted. But  you know what? You are not going to change! So you might as well get the pain over with and let the healing begin now so you can be a happy family again in a few years.

What does coming out have to do with DADT? Everything. The gay community is up in arms because of some pastor who is giving a prayer, but where are posts strategizing how to send letters to repeal DADT? Where is the grass-roots organization to enact ENDA? We’re so damn victimized, we are missing these tremendous opportunities.

Being out gives us strength. It gives us political strength, personal strength, and financial strength because we learn to live on our own. The LGBT community is lacking strength right now, but we are making demands. We need to first show we have the position from where we can make demands. We need to push through a repeal of DADT. We need to push through an all-inclusive ENDA. We need to repeal DOMA. We need to make gay marriage legal by definition in law. Obama cannot do this. America’s laws come from the legislature. When they start there, they have the strength of being backed by the people. LGBT people need to lead in the legislature.

Being out allows us to say to our families, “This is what is important to me. This is my family. This is why marriage is important. This is why my job need to be secured. This is why I can’t join the Army. This is who I am and I am part of America too.”

I have outrage fatigue, too. I am tired of being outraged and I want a new direction. We cannot wait for Obama. We must lead ourselves. We must lead America.

Nigel Owens

Early one morning, Nigel Owens scrawled a note saying he “just couldn’t deal with it any more” and crept out of his parents’ house. Fat, lonely, bulimic, addicted to steroids and secretly gay, Owens climbed high above the Welsh valley where he grew up and waited for the sleeping pills to take hold. He has no memory of being saved but was spotted and taken to hospital by a police helicopter. If his rescuers had arrived half an hour later, he would have been dead.

Nearly 13 years on, he is not fat nor bulimic and certainly not on steroids. Most notably, his sexuality is no longer a secret. This is a big deal because Owens is an international rugby union referee…

(Straight rugby star) Ben Cohen last year organised a reception for his gay fans. “My impression is that it would be fine to be able to come out in rugby,” Cohen said.

Would it really? Owens refereed in the World Cup last year and has been encouraged by the sport’s reaction to his sexuality. He says he has never suffered discrimination. “Hand on heart,” he declares, he has not heard any homophobic abuse from rugby crowds either.

Referee learns a lesson in life – rugbyheaven.com.au

Harvey Milk, Second Sight – Harvey Milk in personal photographs from his life

glbtq – social sciences >> Milk, Harvey – A comprehensive biography

Originally published Tuesday, October 11, 2005

Coming Out Is Essential

To me, National Coming Out Day is celebrated on the wrong day. National Coming Out Day should be celebrated on May 22, Harvey Milk’s birthday.

Harvey Milk, Second Sight

Harvey Milk was a U.S. Navy veteran, a photographer, a Broadway producer, a hippie, a businessman, a politician, an activist by simply being himself, and a martyr. Harvey Milk is one of my greatest heroes.

Harvey Milk knew the power of being yourself. Coming out, to him, was essential to our survival. By staying closeted, we marginalize ourselves in the eyes of society. Being out makes us a simple matter of fact to our neighbors. When they vote and decide our place in society, our neighbors need to know us for who we are, not for who homophobes make us out to be.

…Gay brothers and sisters,…You must come out. Come out…to your parents…I know that it is hard and will hurt them but think about how they will hurt you in the voting booth! Come out to your relatives. ..come out to your friends…if indeed they are your friends. Come out to your neighbors…to your fellow workers…to the people who work where you eat and shop…come out only to the people you know, and who know you. Not to anyone else. But once and for all, break down the myths, destroy the lies and distortions. For your sake. For their sake. For the sake of the youngsters who are becoming scared by the votes from Dade to Eugene.

Coming out has its dangers, and Harvey Milk knew that. He knew that people exist who lash out at what they cannot comprehend, or what they fear. Harvey Milk was murdered in an act of political revenge. A riot broke out when the murderer received only a “manslaughter” verdict. The actions of the killer were viewed by many as a clear case of premeditated murder, not manslaughter.

White Night Riot:

Dan White loaded his pistol, put some extra rounds in his pocket and drove over to City Hall to exact revenge. He felt he had been bitterly betrayed by Mayor Moscone and Supervisor Harvey Milk when they agreed to appoint a political ally to political enemy White’s resigned seat. He entered through the unmonitored side door and proceeded to Moscone’s office, shot him in cold blood, and then, reloading his gun, he walked down the hall to Milk’s office and blew him away, too.

Even after his death, Harvey begged us all to come out. In a statement he wrote to be made in the event he was killed, Milk said,

If a bullet should go through my head let that bullet go through every closet door.

Even Christian fundamentalist politicians like Monte Watkins have something to say about Harvey Milk in this fascinating article from The Texas Observer

I disagree with a lot of stuff. I did not agree when Harvey Milk, the homosexual Town Supervisor in San Francisco, was shot by someone who was supposedly a conservative. I totally disagreed with that. That is NOT the way to disagree. You have to be involved in a Godly manner – disagree, but disagree gently. You don’t hurt people.

On this National Coming Out Day, remember Harvey. Coming out is essential to our lives. I came out to a new person at work today when I simply said, “my boyfriend and I …” It was painless. Come out!

HRC : Coming Out Resources

Gay Life at About.com: Coming Out Resources

Coming out: A domino game – Joe Solmonese, president Human Rights Campaign

…Coming out can go all the way from the chat between airplane passengers to the inside of the voting booth on Election Day. On this National Coming Out Day, make a commitment to yourself to talk about it, every day. And before the year is out, talk about it to one friend, one family member, one coworker, and one neighbor on the plane before National Coming Out Day 2006.