My Dear TJF,
As I read what I have written I realize I havebarely begun to cover the simplistic, not well thought out and notwell written first paragraph of your commentary.  I have decidedto submit it as I have written it.  In re-reading your entirecommentary I am so very tempted to respond to each of yourstatements, line by line and word for word.  I sense that thiswould be too long for a reply to the forum.  This is a forum andif there are those who would like to see a longer  more completereply to your commentary they will say so.  I doubt this will bethe case.  Simplicity, being what it is, the ultimatecomplexity, therefore WYSIWYG!

How nice it must be to live ina perfect world...or is it those rose colored glasses you haveon.
This might be sage advice, except that one's sexual awarenesswhich includes ones gender awareness and ones awareness of sexualdesires that may or may not coincide with a person's church andsociety, rarely wait until they are "out of High School." These issues are usually played out on the panorama of schoolbeginning in Junior High School and they are rarely able to be hiddenfrom others and certainly if they are it takes a very focused andvery fearful  person to do this.  These years are, for thehuman child imbued with much, fantasy, feeling, experiment andlearning in all areas of life that will ultimately lead to a life, ifone is very lucky, that is inherently acceptable to the individual,regardless of societies mores, and is a life lead with out fear orshame.  As far as I am concerned, forcing any young person towait until they are out of High School is sentencing them to thoseyears filled with shame and fear, "Will I be found out?" There is no conceivable way that you can convince me that those yearsI spent in Junior High School and High School and the thirty yearsafterward that I lived in abject fear, often paralyzing fear, andturmoil of someone finding out I was transgendered was better for methan if I had had some form of outreach in school that helped me toaccept myself and showed me how worthwhile I was.  Coming fromone who survived this I will tell you that you are SIMPLY WRONG, andbecause of this blood was shed and lives were lost. Understanding and compassion DO NOT happen in a vacuum, especiallythe false vacuum you espouse when you say, "Wait until afterHigh School."

I also absolutely disagree with and takesupreme umbrage at this opening statement of yours,

>> "I have a different perspective on the role ofGay/lesbian support groups. I think too many of them are filled withactivists using schools as a social petrie dish. Children need to beprotected from the realities of this imperfect world.">> 

This is a purely homophobic comment that comes straight outof the church and societies first mantra...do not be different, donot be a blip on the screen.  You are imperfect and you are notworthy, you are different in a shameful way and it will not betolerated.  Oh would that it were so that children COULD beprotected from the realities in this imperfect world.   Bullpuckey, when then is it that a child is to learn that this is animperfect world and when then is it that he is to trained and giventhe tools to participate and survive in "this imperfect world." Pity the poor soul (and I mean their Soul) that reaches the world asan adult after High School, and then having no tools, training orsurvival skills, has to navigate successfully through this taintedworld.  Do you propose, perhaps, an extra year after High Schoolwhen we break the news to them..."Oh, by the way, we didn't givethe whole story to you; now that you are out of High School we needto tell you the world is imperfect, not nice, terrifying and justsimply doesn't give a tinker's damn about you as an individual. All you queers, trannies and lesbians are not accepted and you areprobably in a group that has one of the highest suicide rates and youwill live in stultifying fear for the rest of your life as a resultof simply who you are.  TJF, I come from your training programand I am, thankfully, a two-time suicide survivor.  I know manyjust like me and I know more that did not fail in their suicideattempts brought about by fear, lack of understanding, lack ofcompassion, lack of love, browbeating, beatings, and most of all aninability to reach that awareness that they were loved and wereworthy of love and that this had to start with them loving themselvesFIRST and ABOVE ALL, BEFORE ALL!  This path is more correctlybegun early on as one is discovering those things about themselvesthat society and the church may condemn and heap shame upon.  Itis here in those tender, immensely expressive, exploratory andprovocative years of the formation of their sexual drive and identitythat they need to begin to understand the pain of the real world andgiven the tools of love and compassion for all in order meet theonslaught of your "imperfect world."  The foremosttools for survival in this uncaring and imperfect world areacceptance and love of oneself, which lead to acceptance and love ofothers, whomever they may be and a well developed sense of compassionfor all, (this is true Christ Consciousness) and forgiveness. These are the only tools that can stand against the onslaught of hateand aggression that those of us graced with difference have at ourdisposal.  It is with these tools that those of us who aregraced with difference will ultimately move the world away fromhate.   These tools are very contagious.  These arethe tools I have had to learn to use, I could have learned them in Jror High School if there had been a single caring individual who wouldhave been willing to mentor me from their heart at that age. Instead you demean it and fill it with the hate of the church anddetermine that these are breeding grounds promulgated by people whohave an agenda to create more of us.  I am WHO I AM!  Ihave always been so.  No person could have influenced me tobecome transgendered I was simply created this way by the Creator andFirst Source of all life and spirit.

Lastly, you say you are ateacher.  This scare the hell out of me.  I don't want thisto be an ad hominem attack of you; but, I find your inability orunwillingness to use proper punctuation a bit boring and gets in theway of my belief that you are a teacher, at least with any realtraining... perhaps it is just a lazy style of writing that you havedeveloped for situations such as this.  In any case, for me, itdiminishes your argument a great deal.

All of us, youincluded, and the hate makers whoever they are or will be, I believeare only asking for a safe place to simply be...to be free to expressour core self, the self that is the self of our soul.  I thinkyou sense this and in your own way you are trying to do this. In that I applaud you, I just think the sooner one understands thedifficulties the sooner one is capable of coping and surviving andmoving forward.

A'AI ka Hula, Waiho Ka Hilahila, I Ka Hale
("Live with passion,EMBRACE CHANGE, Do not fear it" )

BRIGHT BLESSINGS,

Amanda

I have a different perspective on the role of Gay/lesbian support groups. I think too many of them are filled with activists using schools as a social petrie dish. Children need to be protected from the realities of this imperfect world. There are people out there who will hate you for no good reason and they will do you harm. Thats reality and we as educators and parents have a sacred responsibility to make this clear to kids who may wish to shout out to the world or their school that they are gay and proud.

Plus these kids have other worries to think about for their future. For adults to advise them to "come out" because its "who they are" says that the societies views are paramount rather than their own. Is it not possible for lawrence or any other kid to just be himself without making a grand statement or worse approaching kids who are known to hate him in a condescending or flirtatious way? Reality is that not only is lawrence a kid unable to fully realise the ramifications of his actions but so is the kid who murdered him.  You want to build his self esteem show him he is loved and special, but dont ask him to conduct social experiments with obviously maladjusted kids.

If you look at the case history of the killer you will see that he was tormented as well, inside and out by family and friends.

As a teacher myself here in Korea, I go out of my way to defend the kids who are tormented by others. Human nature or even animal instinct is to sense weakness and exploit it, I know, I have bullied and been bullied. We suffer from inferiority complexes so when we see people inferior to us in some way we pounce. Some kids have bad parents, others bad friends, role models etc. life isnt fair. Our job as parents and teachers is to comfort kids who are struggling and guide them through their schooling to see themselves as we and God sees them. But we must advise against them taking silly risks with their safety. Kids who are still trying to find themselves can react differently to a seemingly innocuous gesture, but some will rspond violently to what they consider a threat, to their reputation their pride their esteem or their honor . We need to help students make it through school safely and I believe that expecting kids to come out of the closet and shout it from the rooftops is putting their safety in danger. That is the reality in an imperfect world.

We can blame the churches, the politicians, the teachers and parents but the solution is for now to avoid provocation until the child is old enough and mature enough to live their lives as openly gay men and women. Wait until they are out of high school!