I have been getting a lot of questions about why I am so involved lately, so I decided to share my story with all of you blog readers.

All of my involvement started when I was in eighth grade. I was very involved with a few organizations at my middle school, and one of the advisors selected me to go to a conference put on by the Anti-Defamation League. She also selected which workshops we were going to attend. One of the workshops I attended had to do with LGBTA issues. This was the first time I heard the word gay or anything of the sort.

The only activity that I remember that day was an activity called Count Your Losses. What we had to do was take index cards and then they told us what to write down on each. They were things like your best friend, your favorite place to hang out, down to you hopes and dreams for the future. The facilitator then went through a had coming out experience. Your friends do not support you, so you tear up that card and watch the pieces fall to the floor. One by one all of the cards were torn up. The story ended with the person you “were” being attacked and killed in a parking lot. So you then take the cards with your hopes and dreams for the future fall to the floor. I remember them talking about Matthew Shepard at one point.

I was really confused and bothered by this activity. I could not believe that people would have to go through this just because they liked someone who was outside of the norm. After sitting with this information for awhile, I finally figured out what I could do to get involved. By this point I was at the high school, so I joined the Gay-Straight Alliance (GSA). I started getting very involved. Come senior year, I was the co-president of the club.

Fraternities and sororities. Greek life. Thinking about this seems to make a lot of people in the LGBT community cringe. However, that is not the case for everyone, and hopefully it is becoming the case for less and less people. At my school, the last president of Interfraternity Council was openly gay. Part of his story can be found in the book BROTHERHOOD: Gay Life in College Fraternities. This book, put out by Lambda 10, which is a part of Campus Pride, is one of three Greek themed books that they have. The others are Out on Fraternity Row: Personal Accounts of Being Gay in a College Fraternity and Secret Sisters: Stories of Being Lesbian & Bisexual in a College Sorority. They are all filled with very interesting stores and can be found here.

Today, The National Day of Silence, has made me think about some recent events that unfortunately, should not have happened.

The first event that happened was brought to my attention through GLSEN. They reported that Carl Joseph Walker-Hoover hanged himself on April 6th. He was an 11-year-old, who did not identify as gay; however, he had to endure endless bullying including things about him being gay. His mother asked the school continually to deal with the problem, but it seems like nothing was done about it. Today would have been Carl’s 12th birthday, but unfortunately he could not take the bullying any more. It is absolutely horrible that he had to go through this, and at such a young age. This article can be found here.

Another incident that occurred recently was an attack at the University of Virginia. Five men attacked an UVa student and his friend. During the attack, the attackers yelled anti-gay slurs. Police believe it to be a “bias-motivated crime” with the motive being their perceived sexual orientation. According to the Associate Vie President and Dean of Students Allen W. Groves, “‘bias-motivated assaults’ are especially hurtful for students because there is no justification for the attack other than hatred.” This type of attack seemed fairly rare for this state, yet it is still very important to be aware that it is happening there, and it could happen anywhere. This article can be found here.