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being GAY.
- Thread starter RyanH
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I'm sorry about your friend, but I also agree that pressures should be self removed... whenever something causes you that much internal conflict then it it is time to either get help or stop caring about the world around you for a second and care for yourself. We have a guy in our circle of friends (RL) that tried to take 30 darvocets one night for the same reason, but his mother found him and dialled 911 and thankfully he was fine (minor liver damage)... he told us he was afraid to come out about being gay and said he didn't really know he was gay, per se, until a few years back... I simply told him that the rest of us had it figured out long before that and that he shouldn't allow the views of the rest of the world make it so painful for him to not even confide in friends.
there are different types of pressure none really different from the other. a teen in school who does not fit in or is teased. a person in gym who is chosen last for a team, a gay youth not realizing or intouch with what is going on inside ones body. we all go through something.
I never had hangups with being gay nor do I now. I am by all people eyes a very straight acting person who is very successful and full of confidence. when people got to know me they accepted me for who I really am not what I appear to be.
suicide is an easy way out for many. it sucks but I can't think of anybody and they would be lying if they said no who has not for 1 second thought about it. could be personal issues, money issues, love issues whatever. to act on it takes no offense a weak person as they leave others to suffer more.
I am lucky as my family knows and accepts me for the person I am there son and there brother. my cousins, aunts and uncles the same. however had they or someone else not accepted me that by all means its there loss. you see nobody even the folks whom brought you into this world controls you the person. that can be only you. I live by how I react and by my decisions I make every day.
if everybody was nice to everybody else and accepted the fact that each of us has a purpose and a reason for being here and in the end only god or whomever you believe in will decide your faith. Ryan I am truly sorry for the loss but life is what you make of it.
peace
I never had hangups with being gay nor do I now. I am by all people eyes a very straight acting person who is very successful and full of confidence. when people got to know me they accepted me for who I really am not what I appear to be.
suicide is an easy way out for many. it sucks but I can't think of anybody and they would be lying if they said no who has not for 1 second thought about it. could be personal issues, money issues, love issues whatever. to act on it takes no offense a weak person as they leave others to suffer more.
I am lucky as my family knows and accepts me for the person I am there son and there brother. my cousins, aunts and uncles the same. however had they or someone else not accepted me that by all means its there loss. you see nobody even the folks whom brought you into this world controls you the person. that can be only you. I live by how I react and by my decisions I make every day.
if everybody was nice to everybody else and accepted the fact that each of us has a purpose and a reason for being here and in the end only god or whomever you believe in will decide your faith. Ryan I am truly sorry for the loss but life is what you make of it.
peace
musclebrains
New member
I don't think stereotyping accounts for the disportionately high rate of suicide among young gay people...and I know that's not the main point of your post, but it's not a helpful polemic to launch in my opinion.
Young gay people kill themselves for a simple reason: They don't know how to handle the very real hatred with which the way they love is met by the dominant culture. To be deprived of freedom and encouragement to love is to be told, as you say, that the very thing that most enlivens life and shapes us in the most positive ways is not our "right" -- that our love is evil.
No, I don't think straight people by and large have a clue what the experience of such blind hatred is like, and I don't think they ever will. While many straight people are exceptions to this, I don't think homosexuality is every going to be integrated into the dominant culture's orthodoxy as more than a tolerated peculiarity, no matter how much gay people try to appear like everyone else. It will always be the fate of every gay young person to decide whether to live cynically, destructively or lovingly in a culture that mainly declares him an oddity.
To me, this is a gift. To create love for youself in a culture that officially despises your way of loving, to cultivate wit to disarm the brutal stupidity of moralism, to live with the deaths of friends (because of such suicides, because of AIDS) and not give up living, to learn to make meaning out of difference instead of the homogenized fantasy of assimilated values -- all of that matures the soul and it's the reason so many gay people end up as humanitarian and religious leaders.
Young gay people kill themselves for a simple reason: They don't know how to handle the very real hatred with which the way they love is met by the dominant culture. To be deprived of freedom and encouragement to love is to be told, as you say, that the very thing that most enlivens life and shapes us in the most positive ways is not our "right" -- that our love is evil.
No, I don't think straight people by and large have a clue what the experience of such blind hatred is like, and I don't think they ever will. While many straight people are exceptions to this, I don't think homosexuality is every going to be integrated into the dominant culture's orthodoxy as more than a tolerated peculiarity, no matter how much gay people try to appear like everyone else. It will always be the fate of every gay young person to decide whether to live cynically, destructively or lovingly in a culture that mainly declares him an oddity.
To me, this is a gift. To create love for youself in a culture that officially despises your way of loving, to cultivate wit to disarm the brutal stupidity of moralism, to live with the deaths of friends (because of such suicides, because of AIDS) and not give up living, to learn to make meaning out of difference instead of the homogenized fantasy of assimilated values -- all of that matures the soul and it's the reason so many gay people end up as humanitarian and religious leaders.
C
Code
Guest
No doubt about it, being gay must be hard. Job interviews, traffic violations and other slightly confrontational situations.
But remember, people live where they choose to live. Even the poorest Americans have the option of moving to areas of higher prosperity and/or wider acceptance.
But I do agree, it's not easy to be different especially in rural areas. Psychologists, social workers and friends (even onlines ones) could/should be looked to for support.
But remember, people live where they choose to live. Even the poorest Americans have the option of moving to areas of higher prosperity and/or wider acceptance.
But I do agree, it's not easy to be different especially in rural areas. Psychologists, social workers and friends (even onlines ones) could/should be looked to for support.
RyanH
New member
flexed1 said:
I see your point, and I too, am very lucky to have cool parents. But, what troubles me is that I think alot of gaymen are out of touch with other gay men----until Tom's death, I never really thought about how isolating it must be for some people with circumstances different from ours.
Again, if you throw into the equation: being disowned by your family, living in a rural area with few friends you can relate to---that must change the view. The obvious solution is to change your view. But many don't know how.
The question is how do you reach those people? Who is their voice?
musclebrains
New member
the idea that someone should remove the pressures from his life in order to evade suicide assumes that the person in a suicidal state is rational -- which he is not.
I'm sorry to break the news to you, but in states of utter despair, the obliteration of suicide is welcomed as an end to pain that has become unbearable. By the time one reaches such a state, one is not rational -- and when everyone, including your own parents, tells you that you are in fact despicable, you move to the decision to annihilate yourself much more quickly than someone with ordinary depression.
Telling people who are in the utter black hole of hatred because of their love that they are "weak" simply denies them what they need -- love -- and hastens their death.
I'm sorry to break the news to you, but in states of utter despair, the obliteration of suicide is welcomed as an end to pain that has become unbearable. By the time one reaches such a state, one is not rational -- and when everyone, including your own parents, tells you that you are in fact despicable, you move to the decision to annihilate yourself much more quickly than someone with ordinary depression.
Telling people who are in the utter black hole of hatred because of their love that they are "weak" simply denies them what they need -- love -- and hastens their death.
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