Image courtesy of LGBT Pink Panther Movement
Jokes are supposed to be funny. They always start with a set up and then build to a crescendo where the plot twists and the listener bursts out laughing. Last week a “joke” went viral, but no one was left laughing.
The “joke” was a piece titled “PARENTS PUT 16 YEAR OLD DAUGHTER UP FOR ADOPTION AFTER LEARNING SHE IS GAY”. It came from a site called “The Memoirs of DEACON Tyson Bowers III”, and had previous iterations on the Daily Bleach and Christwire. The site it came from had other “credible” material such as KENTUCKY MAN SUES MOTHER FOR NOT ABORTING HIM, DANGERS OF PRIDE WEEK, STUDY: LESBIANS MORE LIKELY TO EAT FISH, AFRICAN AMERICAN SCIENTIST INVENT SYNTHETIC WATERMELON and GAYS BUILDING SECRET PENILE SHAPED RESORT ISLAND.
The piece was written as humor…satire… but none of the 72,000 who shared it took it that way. They believed it to be real.
Who could blame them? The article described the mindset of a homophobic couple from “Southern Carolina” who upon learning their daughter was “gay”, sought to put her up for adoption. Those who believed the story did so because even though it was fake, the mindset itself is painfully and horrifically real.
The story sped through Facebook and pages posted it, in most cases temporarily, only to take it down again with the apology that they had fallen for the hoax.
The most heart wrenching thing to observe were the sweet souls who were willing to step up to help. Numerous people sought more information because they actively were looking to adopt the abandoned teen in question.
Here is some news for them, and for those of you who cared about the 16 year old girl in the fake story. She exists. The story was bogus, the situation was a lie, but she is the truth. She is 16 and 15 and 14. She is male, she is female and she is transgender. Her parents did not try to adopt her out… they simply kicked her out, and slammed the door behind her. “She” is our homeless lgbt youth. She not only exists, she makes up to 40% of the total of all homeless teens, even though lgbt teens make up only 3% of the total population.
Writer Cathy Kristofferson researched and wrote an important piece in which she paints an accurate and urgent portrait of the LGBT homeless teen. Of the disproportionate rate she states, “Simple. Youth who come out to their parents are rejected by those parents at a rate of 50%, with 26% immediately thrown out of the house to become instantly homeless and many following soon after as a result of the physical and verbal abuse that ensues after their declaration. Empowered by the gains in equality and acceptance with the heightened visibility the adult gay community has welcomed of late, youth are emboldened to come out at ever-younger ages while still reliant on parents who are a flip of the coin away from rejecting them. Simple factors of 4 tell the story of parental rejection and its effect on queer youth homelessness:
- 2 out of 4 will be rejected by their parents when they come out
- 1 out of 4 will be kicked out by their parents when they come out
- 3 out of 4 homeless queer youth will say parent objections to their orientation led to their homelessness
Youth homelessness is bad enough on its own but being queer further compounds the difficulties. Devastating statistics like 62% of queer homeless youth attempt suicide only begin to tell the story of the additional hardship endured when compared with their heterosexual counterparts. Queer youth experiencing homelessness are:
- 3 times more likely to commit suicide, and 8 times more likely due to parental rejection
- 3 times more likely to turn to prostitution and survival sex
- 6 times higher incidents of mental health and substance abuse issues
- 7 times more likely to experience sexual violence at a much higher risk of victimization by rape, robbery and assault “
So, yes. There was an article passed around the other day, and thousands were rightly outraged and cared. The article was a fraud, bur your feelings and mine were not. We need to not focus on the tomfoolery of the internet and focus instead on the WHY, the reason behind our feelings.
The WHY is that there are real kids out there that need not only our indignation, but our action. Last Christmas, I suggested reaching out to them in the spirit of the season. Now I am suggesting it in the spirit of what is right.
If you wanted to adopt the 16 year old in the story, find the real her and adopt her. If you wanted to send money, start a program, get involved, please do it. If you felt passion around it, please channel that passion into action.
If we don’t, then the unreal story becomes real. It becomes an allegory for the progressive community who chose to adopt out its youth in need. We are better than that. Let’s not have the next viral story be ours.
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Hi great reading yourr blog
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Thank you for writing this.It makes me very sad to see and here about this, but One thing I hae noticed Is there Is a lot of out cry to help which I’m all for but not a lot of information on how to do so. In this article you say adopt or take in homeless “queer” Youth which I am more than willing to do. but how do I do that? I don’t live in a big city so there’s not a lot of groups or anything or any in the area . I will try to start one but that’s not as easy as it sounds So i was thinking if i have this problem i bet i’m not the only one. SO does any one have suggestions on what to do and how? I have one but I don’t know if it would truly work what if we designed (or used something already designed) that shows that a house is a safe house for “queer teens) or even adults then bombard every where we know with this information and do our best to make sure the people that need to know do. I know this idea is not perfect and can be miss-used and abused but so can just about any program and it seems to me to be better than not being able to do anything. plz let me know your thoughts and ideas on this.
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I find it so heartbreaking that parents actually treat their children that way. Parents are supposed to their children unconditionally. Even if they don’t necessarily agree with their children’s lifestyle, regarding sexual orientation, they should still support them because they love them. A person’s sexual orientation is not a switch…you can’t just flip it on and off at will. People need to realize that, and get over it. No child should ever be thrown out or rejected by his/her parents just because of sexual orientation. That’s sickening.
Oops, mistake in second sentence. Parents are supposed to *love* their children…
❤
I’ve been supporting the homeless youth shelter in Denver. They average sixty kids a night. I can’t imagine the horror of being a homeless teen so I give them money and clothes.
It’s almost always hard to come out to parents, but while you are under their roof, it can be dangerous. Thank you for this post.
Although I detest the word “queer”, I found this article to be very well written and informative. Thanks for sharing your views.
I understand your detestment, but the current queer youth movement is trying (and in my opinion succeeded) to retake this word to empower ourselves. making light into darkness is what were all about, right?
*Making darkness into light* is what I meant. Oops 🙂
wow i read this and as i was reading it i started to cry just thinking about all those young ppl who are too afriad to come out to their parents and family & friends its hard enough already having these feelings inside u let alone not have someone to talk to who understands u its so sad it took me 46 years to come out and i’m not all out yet only to some close friends and a few family member thank god my parents r dead now or i dont know if i would have come out at all but iv’e lived my whole life as a lie never really happy trying to find love in all the wrong places and wrong ppl , i just talk to my 13 year old neice who just came out to her mom 2 months ago i told my neice I LOVE her just how she is she is beautiful she told me titi i’m bi i like girls but i like boys too is that ok , i say yes sweety it is ok u love who ur gonna love let it b male or female it doesnt matter as long as u will be happy im glad that today we do have a lot more LGBT group that help young ppl talk and express them self it really does help so thank you all for being here for the LGBT community god bless us all ❤
If this was a hoax, who put it out. Did someone also steal the logo from this Facebook site?
Reblogged this on db mcneill – Momsomniac.
Reblogged this on tolerantpeople and commented:
While this sotry that I also wrote about was supposed to be satire, for those of us who have struggled with family and society all know that this wasn’t too far from the truth. In fact, for many LGBT youth this is a REALITY. A horrific and life altering reality. So even though it is fake, it has brought attention to a serious issue – and really, isn’t that what satire is supposed to do?
*story 🙂
Thank you for writing this. It brought people to our BLOG to read Cathy’s article which had been written a few months ago. So the attention back to the real from your exposure here was important. Maybe a little bit of good came out of the hoax….. but as a victim of a serious hoax myself, I can say they are very dangerous.