Newsweek Cover: Young, Gay, And Murdered In Junior High! (homophobicly bias article)

This article greatly bothered me. As a gay male I felt as though it had to be thick with spin. It almost sympathizes with the murderer who was "pushed to it" because he was "bullied" because the 15 year old flaunted his sexuality.

They even question if the was really gay or just wanted attention because he was only 15. I can tell you now that I knew I was gay in 4th grade, and told my parents in 7th grade. I never flaunted it, and am not a flamboyant person, but I KNEW.

It talks of his sexuality as if he flaunted it because he was so feminine but NEVER ONCE stopped to ask if he was transgendred or had Gender Idenity Disorder. I did a documentary on these subjects at UNCG and also did a final research project on Gender Identity Disorder in youth. It does happen.

I felt like the article was borderline homophobic for turing Ms. Epstien into the villian all because she dared to tell Larry that he had the right to express his sexuality and shouldn't be ashamed of being gay. What a monster she was, yet it tells the side of those who think she is to blame for his death because if she had made him go back into the closet then Brandon wouldn't have had to kill him.

The fact that Newsweek, a magazine that is supossed to be unbiased, wrote this article... I am very disappointed. I'm not the only one either. My best friend read this article before I did and agrees with all of this.

The reality is that Larry was probably transgendered and needing to express that. He probably had a legit crush on Brandon, and my friend and I pointed out that he probably DID have sexual relations with Brandon... something he claimed and Brandon denied. It lines up with the sexual relations I had when I was in middle school with homophobic boys who were in the closet and terrified others would find out. It makes sense in reality yet the article, which wont even come out and fully support his claim that he was gay, flat out jumps to the conclusion that of COURSE Larry was lying about doing anything with Brandon as well.

Please read this article, and if you feel compelled, please write a letter to Newsweek. What should have happened is that this school SHOULD have tried to protect Larry by emphasizing tolerance, and should have had some system in place (like most of the schools I've been in) to make sure that guns weren't being brought into the classroom.

http://www.newsweek.com/id/147790/page/1

I like that, it is the same thing

He probably just wanted someone/boyfriend, like the rest of the people, sometimes younger gay people have no place to go to meet other gay people.

:hi: :hug: :hug:

murder is that it's a classic case of bullying and sexual harassment with little school intervention. The school needed to intervene and have professionals teach appropriate behavior and official ways to intervene in conflict. I don't believe that Larry coming out in middle school or wearing heels was the problem as the article implies. The conflict was because the school did not teach conflict resolution and acceptance.

I don't see why people in the real world are not outraged by this newsweek article. And if this boy DOES get off because of propaganda like this ... it'll be AWFUL. :(


The fact that one of his friends would make fun at Larry's memorial service and say "that's so gay" AT THE MEMORIAL SERVICE goes to show that nothing has been learned and the town has turned Larry into the villian and Brandon into the guy that did what they all secretly knew had to be done.

I saw a person on a youtube memorial video for Larry saying that being proud of being gay was like being proud of having AIDS. That homosexuality was a disease. That homosexuals made him SICK. He was defending Brandon for shooting this boy and thinking of BRANDON as the maryter. It's awful, how is this being spun that way? A 15 year old was terrified and then shot right in front of his teacher and a class room of students!

Who's to say that it wouldn't have happened outside the school?

Until gay people can serve openly in the military, marry in every state, rent apartments, adopt children or visit loved ones in the hospital without institutionalized hassles and do everything else that other American citizens can do, the problem is with society in general.

BTW, Oxnard is a mostly impoverished town, with a large Hispanic and African-American population and is located next to a huge Naval base, right smack dab in a very, very white and affluent county. The very same county that has the Ronald Reagan Library and Simi Valley, the city that hosted the trial for the cops who beat Rodney King.

that teach tolerance. I also think that all need to understand sexual harassment and where the lines are drawn. You can show interest in someone without crossing the line to harassment. Brandon may have not known how to handle unwanted attention and the school should have procedures in place to handle inappropriate behavior whether it's a gay, bi, or straight attraction so that all feel protected.

I had no idea about this location. Thanks for the info.

...what a school may teach is dependent on what the school board allows.

I'm sure you've seen what the GOP has crammed into the public schools lately: creationism, abstinence-only and every other anti-logic brand of religious dogma.

I fear it may be a while before all the school districts are purged of the American Taliban and finally permitted to teach real tolerance.

even after his murder, they tried to push the reason for the murder--and the fact that it was a hate crime--under the carpet, as if the kid's gayness was something too shameful to be addressed even in death.

The school had ample opportunity to deal with this in a productive, adult way; it chose the worst option every time.

what a load of shit that article was. I am very angry about it.

and black people are asking to be lynched if they don't dress in pink polo shirts? In reality, of course not, but in the reasoning of this article SURE! This article is outragous and if this was said about any other social group no one would stand for it.

Thank you so much for your anger. I appreciate it because I have felt stunned by reading this article. I want people to know how outrageous this is!

They allow comments, I suggest everyone let them know what a poor job they did at "reporting" this story.

Teachers put up these pretend plans for "anti-bully" programs and talk about tolerance and all the rest of that crap...because they are simply covering their asses for the eventual wrongful death lawsuits. In fact, teachers don't really give a damn who dies in school, as long as they don't get personally blamed.

Why did you gay people ever think teachers would protect you? You seriously bought into their lies? Exactly how credulous are you? Would you be interested in kissing these colorfully-painted and absolutely safe toys, imported by Wal-Mart from China?

Hopefully my students aren't reading DU, as that would just make it harder to let me know if they need help with anything.

He probably knew how hopeless they were.

Yes, there are bad teachers, but there are also great ones. Ones who try their best, sometimes risking their jobs, to protect students from anti gay or anti any other harassment.

I don't think I've ever seen blaming the victim (and the lesbian school administrator who treated him well- they both got more ink than the kid with the gun) taken to such an epic extreme. I'm fucking LIVID.

"But despite all the attention and outrage, the reason Larry died isn't as clear-cut as many people think."

Oh really? A little homophobic shithead, obsessed with HITLER, walks up to a kid and fires two shots point blank into his skull.

What the FUCK is not "clear cut" about that, mediawhore asshole? :grr:

....how many articles get written by the media about kids shooting other kids and we've got to hear some spin explaining "mitigating factors". It seems that unless we give a murderer some sort of excuse, there's no "juice" to the story.

:mad:

I am kicking this back up again, because I am STILL angry over it and reading these responses helps.

If we make a big enough stink about this maybe newsweek will publish a retraction.

One teacher complains that by being openly gay and discussing her girlfriend (presumably, no one would have complained if she had talked about a husband), Epstein brought the subject of sex into school.

Oh, please.

We probably aren't at the point yet that gay administrators or teachers can openly discuss their home lives and partners like their hetero colleagues. Unfortunately. But this is over the top.

I'm a middle school teacher. I GUARANTEE YOU: it is not the admins who bring the "subject of sex" to school. I cannot imagine anyone who has spent any significant amount of time with many people that age, who actually remembers their own adolescence, that would think that.

I worked for a lesbian principal in the 80s. She wasn't officially "out," although it was known and accepted by any who knew her, and her partner came to staff parties as her "room mate."

We walked carefully, as we were in a conservative area, and we wanted to protect her professionally.

The gay men I taught with were NEVER out.

As far as the students go, we've got an even longer way to go to promote tolerance among the student body. I will say that we intervene in any cases of "stalking" and sexual harassment, and we get a few each year.

Were they afraid to intervene with this boy, in either direction, because of his differences?

Was he really "stalking," or "harassing," or was he just doing like the rest, trying desperately to establish a sexual identity with his peers and deal with attraction, just like every other adolescent?

Was some of it "acting out" because of other issues in his life? Maybe.

Were the adults so uncomfortable with him that they didn't do as much as they could have to prevent such a situation? Maybe.

I wonder about the shooter; apparently, he also had a dysfunctional family. Who dropped the ball making sure that he didn't have access to that gun, that he couldn't bring it on campus?

How did you know in 4th grade? I remember in 4th grade having a crush on Superman (George Reeves guy) and drawing a pic of he and I to make another little girl jealous. When I was older I cut out photos of models and taped them to my closet (yes, closet, heh, heh) because I wanted to be pretty someday without my buck teeth, warts, etc. My housemother (grew up in religous boarding school) got mad and tore them off. I couldn't understand the reaction until I got a little older and thought maybe they thought I liked girls. We were always being preached at how God destoyred Sodom and Gomorra because the guys liked guys.

because homoeroticism is completely taboo. If you are a 10 year old boy and you want to wear feminine clothes, paint your nails, you get crushes on boys, and you fantasize about growing up and marrying a boy, chances are you already know you're queer.

With girls it is far more confusing. If you want to wear masculine clothes you're a tomboy, maybe even considered "smart and serious". The tomboy transformation movie, where the heroine realizes her "womanhood" and eventually comes down the spiral staircase in a princess gown is a cinematic staple. In Victorian England, girls were expected to engage in "Romantic Friendships". It was considered completely normal to fall in love with another young girl, kiss, stare longingly into one another's eyes and pledge devotion. It was practice for marriage.

For that reason, middle-class women aren't considered "real and permanent" lesbians by the heterosexual world until they're out of the teen years (which now ends with college graduation.) Working class women who don't get to go to college, on the other hand, are considered dykes pretty quickly in life, however.

I remember my mom telling me that when I turned 12 I shouldn't climb trees anymore. I was a tomboy that's for sure.

When I was in the 4th grade I had a hella big crush on this boy named Nick. He was actually in the 3rd grade, but him and I were the same age because I had been skipped ahead a grade. I hung out with him, and became friends with him, and got him to spend the night at my house. Then I set up "games" for us to play (wink wink) that ended up with us fooling around. It was a great memory actually and we slept in the same sleeping back together in the floor doing what I now know is "spooning" but at the time had no idea, it was just sleeping in the same sleeping bag. BUT, he was straight, and I knew then he wasn't interested in me like that, and now I know what the words are for it. I knew I was different though. I had wanted to be a cheerleader. I had wanted to be Alice from Alice and Wonderland for halloween when I was 3. I used to dress up like the wicked witch and glinda from the wizard of oz when I was 5.

My dad spanked me in a grocery store once for walking like a girl. I also had a major crush on the boy from The Neverending Story movie Noah Hathaway. When I was in 5th grade I had wrote a invitation to him asking him to come to my b-day party. I told him how cute I thought he was and had my mom draw me a picture of him. My mother was terrified I was going to grow up to be gay, and since I knew I was different and knew she'd hate it I lied and told her I liked the Spice Girls because they were "hot".

I was shocked that when I told her in 7th grade, that I was gay... after she cried and everything... she hugged me and told me she loved me no matter what! We didn't tell my dad for a while after that, and he was VERY upset when he found out. But he has come around. Both of them are conservative southern baptists, but now they go with me to gay clubs when I perform there!!!! They support me and love me, and hope that I find a husband that makes me happy. They strongly support gay marriage and gay adoption.

But yes, I knew I was gay from a very early age. I found boys attractive. I found the things girls did to be the things I wanted to do. When I was 3 I had tea parties with my stuffed animals. We have pictures of my grandpa sitting at a table while I served him imaginary "tea". It was just what felt natural. I didn't know the words for it. I wasn't saying "i'm gay" in my head but I did know that I was different and that I liked boys and not girls. I just didn't know that liking boys and not girls had a techincal term. As soon as I heard the word gay, and what it was, I was like OH THAT'S what this is... and then I was like "thank goodness I'm not the only one." because I had worried that I WAS the only person who liked boys and not girls. It was scary to think I'd have to live my whole life like that. And boy did I wish I liked girls. I would have done anything, and tried so many stupid voodoo type remeedies to fix it. It never worked.

My mom used to tell me she was afraid I'd kill myself because I couldn't turn myself straight. I even prayed with a pastor and my youth minister Alex Kidd to turn me straight. And gave him what little porn I had managed to collect so he could burn it. It didn't work. Now I am at terms with it. Going to the North Carolina School of the Arts was a BIG help, because I was able to see at that point that there were not just SOME people like me but a LOT of people like me who didn't feel guilty for it, who were leading happy lives, and some of whom were VERY good looking.

In 6th grade (or maybe 7th) we had sex education. They mentioned, homosexuals very briefly. I raised my hand and asked how homosexuals had sex. Because I wanted to know, obviously that would be vital info to me. until then I'd always just fantasized about groping and kissing. The teacher told me that was something I should ask my parents. I did ask my dad, and he refused to tell me. I wasn't able to find out until much later via porn. Not the ideal situation. haha.

But like I said, now all is great, and I did know in 4th grade. I also had a crush on a boy called Scott at the time. He grew up to be gay as well. Sadly he was never out of the closet until after college, he apologized to me recently for being so mean to me about my crush on him and had apparently thought I was cute too but was too afraid of people finding out. We're friends now, all these years later even though he lives far away. And that rocks.

But thank you for asking. I think sometimes people wonder questions like that but never ask because they are afraid of seeming offensive and then they just assume that maybe I'm talking off my cuff about knowing I was gay in the 4th grade without having all the information. I don't find it offensive at all and I thank you for taking the time to ask. :)

-- David

"You need to nip "flaming" in the bud," "homo's recruit," etc., etc. It's amazing how many people can be so blinded by philosophical views about gays that have no place in the 21st century.

:(