I think we need to bring back leading strings, as some people clearly should never be let off them to inflict their cruel stupidity on the rest of the world. Kid just wanted some damn privacy. Is that so hard these days? I hope the two offenders live long, long lives thinking about Tyler and his family.
This is so completely awful. I've been emailing Dan Savage's It Gets Better Project to people this past week. And as I email it to people, more stories keep coming about a gay teen in Texas, in California, in Iowa, in Michigan. I know these are all incidentals and it's probably the same stats as before last week, but you know what? No one should be subject to this kind of bull shit.
Totally breaks your heart, doesn't it? The poor kid...his poor family. But just today I was teaching a subject that touched on homosexuality (among fictional characters) and I was really surprised by how much homophobia there was among my students. And I mean homoPHOBIA -- not hate so much as ignorance, creep-outedness, etc. I tried telling a funny story and it fell flat with about 1/3 of the class. How can this still be?
Very heartbreaking indeed. AM i saw Dan Savage's project too. Great idea and I do hope it helps a lot of young people. Too late for this poor guy thou. I hope there's a special spot in hell for the assholes who did this.
You know, I have to give my students at Inner City Community College some props----they are a very open minded bunch. When issues of GLBT come up in my class (which they do on occassion--especially in my Composition class) I am always heartened by the way the new generation seems to be much more aware and accepting of each other's sexual differences. Maybe that is what comes from living so close to the edge (as many of them do). Or maybe it is somethng in the water.
My students are very tolerant. They tolerate, with slight pity, the poor dear homosexual who can't help it and probably had bad parents. I look more or less straight, so they really don't know who they are talking to. I try to find the teachable moments in there, but it's depressing as hell.
Like Bella, I have to give my students some props too. Even though I teach in America's Heartland, in a subject not known for cultural sensitivity, my students at Midwestern Miracle University support gay rights, including gay marriage and ending DADT. They may want everyone convicting of jaywalking to get the death penalty, but they want their marijuana and don't care who's loving who.
Although the story itself is sad and horrible, I'm also upset at the news coverage that is claiming that this is all because of social media and if we just didn't have facebook or twitter this wouldn't happen.
Seriously? No. This is because students are cruel and horrible to one another. If you think they are assholes to us, you should see who they are to each other. I went to college 10 years ago, and even then I thought things would be "better" than high school, and that truly I had never suffered so much sexual and emotional harassment in my entire life (I include up till now--I'm not just comparing this to K-12).
Furthermore a lot of it was university-accepted. The local humor rag encouraged students to build snow cows and moo at women as they walked past--they did. A student organization was actually formed to keep women from earning their "MRS" degrees, and to keep ugly chicks from "getting laid." These were sanctioned activities.
Homosexuals, of course, have it worse. I can't tell you how many times my friends complained about treatment only to find out it was "all in good fun" and "not to worry about it."
Does social media make it easier to be jerks? Well, sure. But that's not the issue. The problem is that the student that mouths off to the professor is also spewing hate around campus everywhere they go. It's not limited to sororities and fraternities (heck, at least at my undergrad institution I found out far far too late that they were in many cases MORE accepting of difference than the jerks in the dorms). Unless we stop sanctioning bullying on campus then we won't stop having sad sad things like this happen. Unless we melt the flakes nothing will ever change!
His body was found.
ReplyDeleteI think we need to bring back leading strings, as some people clearly should never be let off them to inflict their cruel stupidity on the rest of the world. Kid just wanted some damn privacy. Is that so hard these days? I hope the two offenders live long, long lives thinking about Tyler and his family.
This is so completely awful. I've been emailing Dan Savage's It Gets Better Project to people this past week. And as I email it to people, more stories keep coming about a gay teen in Texas, in California, in Iowa, in Michigan. I know these are all incidentals and it's probably the same stats as before last week, but you know what? No one should be subject to this kind of bull shit.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.youtube.com/user/itgetsbetterproject
Totally breaks your heart, doesn't it? The poor kid...his poor family. But just today I was teaching a subject that touched on homosexuality (among fictional characters) and I was really surprised by how much homophobia there was among my students. And I mean homoPHOBIA -- not hate so much as ignorance, creep-outedness, etc. I tried telling a funny story and it fell flat with about 1/3 of the class. How can this still be?
ReplyDeleteVery heartbreaking indeed. AM i saw Dan Savage's project too. Great idea and I do hope it helps a lot of young people. Too late for this poor guy thou. I hope there's a special spot in hell for the assholes who did this.
ReplyDeleteYou know, I have to give my students at Inner City Community College some props----they are a very open minded bunch. When issues of GLBT come up in my class (which they do on occassion--especially in my Composition class) I am always heartened by the way the new generation seems to be much more aware and accepting of each other's sexual differences. Maybe that is what comes from living so close to the edge (as many of them do). Or maybe it is somethng in the water.
ReplyDeleteMy students are very tolerant. They tolerate, with slight pity, the poor dear homosexual who can't help it and probably had bad parents. I look more or less straight, so they really don't know who they are talking to. I try to find the teachable moments in there, but it's depressing as hell.
ReplyDeleteLike Bella, I have to give my students some props too. Even though I teach in America's Heartland, in a subject not known for cultural sensitivity, my students at Midwestern Miracle University support gay rights, including gay marriage and ending DADT. They may want everyone convicting of jaywalking to get the death penalty, but they want their marijuana and don't care who's loving who.
ReplyDeleteAlthough the story itself is sad and horrible, I'm also upset at the news coverage that is claiming that this is all because of social media and if we just didn't have facebook or twitter this wouldn't happen.
ReplyDeleteSeriously? No. This is because students are cruel and horrible to one another. If you think they are assholes to us, you should see who they are to each other. I went to college 10 years ago, and even then I thought things would be "better" than high school, and that truly I had never suffered so much sexual and emotional harassment in my entire life (I include up till now--I'm not just comparing this to K-12).
Furthermore a lot of it was university-accepted. The local humor rag encouraged students to build snow cows and moo at women as they walked past--they did. A student organization was actually formed to keep women from earning their "MRS" degrees, and to keep ugly chicks from "getting laid." These were sanctioned activities.
Homosexuals, of course, have it worse. I can't tell you how many times my friends complained about treatment only to find out it was "all in good fun" and "not to worry about it."
Does social media make it easier to be jerks? Well, sure. But that's not the issue. The problem is that the student that mouths off to the professor is also spewing hate around campus everywhere they go. It's not limited to sororities and fraternities (heck, at least at my undergrad institution I found out far far too late that they were in many cases MORE accepting of difference than the jerks in the dorms). Unless we stop sanctioning bullying on campus then we won't stop having sad sad things like this happen. Unless we melt the flakes nothing will ever change!