Anti-gay bullying shows tolerance education needed on all fronts

MONTGOMERY, Ala.PRNewswire-USNewswire--GHN News Editor --People may think the Southern Poverty Law Center
simply stands up for the rights of African Americans, but the
organization looks at injustice on all fronts, especially hate crimes,
including bullying of gays.           

The Southern Poverty Law Center's Teaching Tolerance project is targeting anti-gay bullying in a new documentary film – Bullied: A Student, a School and a Case that Made History – that will premiere in Washington, D.C., next Tuesday, Oct. 5.

The film, which offers lessons for students and educators on the
devastating effects of bullying, is available along with a teaching kit –
free of charge – to every school in the country.

"As we've seen very recently in the news, the effects of anti-gay bullying are devastating," said Maureen Costello,
director of Teaching Tolerance. "Unfortunately, thousands of incidents
like those that led to the recent spate of heartbreaking suicides are
happening in schools across the country every day. We hope this film
will help students gain a better understanding of these effects and,
along with their teachers, realize the necessity to act."

Bullied
tells the story of a student who stood up to his anti-gay tormentors
and filed a federal lawsuit against his school district. The suit led to
a landmark federal court decision holding that school officials could
be held accountable for not stopping the harassment and abuse of gay
students.

Despite that ruling, anti-gay bullying continues to be a severe, nationwide problem. In Massachusetts, for example, 11-year-old Carl Joseph Walker-Hoover hanged himself with an extension cord in 2009 after being bullied by classmates who perceived him as gay. In Indiana, another student hanged himself earlier this month after being subjected to anti-gay bullying. In the Anoka-Hennepin school district in Minnesota, at least four gay students have committed suicide in the past year alone.

Just recently there have been two high-profile cases in the news.

Bullying, underlines one publication, has no boundaries as an article details how a Rutgers student, 18-year-old Tyler Clementi,  lay in a black body bag at the end of the dock at the Columbia University boathouse, having jumped to his death because of bullying.

 A law blog
documents the accounts following Asher Brown's suicide.  Asher's mother
claims she made many phone calls and sent emails to school officials
about her son, Asher Brown's being bullied at school and that her
requests for help were not heeded.  She maintains she visited and called
the school, but that her calls went unanswered and her pleas ignored.
The school denies she made any attempt to get help for her son, Asher
Brown, age 13, who committed suicide following bullying incidents his
mother claims he could no longer tolerate.

Nearly
nine out of 10 LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender) students
experienced harassment in the past year – a rate three times higher than
students in general, according to a 2009 GLSEN survey. Lesbian, gay or
bisexual adolescents also are twice as likely to be depressed and think
about or attempt suicide as their heterosexual peers, according to
research cited by the government.

But
anti-gay bullying is not confined to students who are actually gay.
According to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and the
National Mental Health Association, anti-gay bullying is frequently
directed at straight students who are perceived as gay.

Bullied tells the story of Jamie Nabozny, who suffered relentless verbal and physical abuse at the hands of his classmates in Ashland, Wis. School officials failed to stop the attacks, despite pleas from Nabozny and his parents.

"Students
should never be afraid for their safety at school," said Nabozny, now
34. "This film offers hope to students who are being harassed and should
inspire educators to live up to their responsibility to stop the
bullying that is shattering lives."

SPLC urges school districts to adopt policies that specifically address
bullying based on sexual orientation or gender expression.

Bullied
is the seventh film produced by the SPLC's Teaching Tolerance program.
Four of the program's past documentaries have been nominated for Academy
Awards®, and two films – "A Time for Justice" and "Mighty Times: The
Children's March"– have won the Oscar® in the short documentary
category.