Brought to you by the letter Q and whichever number you choose
Being a member of a minority is a very real fact for many people in our society. Although we live in a world that seems progressive it is not always the reality that some people see. Being an LGBTQ youth can be a harrowing experience depending on the support system you may or may not have. There has been a rise in the suicides by queer youth and this trend shows no signs of slowing down. Almost every week there is another story in the news about a young LGBTQ youth who was bullied and tried so hard to be stoic and persevere but was unable to find the strength to continue on when their day to day life was so hard.
The book "The Letter Q" is a collection of deeply personal essays that adult authors write to themselves as young people to let them know that the "It gets better" campaign is not just lip service but that if you do persevere and hold on that your life will get better. Each letter is like a tightly focused biography, where the writer
reveals an aspect of his or her self that speaks to the heart of what's
important to LGBT teens. With moving stories from contributors such as
Brian Selznick, Michael Cunningham, Amy Bloom, David Levithan, and
Rakesh Satyal, this is a book that should be available to every LGBT kid
coming of age today and fans of this stellar list of authors.
8 thoughts on “Brought to you by the letter Q and whichever number you choose”
This is something I will definatly read.
oops, I meant definitely.
I highly recommend anything that I would highly recommend!
Shouldn’t we be spending more time actually making things better instead of just hoping, a great number of people still hold very regressive and prejudiced philosophies, obviously education on these has failed to reach them, maybe in part because of the fact that teachers rarely ever touch on these issues in fear of being offensive to a certain party.
One would almost think that sexual orientation is the number one cause of being bullied in school.
But it isn’t.
According to the Toronto District School Board’s findings, sexual orientation is down on the list. Weight, appearance, grades (high and low), socio-economic status, and ethnicity are all more common reasons for being bullied than sexual orientation.
Yet you don’t hear this much.
You never heard calls for Hot Girl/Plain Girl Alliance clubs in Catholic schools, for instance, as you hear calls for Gay/Straight Alliance clubs. Athletic Guy/Fat Nerd Alliance clubs were never imposed upon Catholic schools, yet Gay/Straight Alliance clubs were.
I wonder why that is?
Joe I think you make some really good points. May I suggest that one of the reason’s that the alliance you suggest have not been created is that no one is brave enough or common sense enough to try to create them. I think also it may be that a lot of people are not willing to take the work that may be required to bridge those socio-economic, physical attributes gaps. Perhaps Joe, you could be the change you want to see?
Hello Affaan
I agree with you, we should be making change instead of just talking about it. However, social change is a slow moving thing. I am not sure we can blame the teachers entirely as they are governed by the board of education and also have to teach all youth of myriad background. I think a really positive sign of change is that this book is available and got published in the first place. Perhaps I can suggest that you try to be more vocal about these issues in your day to day life? If you see someone being bullied or something that you don’t agree with where someone is being minoritized, that you stand up for them. Major social change meets great resistance and the only thing you can do is be patient and be the change you want to see.
The whole gay/straight alliance in Catholic schools, sadly, has nothing to do with partnership between people of different sexual orientations. If you look closely into the issue, you will see that this is really the ministry of education trying to take a jab at catholic education. Its really depressing because at the end of the day its not the name that matters but instead the values of acceptance and love. Also I agree, I wish the more prominent forms of bullying like weight, ethnicity and grades would get more attention from media