Andrew Van Baarsen cringes when he hears those hateful words so many gay teens dread.
Sometimes they are directed at him, sometimes they are just part of the everyday conversations between students that fill the halls of his school, and many others like it. In either case, the affect is the same.
“Every day, you hear the word ‘fag’ tossed around, or ‘gay’,” Van Baarsen says. “People use these words, and they really don’t get the implications.”
For many gay students, the flippant and derogatory use of those words reinforces the belief that there is something wrong with being homosexual, he explains, and leaves them feeling ostracized and alone.
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Van Baarsen, a Grade 12 student at Thomas Haney secondary in Maple Ridge, came out as gay three years ago.
He is one of a couple dozen students at Thomas Haney who make up the Fruit Salad Organization. The group is a place of refuge for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender students, as well as their “straight allies.”
Today the group will be participating in Pink Shirt Day anti-bullying campaign and encouraging fellow students to stop using hateful language, and stop the bullying of gay teens.
Bullying is a way of life for many gay teens, explains Fruit Salad member Nathan Knowles, as he found out first hand.
When one of his friends posted on Facebook about gay rights, Knowles commented to show his support. That sparked an angry tirade of abuse from an older relative of the friend.
“Here’s this 47-year-old adult telling me that he hopes I get AIDS and calling me a fag,” said Knowles. “Why do I deserve to get some disease that would most likely kill me because I’m willing to stand up for kids who don’t have a voice of their own?”
The abuse many gay teens suffer is beyond mere bullying, says Knowles.
“We’re talking about people getting picked on for who they are, for something they have no control over,” he says, likening it to racism.
Unlike homosexuality, homophobia is a choice, Van Baarsen stresses.
“No one is born homophobic,” he says. “Someone has taught them that. Someone has taught them to hate.”
For many gay teens, growing up means pretending to be someone they aren’t. It means changing the way they talk and how they act and how they dress, so they don’t attract attention.
It’s about survival, says Van Baarsen, and the abuse can come from all corners, including one’s own family.
While Van Baarsen and Knowles’ parents were both supportive of them coming out as gay, many other teens in their position aren’t so lucky.
Earlier this year, Van Baarsen was approached by a Grade 9 student at another school who came out to him as gay, and asked him for his advice.
“Given his situation, I told him it was safer for him to stay in the closet until he’s done school,” he says. “It sucks I have to tell someone that, but he was safer that way.”
For some, the bullying can be so destructive, that it leads to suicide.
Van Baarsen admits he had suicidal thoughts when he was younger and struggling to come to grips with his own sexuality.
“You think there must be something wrong with you,” he says.
And the bullying just reinforces that belief.
According to the University of Toronto’s Centre for Addiction and Mental Health, close to a third of all lesbian, gay, and bisexual youth will contemplate or attempt suicide, compared to just seven per cent of all Canadian youth.
In all, close to 600 youth between age 10 and 24 die by suicide every year in Canada.
“Kids are dying,” says Van Baarsen. “But some people just block that out.”
Kathryn Ferguson is an English teacher at Thomas Haney, and founded the group last year. Ferguson said she watched one of her best friends get bullied mercilessly in high school for his perceived homosexuality, and wanted to offer gay teens at Thomas Haney a safe haven and a chance to advocate to make life better.
“There’s safety in numbers,” she says. “Here they can be who they are and feel comfortable and safe.
“These kids are incredibly brave, I’m super proud of them.”
Earlier this school year, the Fruit Salad Organization collected more than 200 signatures for its Lemon Pledge, where students at the school pledged to be tolerant and accepting of all their fellow students, regardless of sexuality or gender.
This week, the Fruit Salad Organization, along with similar groups from Samuel Robertson Technical and Maple Ridge secondary schools, are encouraging Maple Ridge-Pitt Meadows-School District trustees to adopt a policy to help protect gay teens at local school schools.
Knowles says that specific policies have already been adopted by more than 15 districts across the province.
The Fruit Salad Organization is currently circulating a petition at the school supporting the proposed policy, and hope to bring hundreds of student signatures to the school board’s meeting Wednesday.
“There’s more and more people standing up and saying they support us,” says Knowles.
Van Baarsen, for one, says the group efforts have helped to improve the culture at the school by helping students realize gay teens are people too, and deserve respect.
“It’s definitely better, especially with younger students,” he says. “Not so much in the community.”
Fruit Salad member Leah Bedford says that for the bullying of gay teens to stop, everyone has to do their part.
“If you see someone being bullied, stand up, do the right thing, and say, ‘Stop, this is wrong’,” Bedford says.
Unfortunately, the stigma of being gay is so great, that it discourages many to intervene.
“There’s a worry someone might question their sexual identity,” says Knowles. “And people don’t want to put the energy into dealing with the problem, that would mean they’d have to look at their own behaviour.”
Ferguson hopes to see a day when the Fruit Salad Organization isn’t necessary, when the question of one’s sexual identity is irrelevant.
“It takes a strong person to do what’s right, as opposed to what’s popular,” she says. “But our numbers are growing ... and that makes it a little more difficult for bullies.”
Visit pinkshirtday.ca for more information about Pink Shirt Day.