New resources aimed at creating a "Best Practices" guide for suicide prevention among LGBT youth have been released this week by the Family Acceptance Project at San Francisco State University.

Over the past few years, media reports of suicide among LGBT youth has become increasingly more common. Communities, schools, colleges and youth service organizations have struggled to fill an urgent need in identifying at-risk youth, risk behaviors and intervention strategies to prevent suicide and suicidal behavior.

The new "Best Practices" resources include several studies and publications created by the Family Acceptance Project under the direction of Dr. Caitlin Ryan and are designed to help reduce vulnerability and risk among LGBT children, youth or adults.

The first of these resources – a multi-lingual, multi-cultural series of family education booklets – Supportive Families, Healthy Children: Helping Families Support their LGBT Children – have been designated as the first “Best Practice” resources for suicide prevention for LGBT youth and young adults by the national Best Practices Registry for Suicide Prevention.

“Our work is grounded in rigorous research and rooted in the cultural experiences and values of scores of diverse LGBT youth and families," said Dr. Caitlin Ryan, Director of the Family Acceptance Project. "So these family education booklets resonate for very diverse families and help them decrease rejecting behaviors which our research shows -- though motivated by care and concern – instead contribute to serious health risks for LGBT young people. For example, our research shows that common rejecting behaviors such as trying to prevent LGBT youth from learning about their identity, not allowing them to have gay friends or not letting them participate in an LGBT youth group are related to a 9-times greater likelihood of attempted suicide.”

In discussing the importance of FAP’s family education materials, Dr. Ann Haas, Director of Prevention Projects for the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention, noted: “For the past decade, Dr. Ryan and her team have undertaken foundational research on the role of families and related social institutions in contributing to protective factors and risk for suicidal behavior among LGBT young people. They have turned that research into powerful prevention tools for diverse families. Used in programs across the country, these tools will save lives.”

Supportive Families, Healthy Children is available for download on the FAP website at: http://familyproject.sfsu.edu/publications. Printed copies are available for distribution from the Family Acceptance Project in orders of any size. Lower literacy and faith-based versions are in development. FAP provides on-site training on using these materials and FAP’s research-based supportive family intervention model and other resources and tools. Contact [email protected] to obtain printed versions and for information on consultation and training.

Information on Supportive Families, Healthy Children’s “Best Practice” designation is available on the Best Practices Registry’s webpage hosted by the Suicide Prevention Resource Center at www.sprc.org.

WATCH THE EPISODE -

-

CLICK HERE

For more info, visit www.whitehouse.gov/itgetsbetter and www.itgetsbetterproject.com/blog/entry/president-obama-it-gets-better/

Last week, the Rutgers University student newspaper ran an editorial entitled "Media exploits university tragedy." The response nationwide was dramatic. Below is a well-composed comment by Bill Courson left on CampusPrideBlog.org about the editorial. We thought it was worth sharing in a post.

The editorial appearing in today's Daily Targum ("Media exploits university tragedy") is thinly concealed homophobia, from start to finish.

Immersed in heterosexual privilege, an editor or editorial staff such as this has no worthwhile guidance to offer on the subject of gay and lesbian issues; indeed, calling this editorial presumptious falls far, far short of the intensity of the offense given by it to gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered Rutgers students, faculty, and administration as well as the larger community.

The writers of this piece might be ignored, but better yet, castigated and called to account for their decerebrate impertinence in writing: "… The mistake was that Clementi's death should not have been turned into a lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender protest for gay rights and safe spaces at the University … Essentially, an angry mob fending for their rights turned the death of a young boy into a cause for "safe spaces" for gays across the University – all the while, these spaces already existed."

Self-evidently, this is untrue.

Self-evidently, to make such an assertion is ineffably stupid, and is redolent with the fetid ichor of "Focus on the Family."

HELP US SEND A CLEAR MESSAGE AGAINST LGBT HARASSMENT & HATE

Tell Rutgers University President Richard McCormick to take immediate action in the wake of this national tragedy and immediately expel both students in accordance with their own Student Code of Conduct for invasion of privacy.

If you're an Rutgers University Alumnus, please contact the campus online:
http://www.alumni.rutgers.edu/s/896/index.aspx?sid=896&gid=1&pgid=382

“Now is the time to act decisively and send a clear message at Rutgers and at colleges across the country that LGBT harassment and hate will not be tolerated any longer,” states Campus Pride noting it has now been two weeks since Clementi committed suicide.

(New Brunswick, NJ) Campus Pride, the nation’s leading non-profit organization working with lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender (LGBT) and ally college and university students, today called for Rutgers University to act decisively to expel both Dharun Ravi and Molly Wei for invasion of privacy of fellow student Tyler Clementi. Two weeks ago on Wednesday,September 22, Clementi jumped off the George Washington Bridge posting on his Facebook page, "jumping off the gw bridge sorry."

According to Campus Pride, the Rutgers University Code of Student Conduct prohibits "making or attempting to make an audio or video recording of any person(s) on University premises in bathrooms, showers, bedrooms, or other premises where there is an expectation of privacy with respect to nudity and/or sexual activity,without the knowledge and consent of all participants subject to such recordings."

“Ravi and Wei acted maliciously to secretly tape Tyler Clementi, even posting comments to encourage others to ‘video chat’ and watch. This is an egregious act of invasion of privacy. Both students should be expelled. Period,” said Shane Windmeyer, executive director and founder of Campus Pride. “This act was not simply a prank. It has been two weeks now and neither student has been expelled. Now is the time to act decisively and send a clear message at Rutgers and at colleges across the country that LGBT harassment and hate will not be tolerated any longer.”

Campus Pride’s “2010 State of Higher Education for LGBT People” released last month shows that LGBT incidents of harassment and discrimination are neither rare nor fleeting-- they are real. The national study indicates that one quarter (23%) of LGBQ staff, faculty,and students reported experiencing harassment. An even greater percentage of transgender students, faculty, & staff reported experiencing harassment (39%), often more overt and blatant on campus.

Since the death of Clementi, Campus Pride has received hundreds of emails and phone calls from concerned parents of LGBT youth who are asking for resources to determine safe, welcoming LGBT-friendly colleges and universities. While the national organization recognizes that it takes time for law officers to deal with the investigation surrounding the criminal charges and prosecuting to the full extent of the law, Rutgers University has a clear violation of its own student code of conduct to enforce for the safety and privacy of all students.

“Rutgers University has an obligation to the family of Tyler Clementi and to parents who have gay kids across the nation to enforce the student code of conduct,” said Windmeyer. "The nation is watching what happens.Rutgers should take immediate action in the wake of this national tragedy and immediately expel both students."

For more information about Campus Pride's "2010 State of Higher Education for LGBT People" report, visit www.campuspride.org/research.

“Now is the time to act decisively and send a clear message at Rutgers and at colleges across the country that LGBT harassment and hate will not be tolerated any longer,” states Campus Pride noting it has now been two weeks since Clementi committed suicide.

(New Brunswick, NJ) Campus Pride, the nation’s leading non-profit organization working with lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender (LGBT) and ally college and university students, today called for Rutgers University to act decisively to expel both Dharun Ravi and Molly Wei for invasion of privacy of fellow student Tyler Clementi. Two weeks ago on Wednesday, September 22, Clementi jumped off the George Washington Bridge posting on his Facebook page, "jumping off the gw bridge sorry."

According to Campus Pride, the Rutgers University Code of Student Conduct prohibits "making or attempting to make an audio or video recording of any person(s) on University premises in bathrooms, showers, bedrooms, or other premises where there is an expectation of privacy with respect to nudity and/or sexual activity, without the knowledge and consent of all participants subject to such recordings."

“Ravi and Wei acted maliciously to secretly tape Tyler Clementi, even posting comments to encourage others to ‘video chat’ and watch. This is an egregious act of invasion of privacy. Both students should be expelled. Period,” said Shane Windmeyer, executive director and founder of Campus Pride. “This act was not simply a prank. It has been two weeks now and neither student has been expelled. Now is the time to act decisively and send a clear message at Rutgers and at colleges across the country that LGBT harassment and hate will not be tolerated any longer.”

What can clearly be referred to as an epidemic, within only the past few weeks, a number of gay young men have taken their lives by all indications as a result of the unrelenting homophobic taunts, harassment, and attacks they had to endure by their peers: Seth Walsh, 13, hung himself from a tree outside his California home; Billy Lucas, 15, hung himself in Indiana; Asher Brown, 13, from Texas shot himself in the head; Tyler Clementi, 18, first-year student from Rutgers University took his life by jumping off the George Washington Bridge. And though we are not yet certain of the precipitating factors, now we hear of the tragic suicide of gay student, Raymond Chase, 19, from Johnson & Wales University in Rhode Island.

All this comes on the heels of the news from Michigan, where Assistant District Attorney, Andrew Shirvell, has been targeting University of Michigan's gay student-assembly president, Chris Armstrong, for the past six months with abusive and highly inflammatory epithets and images on his internet blog site. For example, Shirvell displayed a photo of a swastika placed over a gay-pride rainbow flag with an arrow pointing to Armstrong's face.

Also on the blog, Shirvell accused Armstrong of seducing "a previously conservative" student until he "morphed into a proponent of the radical homosexual agenda." He also has protested outside Armstrong's house, loudly shouting that Armstrong is "Satan's representative on the student assembly."

Read the rest of Shane Windmeyer's post at Bilerico.com...

Photo courtesy RawStory.com

The commentary below is written by Dr. Warren J. Blumenfeld, Associate Professor of Multicultural and International Curriculum Studies at Iowa State University. He is co-editor of "Readings for Diversity and Social Justice and Investigating Christian Privilege and Religious Oppression in the United States."

What can clearly be referred to as a continuing epidemic, within only the past few weeks, a number of gay young men have taken their lives by all indications as a result of the unrelenting homophobic taunts, harassment, and attacks they had to endure by their peers: Seth Walsh, 13, hung himself from a tree outside his California home; Billy Lucas, 15, hung himself in Indiana; Asher Brown, 13, from Texas shot himself in the head; Tyler Clementi, 18, first-year student from Rutgers University took his life by jumping off the George Washington Bridge. And though we are not yet certain of the precipitating factors, now we hear of the tragic suicide of gay student, Raymond Chase, 19, from Johnson & Wales University in Rhode Island.

Throughout the past week, I have attempted to monitor the media to determine any themes in the way they have represented these tragic incidents. For many of the news outlets, it appears they are portraying these events as some sort of new trend they have deftly unearthed.

In reality, however, the media and our society generally suffers from a collective memory loss. This issue has arisen numerous times over the decades, but then appears in the media from time to time as if it were a unique and previously unrecorded development.

Back in 1989, for example, the United States Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) issued its "Report on the Secretary's Task Force on Youth Suicide," which found that "A majority of suicide attempts by homosexuals occur during their youth, and gay youth are 2 to 3 times more likely to attempt suicide than other young people. They may comprise up to 30 percent of (the estimated 5,000) completed youth suicides annually.” [U. S. Department of Health and Human Services, "Gay Male and Lesbian Youth Suicide," by Paul Gibson, in Report of the Secretary's Task Force on Youth Suicide, ed. Marcia R. Feinleib, Washington, DC, January 1989.]

The report recommended that "mental health and youth service agencies can provide acceptance and support for young homosexuals, train their personnel on gay issues, and provide appropriate gay adult role models; schools can protect gay youth from abuse from their peers and provide accurate information about homosexuality in health curricula; families should accept their child and work toward educating themselves about the development and nature of homosexuality"

The causes for these suicides have also been known and documented for decades as well. For example, Kevin Berrill, Director of the Anti-Violence Project of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force at the time of the 1989 report’s release stated correctly pinpointed the societal impact: "The increased risk of suicide facing these youth is linked to growing up in a society that teaches them to hide and to hate themselves.”

Initially, however, the report was suppressed by the George Herbert Walker Bush administration under pressure from right-wing groups and by conservatives in Congress. After the findings, William Dannemeyer, who was at the time a conservative Republican member of the U.S. House of Representatives from California, called for then-president Bush to "dismiss from public service all persons still employed who concocted this homosexual pledge of allegiance and sealed the lid on these misjudgments for good." HHS Secretary Louis Sullivan wrote in a letter to Dannemeyer that the study "undermined the institution of the family." [Quoted in Chris Bull, "Suicidal Tendencies," The Advocate, April 5, 1994, p. 37.]

The findings of the report, however, were leaked to the press and finally released.

Other studies confirmed these findings. Gary Remafedi, Assistant Professor of Pediatrics, University of Minnesota, and author of Death by Denial: Studies of Attempted and Completed Suicide in Gay and Lesbian and Bisexual Youth, found in a 1991 study of 150 gay and lesbian youths in Minneapolis, more than 30% said they had attempted suicide at least once as a teenager.

“The youths who are at the greatest risk for suicide are the ones who are least likely to reveal their sexual orientation to anyone. Suicide may be a way of making sure that no one ever knows. It's homophobia that's killing these kids.” [Gary Remafedi, quoted in Bull, Chris, "Suicidal Tendencies," The Advocate, April 5, 1994, p. 38.]

Some media recently have labeled the high profile suicide of Tyler Clementi as a national “wake up call” to the problem of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender suicide.

Don’t blame me if I’m cynical, but didn’t we hear the same warning back in 1998 after the brutal homophobic murder of Matthew Shepard. Hundreds, maybe thousands of LGBT people have suffered vicious attacks, many ending in murder since 1998. Why then do the media not continually cover these incidents. If they did, our nation would not need a “wake up call.” We as a society might remain awake and vigilant.

I suspect in a week or so, even as the suicides and homophobic assaults continue, the media will move onto its next so-called “trend.” In a few years, maybe ten or so, they will issue yet another “wake up call” and (re)discover homophobia and its impact on the lives of our youth all over again.

Instead, we as a society must not depend on the media to alert us to the realities. As a society, we must take responsibility for the consequences for our inaction. More importantly, we must take responsibility for eliminating the stigma and the stereotyping of anyone and any group along the complete spectrum of human diversity.

Photo by DRB62, via Flickr, licensed under Creative Commons.

In the wake of two college suicides Tyler Clementi of Rutgers University& Raymond Chase of Johnson & Wales, Campus Pride reissues findings and recommendations from the "2010 State of Higher Education for LGBT People" released last week at a U.S. congressional briefing on Capitol Hill

(Providence, RI) Campus Pride, the nation’s leading non-profit organization working with lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender (LGBT) and ally college and university students, offers its condolences and support to the family of Raymond Chase who reportedly hung himself in his residence hall room this past Wednesday, September 29, 2010 on the campus of Johnson & Wales in Providence, RI.

“The loss of Raymond this week is the second college LGBT-related suicide in a week and the fifth teenage LGBT suicide in three weeks. The suicide of this openly gay young man is for reasons currently unknown; however, the recent pattern of LGBT youth suicides is cause for grave concern,” said Shane Windmeyer, executive director and founder of Campus Pride. “Campus Pride demands national action be taken to address youth bullying, harassment and the need for safety and inclusion for LGBT youth at colleges and universities across the country. We must not let these tragic deaths go unnoticed. Together we must act decisively to curb anti-LGBT bias incidents, harassment and acts of violence.”