I was reading an article on
gay bashing in high schools, and had a flashback so hard it was nuts. It felt so much like a panic attack, but there was nothing to panic about.
I took an anxiety pill anyway, and allowed the memory back. In short, there was a point in middle school where just about every boy in 6th and/or 7th grade decided I was fair game for what I can only describe as "rude construction worker" - as in, even construction workers don't yell out your name and lift up their shirts and prance at you. They'd chant my name, sometimes in unison, and try to get my attention. It wasn't so much premeditated as flash-mobby. I had no idea what they were on about, so I'd look at them and then away, and go about my business. It was impossible to ignore, but at the same time I knew from my time being bullied, and, well,
being a bully, that getting bent out shape or complaining wasn't going to do anything. There were certain teachers who's classrooms they wouldn't dare try it in or around, but the good ones can't be everywhere.
It would happen in the halls, or recess, or at lunch, but one day it happened in the gym, during PE. We'd all changed into our shorts and tshirts. The boys were in the bleachers, stacked up to be ready to go outside. The girls were getting stacked up in the bleachers on the other side of the gym, to be ready for whatever we were going to do inside the gym.
When I came out of the changing room there was a deafening roar. Every damned one of those boys went fucking nuts. Technically they all stayed seated in the bleacher area, but it was like some crazy burlesque, all of them clamoring for attention. I stared at them, puzzled for a few seconds, then shook my head and went to the bleachers.
I don't remember what my feelings were at the time. I've blocked so much of my life out, and I'd really rather it stayed blocked, thanks. But one thing I remember now, and that's where the RAGE came from. The Coach. He just fucking stood there and smiled his amusement. I don't remember what the girls were doing. I think some of them were laughing at the spectacle at the boys and not necessarily at me. (I'm sure some of them were, but what else was new?) I knew the girls' coach didn't care - she hated my family, so I deserved whatever I got.
But the coach. Goddammit. It might have been all of a minute. But it's stayed with me, apparently. The article mentions kids who had all the home support they could ask for, and still tried to (and sometimes did) kill themselves.
I do feel a little like the one girl who made it through. She's not the happy trippy kid she was. There's a shell that I recognize, and that I try to project myself. I know, goddamn, I know.
Slime like Barb Anderson* are in the midst of their own gay-panic. Panic that takei will be "normal". Panic that their perceived control over America will be over once takei take over. Panic that people like her will be a minority, and they know exactly how minorities are treated and don't want to be in that position. So instead of fighting for the rights of minorities, Slime like Barb Anderson and her PALs are fighting to keep the "abnormals" in their place, because dog knows you don't want to fall down from such a high perch.
Trouble is, you can't keep people down without staying down there with them.
________________________________
*Oh, yes, I will call you slime, for thinking you can just force everyone to conform to your twisted version of the bible. I will call you slime for lying about what it is to be gay. I will call you slime for even implying that ANYONE deserves to be bullied. I'm already laughing at you composing an email telling me you're "hurt" and "offended" by me. That you feel "bullied". You don't know from bullied. It's what people with power do to people without power, who have no recourse but to take it. All you have to do is close the browser window.
