American Dream My Ass

Public settings can be traumatic for many LGBT individuals, as there is no safe way to be sure that where you are going is hate-free. There were many places I have had to avoid when walking my dog in my own neighborhood for fear of my own safety. I can't recall how many times neighboring kids/teens followed me/yelled hateful slurs at me simply because I walked past them. However, for so many LGBT young adults, they face severe discrimination and hatred in their own homes in addition to the outside world.

Heterosexual Privilege #5: I will not be kicked out of my own home due to my sexual orientation.

This is not to say that heterosexual teens are not kicked out of their households, indeed they are. However, being non-heterosexual drastically increases the likelihood that teens will face discrimination in their own households. Unlike households of families who are racial minorities and can talk to their children about discrimination based on race, so many LGBT young adults/children do not have LGBT parents they can look up to/confide in when they are experiencing inordinate amounts of stress from the discrimination and hatred they experience in school/in their neighborhoods based on their sexual orientation. LGBT youth often feel quite alone in their struggles, as their family units, with whom they are expected to turn to in times of trouble, show absolutely no sympathy for their struggles. In fact, mere disclosure of one's non-heterosexual orientation is far too often seen as a burden for other family members, as they must "deal with" with fact that their sibling/child/other family member is "different".

 So many parents feel so uncomfortable with a departure from a 1950's image of the Cleaver family that they ultimately disown their LGBT children instead of working on their own prejudices/hatred. So many of these people cannot deal with their own discomfort in discussing sexuality in general that they instead choose to stop loving their children (or perhaps these parents were never even fully human enough to love them in the first place, as one could argue).

It's difficult to estimate what proportion of homeless youth identify as LGBT, but the few studies that actually address this issue reveal rates of 11-35% (which is enormous, considering the small percentage of LGBT youth in this country). As these adolescents are turned out onto the streets with immensely limited opportunity for financial gain (given that many of them don't even have high school diplomas), they often turn to prostitution, drug use, and drug dealing to actually survive. Moral elitists often argue that these "choices" are never acceptable, but I would wager that those who make those privileged arguments were never disowned by their parents at age 13. It is difficult to  land a job when you don't have a place to shower or clean clothes to wear to your job interview. What choice do you have when you are forced to sleep in a park?

Ultimately, the high rates of LGBT homeless youth further oppress non-heterosexuals as a group, as being disowned at a young age essentially prevents you from getting an education, thus blockading you from entering a career with social power (such as a judge, doctor, business owner, etc.). Preventing LGBT youth from getting an education keeps them out of the realm of public policy/law/scientific research (because apparently you must have $40,000 in order to prove that you're "smart enough" to go to college), which perpetuates heteronormativity in fields that wield social power to create change. Yes, we must all do our part to change society, but a supreme court justice unfortunately has more social power than a sex worker.

Due to the "American Dream" (or nightmare, as I like to call it), we all think we have an equal opportunity to change the world/make a fortune/do whatever the fuck we want to do. We don't. Period. If you disagree, please explain how a wealthy white straight boy with family connections ino every high-paying field has a more difficult time making ends meet than a homeless lesbian latina. I'm serious-- try and explain it to me, because I don't understand the logic. In our society, we tend to hate the poor. We love to blame individuals in this country, because it prevents any real social change (i.e., effort on our part) from occuring. If someone is poor, we say that they should work harder.

Tell me, how can this make sense when in 2005 the average compensation for CEO's of the 350 largest public companies  9.2 million (which often evades taxation, as these are compensations and not official salaries)? If these CEO's happen to be making more than you, is it because they are working harder? I'd like to see what kind of hard work they are doing to earn that much, because so many people in this country perform back-breaking labor to live below the poverty level (or less than a dollar a day, in many places across the world).

Anyway, I digress. To close, I would like to show this image of Pope Benedict sporting major bling, while preaching about living like the poor.

G'night folks!

-Harvs