A Safe Environment: No Hate Speech

Something very important in a happy healthy gay person is a comfortable environment.

Everyone should watch their language; you never know who will take offense at what you say, or be wounded.

If you are a conservative father, and you say the f word (the one pertaining to a gay person) constantly around your in-the-closet son, you are sending the message that gay people aren't welcome in your house, that they are mutants, abominations, devils. Obviously, this cannot be good for your son's mental health.

Percentages of suicide are much higher among GLBTQ teenagers. Can you guess why?

Home is where you should feel welcome. Family and friends are supposed to love you for who you are.

As soon as your friends start slinging "that's so gay" around, as soon as your mother gives you a lecture on how God hates gay people, as soon as everyone says "no homo" after everything they say, you crumble.

You are unwelcome where you thought you would always be welcomed.

You shelter that part of you, and, like a horrible fungus, it grows, and destroys you.

Don't be fooled by the purple prose. This is serious.

For the sake of everyone around you, please don't use words that could be potentially offensive or harmful to people.

Just, don't!

And, of course:

Stay happy.

:)