Jamey Rodemeyer’s suicide has been weighing on my mind a lot. I'm sure his death has been weighing on the minds of many people. And now we have learned that even though Jamey is dead and gone, the bullies who went after him in life are still bullying him in death.
Recently we’ve seen a great outpouring of sympathy for a murderer of a gay boy. Like Jamey, Larry King was bullied for years before he was killed, and he was portrayed as the aggressor in court and in the media when his killer was put on trial simply because he refused to conform to his bullies’ concept of masculinity and he dared stand up to them. Many seem to think that we should let his killer off the hook. They claim he was just a kid and his brain wasn’t fully formed or something. So even though we hold kids accountable for smoking dope, even though we chap their asses if we catch them smoking dope--which seems like a youthful indiscretion to me--killing someone, especially a gay boy, seems to be an excusable offence.
We have Christianists using nefarious means to get the LGBT education act repealed out here in California. We have Christianists claiming that effective anti-bullying programs that address homophobic bullying are a means to recruit and indoctrinate kids into the “gay lifestyle.” We have seen a mother punished for daring to get on board a school bus to tell bullies to leave her son alone.
So what are we to do? They are literally killing our kids, and they’re preventing us from defending them in a nonviolent way. Hopefully things will get better. Hopefully society will change. And I believe it is changing. But obviously it’s not changing fast enough for kids like Jamey. What about them? Are we to allow them to continue to be slaughtered as we wait for gradual and peaceful change?
Many of the kids like Jamey are targeted specifically because they don’t fight back. They aren’t passive by conviction, they are passive by nature. I think this is a beautiful thing. These unexpectedly delicate boys can bring out the best in humanity. They teach us that it is possible to live in this world peacefully. Many want to protect them and champion them. But others see their passivity as a weakness and an opportunity. Rough boys go after the passive ones, and they hound them, make their lives miserable. And although many are careful not to come right out and praise bullying, these rough boys have their champions as well. In the minds of many, bullies are preserving the idea that traditionally masculine, heterosexual men are superior to non heterosexual men and women. And it is unlikely that they’re going to yield to attempts to curb bullying or any school-sponsored denunciation of homophobia.
That leaves boys like Jamey and Larry vulnerable. If we’re going to make school a dog eat dog environment, if we’re going to let teenagers off the hook for cruelty and even murder, then it seems to me that the bullied boys should at least be told that they have just as much license to inflict mental and bodily harm as those who torment them. But it’s not likely that they’ll utilize this license because, as I’ve already pointed out, they are by nature passive. And if one did snap and blow away a young thug, somehow I doubt they would be given a pass or garner as much sympathy as those who target them.
So it seems that we, those of us who were once bullied like Jamey but somehow survived, are left in an impossible situation. Our hands are tied behind our backs as we watch our heirs suffering and dying. We wait in sorrow for our society to recognize our worth and to decide to protect and nurture us when we’re young. We wait for those who claim the mantle of righteousness to rise to the level of their victims. We wait for parents, school teachers, ministers and politicians to let go of their prejudices and stand up against bullying rather than subtly and not so subtly encouraging it. We wait, but some of us are growing weary of waiting.
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