Confronting homophobia in Marin County and benefitting all.

Yesterday afternoon, I met with an administrator from the Marin county school system to talk about my "little brother's" experience with anti-gay harassment in high school. This happened when Jase was a junior in high school, by five or so members of the high school football team. The verbal bullying took place two years ago and lasted about 6 months.

At the time it happened, Jason asked his mom and me to stay out of the situation and let him deal with the boys involved. As difficult as his request was, we agreed to it as long as he was not being physically hurt or strongly emotionally-impacted by it. As I learned by editing one of his college essays, this verbal harassment stopped because he started laughing directly at, instead of fleeing from, these big bullies. (Jase is 6'2" and confident, and no shrinking violet.) Good for him, and we all deal with these situations in different ways.

So yesterday was my chance to talk openly with a school official about the situation since Jason has graduated. I am so happy to say it went well. The administrator was concerned to learn about the situation. Ironically, he told that one of his children had been chronically harassed at (a different) high school so he full of understanding and empathy about Jason's experience. He related that, coincidently, in June, he had a diversity sensitivity organization train the top officials in the schools he supervises. He also said he was going to revisit this situation with the principal of the school to make sure this situation didn't happen again. Lastly, he expressed his apologies and best wishes to Jason.

I feel a better now for having talked with the school district, so other LGBT kids can feel free to be themselves and don't have to face the same thing as Jase did. And this gave me a chance to rectify this wrong at the system level, while still respecting Jason's wishes. This conversation was not just the right thing to do, in some small way, it will benefit all students in the county, for none of us are free until all of us are.