Depending on your view, the answer to that question might seem really obvious or very tricky and hazy.
This is a subject that's talked about all the time, however, when it is, there's often little to no clear definition about what healthy sexual development is. Many easy assumptions get made, and ideas about what's healthy for all people are often based in or around personal agendas, ideas and personal experiences of sexuality, rather than being based in broader viewpoints, truly informed and comprehensive ideas about all that human sexuality and development involves and real awareness of possible personal or cultural bias.
We think this question is very, very tricky and that the answers aren't at all obvious or easy: sexuality is incredibly complex, especially given its incredible diversity, not just among a global population, but even within any one person's lifetime. Our cultures also are often sexually unhealthy in many ways, and so ideas about healthy sexual development, deeply influenced by culture, are often flawed, incomplete or limited, and can sometimes present things as healthy which truly are not, but are so pervasive or so much a part of cultural frameworks that people assume they are or must be. So, what healthy sexual development is is hardly a simple question, nor a question we can answer casually or without a whole lot of deep thought and consideration, both ideally coming from multiple perspectives and kinds of expertise.
At a recent conference I was part of in London, Alan McKee presented a talk which included a piece published in the International Journal of Sexual Health (2010, 22(1), Healthy sexual development: a multidisciplinary framework for research, Alan McKee, Kath Albury, Michael Dunne, Sue Grieshaber, John Hartley, Catharine Lumby and Ben Mathews). As someone who's worked for many years in sexuality and sex education, and who worked in early child development for several years before that, I've heard "healthy sexual development" tossed around a lot, but have often felt dissatisfied with the way it was undefined or some of the things it has implied when people have used it. Often, critical pieces seem to be missing, personal agendas seem to be central and unrecognized, or the way it's defined hasn't been broadly inclusive, holistic or thoughtful.
What McKee and his colleagues determined to be the core parts of healthy sexual development had me jumping up and down in my seat with joy (literally: I may have disturbed my fellow attendees with my bouncing). It summed up the things we try to support, encourage and inform our users with and keep core at Scarleteen so well, and so much of what I think -- after many years of thinking hard about and working with these issues, and being fully and broadly immersed in them with a very diverse population -- truly is central to healthy sexual development.
Their work also makes it wonderfully clear that sex education and supporting healthy sexual development isn't just something that can or does happen in what we call sex education, but can -- and should! -- be present in and come from many different kinds of education, information and support. Not only do I think this list includes the key issues for the development of healthy sexuality for individuals, I think it's also an excellent framework for working towards cultures which are sexually healthier than most are and have been.
I'm delighted to have permission to excerpt and reprint this framework here. I believe the domains listed are benchmarks everyone can use whether we're providing sex education, parenting or mentoring, evaluating the health of our sexual interactions or relationships with others, or working on our own personal growth and well-being when it comes to our sexuality. I've included alternate ways of understanding the key points and also some links to get started with on our site in exploring ways of supporting these aspects of healthy sexuality at the end.
From the paper: "A consultative group was gathered consisting of seven Australian experts across a number of disciplines relating to children, development and sexuality. The group included a psychologist specialising in preventing child sexual abuse; an early childhood expert; a legal expert in children’s rights; a specialist in sexuality education; experts on sexual socialisation; and on the media’s impact on children’s development. The group commissioned literature reviews of the research on children’s sexuality across their disciplines; and worked together to develop a consensual definition of healthy sexual development that drew on the insights of their various disciplines."
"One key point emerged early in the discussions: this would be a holistic approach to healthy sexual development. In much of the literature in this area the sole concern is the prevention, diagnosis and treatment of child sexual abuse (see for example Haugaard & Emery, 1989; Lamb & Coakley, 1993; Ryan, 2000). The group agreed that preventing unwanted sexual encounters is a key element of healthy sexual element – but it is far from being sufficient for an understanding of the important elements in that development. There is more to healthy sexual development than simply preventing abuse. Important positive skills and understandings must be developed. We identified fifteen key domains which provide a multidisciplinary framework for understanding healthy sexual development:
Healthy sexual development takes place in a context in which children are protected from unwanted sexual activity (Haugaard & Emery, 1989; Sanderson, 2004). This is a fundamental point. Its complexity must also be acknowledged. Hence the second point is:
Healthy sexuality is not coercive (Wardle, 1998; Ryan, 2000; Chrisman & Couchenour, 2002; FPQ, 2006). And so children need to understand the nature and complexity of consent – not just their own, but also other people’s – in sexuality. They need to learn about the ethics of human relationships, and how to treat other people ethically.
In other words: Healthy sexual activity is only activity that is truly wanted by anyone and everyone directly involved in it. Consenting and acquiring consent, and the freedom to withhold or withdraw consent, always; knowing what consent really means and involves for everyone are key to healthy sexual development and to a healthy sexuality and sex life.
In healthy sexual development, children are provided with accurate information about how their bodies work. Research has shown that ‘[i]n the absence of adequate and systematic sex education, children invent their own explanations for biological and sexual processes often in the form of mythologies’ (Goldman & Goldman, 1982, p. 392).
In other words: This means things like accurate words for body parts, science and fact-based explanations of how bodies can or do function not just around sexual reproduction, but also around sex itself and the debunking of mythologies about bodies, sexuality and reproduction.
In healthy sexual development, children learn what is safe sexual practice. This is meant in the widest possible sense, including physical safety, safety from sexually transmitted diseases (Allen, 2005, p. 2), and safety to experiment.
In other words: It's vital to know about safer sex, preventing or reducing the risk of injury, illness and other harm, and how to explore sex and sexuality in ways which are known and shown as most likely to be physically and emotionally safe.
In healthy sexual development, children learn relationship skills more generally. This includes, but is not limited to, communication and assertiveness skills. Children learn to ask for what they want assertively in relationships generally. At an appropriate point this also includes sexual relationships (Impett et al, 2006).
In other words: Part of everyone's sexuality involves interpersonal relationships, whether that's about sexual relationships expressly, or any relationship in which someone's sexuality may be addressed. Learning what is and is not healthy in all relationships -- including family relationships, friendships, interactions with healthcare providers or people outside those spheres -- is a big part of learning what is healthy in sexual relationships.
Emerging from the previous point, in healthy sexual development children learn that they are in control of their own sexuality, and in control of who can take sexual pleasure from their bodies. They are confident in resisting peer pressure. They understand their rights. They learn to take responsibility for making their own decisions (SIECUS, 1995).
In other words: Sexual agency is about having and being afforded ownership of one's body and sexuality, not being externally controlled by others. This includes freedom from unwanted sexual activity and sexual coercion. Agency also means that we're the owners of our own actions and choices. With real agency, we are both held accountable and responsible for them and are allowed the liberty of having ownership for the choices we make.
Every researcher who has studied the healthy sexual development of children insists that children are naturally ‘curious’ about their bodies and about sex (Sanderson, 2004: 62). Studies over many decades have shown that they explore their bodies – including touching and sometimes masturbating their genitals – from birth (Levy, 1928; Ryan, 2000; Larsson & Svedin, 2002b); they ask questions about sex at the same time as they begin to ask questions about other aspects of society (Hattendorf, 1932; Larsson & Svedin, 2002); and they play ‘sex games’ like doctors and nurses with other children from an early age (Isaacs, 1933; Lamb & Coakley, 1993; Chrisman & Couchenour, 2002; Larsson & Svedin, 2002b; Sandnabba et al, 2003). Research has shown that this behaviour is not only normal, it is healthy and has no harmful effect on later sexual development (Kilpatrick, 1992; Greenwald & Leitenberg, 1989; Leitenberg et al, 1989; Okami et al, 1998; Larsson & Svedin, 2002b). Similarly, learning about sexuality does not stop at the point where (or if) sexual intercourse begins. Adults continue to learn about their sexuality throughout their lives, improving their knowledge of and attitudes towards their sex lives.
In other words: Being curious about sexuality and wanting to explore it needs to be understood and presented as healthy and acceptable. Exploring sexuality in healthy ways is also learning about sexuality, and that learning, and feeling open to always learn more, is part of our sexual well-being throughout all of life.
There is a necessary element of risk in all learning. This is also true of sexual learning (Chrisman & Couchenour, 2002, p. 3). In healthy development, children develop agency in order to facilitate resilience, so that bad sexual experiences are opportunities for learning rather than being destructive.
In other words: Sometimes sex can suck, doesn't meet our expectations or things happen to us or by us sexually which are painful or traumatic. In order to be as healthy as we can, we need resilience so that we can deal with and/or heal from disappointment, embarrassment, harm or trauma, rather than being unable to recover or move forward in our lives and sexualities.
Healthy sexual development requires open communication between adults and children, in both directions. As noted above, this means that children are provided with age-appropriate information about sex (SIECUS, 1995), and particularly that they are given honest answers to any questions they may ask (Chrisman & Couchenor, 2002). There is absolute agreement in the literature that this is important for preventing sexual abuse (Krafchick & Biringen, 2002, p. 59; Sanderson, 2004, p. 55), development of a healthy attitude towards their own bodies and sexuality (Chrisman & Couchenour, 2002, p. 14; Impett et al, 2005), and preventing unwanted pregnancies and STDs when they do become sexually active (Lindberg et al, 2008). On the other hand, in healthy situations, children feel comfortable in coming to adults with problems, concerns or issues they may have about their bodies or what is happening to them.
In other words: Healthy sexuality doesn't and can't often happen in a culture or environment of silence. Talking about sex and sexuality openly and honestly is part of developing healthy sexuality and healthy sexual development, both with peers and and with parents, guardians and other adults, and also part of reducing the risk of sexual harms or negative outcomes.
This is a key distinction between healthy and unhealthy sexual development. Healthy sexual development is ‘fun’, playful and lighthearted (Okami et al, 1998, p. 364). Unhealthy sexual development is aggressive, coercive or joyless (Sanderson, 2004: 79).
In other words: It's not healthy for anyone to be pushed into or away from sexual development: both should happen at a pace that's right for each individual. As well, ideally sexual development is something that others support as being okay, something people experiencing it can feel relaxed about and even have fun with and enjoy.
In healthy sexual development children are supported in developing a positive attitude towards their own sexual identity (Impett et al, 2006); and a ‘positive body self concept’ (Okami et al, 1998, p. 363).
In other words: Part of sexual well-being is accepting who we are, uniquely, and feeling accepted in who we are, even if and when our sexuality, sexual identity, embodiment or the ways we are sexual does not conform to someone else's ideas of what our sexualities should be or what our bodies should feel, look or function like.
Children learn to understand that it is acceptable for sexuality to be pleasurable in healthy development (SIECUS, 1995; WHO, 2002, p. 5). It is not shameful to enjoy it. It is a desirable outcome that when they become adults they will have to option of enjoying satisfying and high quality sexual relationships should they choose to do so (Okami et al, 1998, pp. 361, 365).
In other words: Sex isn't just about making babies, something people only do because someone else wants or expects them to or something to exchange in order to get something else. It's also about pleasure. In fact, when sex (of any kind, including masturbation) is truly wanted and consensual and when it occurs in healthy social contexts where everyone involved has agency, it's most often mostly about pleasure. Seeking or experiencing sexual pleasure isn't something to be ashamed of or embarrassed about: it can be a healthy, happy part of life.
In healthy development, children learn social and parental values around sexuality to enable them to make informed decisions about their own sexuality in relation to them. These vary greatly (WHO, 2006: 6). Research shows that parental values around sexuality range from extremely conservative to extremely liberal (Okami et al, 1998), and that judgments about what is appropriate sexual behaviour in children differ dramatically in different societies (Aries, 1962; Higonnet, 1998; Jenkins, 1998).
In other words: Whether we wind up agreeing with them or not, it's important we understand the values and ethics of our world and our closest communities, including those within our families. When we are aware of and understand those well, we can inform our choices with them and also work out what our own values are, whether they're the same or different from the values of our parents or our culture.
xiv. Awareness of public/private boundaries.
As a particular subset of values, children learn how the public/private distinction works in their culture as part of healthy sexual development. This allows them to manage their own privacy, understand public behaviour, and how to negotiate the boundaries between the two (Larsson & Svedin, 2002; Sanderson, 2004, p. 60).
In other words: A healthy sexuality involves boundaries, including boundaries between public and private expressions of sexuality, even though all people don't have the same boundaries. As well, how we present our sexuality and put it into action often is different when it's public and when it's private, both in our individual experiences and when it comes to how we are treated by others. To make sound choices about sexual behavior and expression, choices which include keeping ourselves and others safe, we need to be aware of the differences between what's public and what's private.
xv. Competence in mediated sexuality.
In healthy sexual development, children will develop skills in accessing, understanding, critiquing and creating mediated representations of sexuality in verbal, visual and performance media (Higonnet, 1998; Hartley & Lumby 2003; Buckingham & Bragg, 2004; Ward et al, 2006; Mazzarella & Pecora, 2007; Lafo, 2008).
In other words: Everyone knows that there is (as there always has been) sex and sexuality in all kinds of media. The media is a big presence in our world, especially over the last couple decades, so it's important that we learn how to make sense of and ask questions about what we see, hear or read in it so that we can have a sense of its impact on us and others and know the difference between what the media shows us and how it presents it and how different sexuality can be and often is in real life.
Want to find out about some of those key domains right here at Scarleteen? The following articles are some good places to get started:
I'm 19 and have been with my boyfriend (also 19) for a little over two years. In the last year, our relationship has progressed sexually (but both of us have decided not to have intercourse). A few months ago, he performed oral sex on me. I'd given him blowjobs before and he asked if he could reciprocate. Afterward, though, he was really quiet. I got the nerve to him about it. He admitted he didn't like it. A few months passed, and we decided to try it again, to see if his opinion changed at all. Again, he said it wasn't his cup of tea. We decided it was best not to discuss it anymore because it wasn't working out.
I appreciate he at least tried to make an effort to reciprocate, because he said he felt bad for taking more than he gave, and I know he feels really bad he doesn't like it. But at the same time, he still won't do it. It's frustrating for me because I loved the feeling of it and I haven't been fully satisfied with him just fingering me. How do I bring this up after like months without making it sound like I'm upset with him or guilting him into giving me oral sex again? Other than this, we have a very healthy relationship. I love him a lot and he loves me too.
I'm confused as to how a girl can be "good" in bed in a heterosexual relationship? What does it mean to be good at sex?
In hindsight, I knew when I was around ten or eleven that I was queer: that I had and was experiencing growing sexual and romantic feelings for people of all genders, not just those of one of for those of a different sex or gender than me, feelings I'd continue to have throughout my teen years and my adult life to date. I didn't have the language for it then, though, even though there were queer adults in my orbit I could have gotten it from, adults I naturally gravitated towards without realizing a big part of why was because I saw myself in them and I really needed them. Looking back, others identified my orientation before I did: a homophobic grandparent, an uncomfortable parent as well as a comfortable and readily accepting parent, and, most important to this particular tale, a group of teenage meanies in the blessedly brief time I spent in a suburban public high school in the 80's who sometimes whispered but other times yelled, "Dyke!" or "Lesbo!" as they passed me in the halls.
In that high school, I had a tiny but great handful of friends, all of us outcasts in one way or more: because we were queer, because we were punk, because we had less money, because we were just different and either showed it outright or couldn't pass as "normal." When any of us got harassed, we often had each other to blow off steam with, to find solidarity with, but we couldn't always be there for each other, and even when we could, that didn't make the harassment and bullying any less scary nor did it sting any less.
I remember a particular bunch of girls, junior cheerleaders, especially their nasty ringleader. Jill was the one who instigated most of the harassment, who'd walk by me the most often and bark homophobic slurs, who spread the most gossip about me, even though I'd never done anything to her, or even had any interaction with her at all outside her bullying that I could recall. Heck, I never even talked back when she harassed me: usually I simply scurried into the bathroom or a classroom, flew out unto the smoking lot trying to puff out my upset, or just pretended I didn't hear her and kept on walking. When my boyfriend violently and unexpectedly committed suicide, it was probably Jill who started a very deeply painful and fast-spreading rumor that I'd shot him myself because I was really a deranged, man-hating lesbian.
I'd made myself go to school the day after he died because I was worried I wouldn't be safe for myself home alone. As awful an environment as that school had been for me, I didn't anticipate that even after something so terrible had happened to me, I couldn't count on it to be safe for just one day, or that such a terrible tragedy would be seen by anyone as an opportunity to bully me more about my orientation, of all things. The suggestion that I'd done something so terrible to someone I loved so much, and was reeling so much over the loss of, to the point of being catatonic was beyond outrage; even knowing full well it wasn't true, even knowing the likely source knew nothing about me, it made something already so traumatic so, so much more painful. Maybe to Jill and those like her, any of this seemed harmless or minor or even funny, but it wasn't any of those things for me.
Luckily, I was able to get out of that school shortly thereafter. I switched to a small performing arts school in Chicago, where there were just as many queer kids as straight kids, where queer teachers were out, where I was in a safe community where sexual orientation and all kinds of other perceived weirdness was pretty much a total non-issue. A place where everyone was generally wonderful to each other, perhaps because so many of us had been treated so badly by others in other places before. That school, for so many of us, was our safe haven, and it was very much mine.
Around a year later, I was out with a bunch of friends, including a girl I really liked, at an all-ages club on the north side of Chicago. It wasn't a queer club specifically, but it was a place more meant for misfits of every variety than for girls like Jill; a place where it was also safe to be queer and out. I felt able to be who I was there, including being the girl who really liked this other girl and wanted to keep my lips attached to her face as much as was humanly possible.
So, when I was inside the club making out with my I-so-hope-she-becomes-my-girlfriend and I heard someone behind us squeal, "Oh my GAWD, it's that fucking dyke! I knew it! DYKE!" I was pretty surprised. When I turned around to see that it was Jill and her mall-haired gaggle of flying monkeys, I was even more surprised.
But perhaps the most surprising thing of all was that what she said didn't hurt, not even a little. It wasn't scary. It didn't make me feel small.
It was pathetic, really. It felt like merely a statement of fact, said in such a way that made her look like an idiot, and in a place where the only person who got outed was her: as a bully and a jerk. She was trying to announce to the world I was queer, which seemed a mighty silly thing to do when no one could announce it more than I already had with my lips and hands all over another girl in a public place. Not only did I not care if everyone in the club knew, I knew that what she'd telegraphed most was not how I didn't belong, but how she didn't; not how I wasn't okay, but how she wasn't; not how outnumbered I was, but how outnumbered she was. I wasn't in her space anymore: she was in mine. She hadn't made me unsafe or unwelcome: the only person she made unsafe and unwelcome in that moment and place was herself, made so by herself. I didn't feel embarrassed myself; even despite strongly disliking her, for a nanosecond, I actually felt embarrassed for her.
I grinned. My girlfriend and our friends grinned and then we just laughed. I gave Jill a thumbs up, and then the girl I was with decided she'd had enough of the unwanted interruption and pulled me right back to what we were previously doing, with Jill's continued whine of dykey-dyke-dyke waning like a car running out of gas and feeling more like a cheer for my home team than a jeer. Getting very well kissed while someone (someone who is NOT being kissed, thankyouverymuch) weakly calls you a dyke, The Smiths blaring in the background so you're thinking that in that moment, maybe even Morrissey is happy for once? It really takes the edge off.
It took a while for things to get better for me in a bigger way, but that was the first moment where I remember strongly and firmly feeling that it was going to get better, that it already had, and that it would keep getting better; that people like Jill were going to have less and less impact on and power over me and everyone else as time went on. You know, just writing about all of that brought sharply back how much it hurt: it's gotten better enough for me since then that without dredging it all up again, I earnestly forgot just how very painful it was. It getting better can not only make your present life a lot better, it can also make the times it wasn't better hurt a lot less and have a lot less impact. It gets harder to remember the bad stuff when the better stuff has been so great. And once it has gotten better, even when the jeers or the harassment or the bizarre accusations still happen, it gets a lot easier to brush off and a lot harder to let it get you down.
Admittedly, when it came to my orientation (as opposed to other areas of my life and person), I didn't have it as bad as some other kids I knew, certainly not as bad as most queer people in the many generations before me, and not as bad as plenty of young people today still have it. Not everyone has queer friends or friends at all, not everyone lives in or very near an urban area, not everyone is afforded an opportunity to find a school like I did, not everyone has at least one supportive parent, not everyone even knows one other queer person, and not everyone has even one place they can make out with -- or even hang out with -- someone of the same-sex or a similar-gender and feel or earnestly be safe.
It turns out that Dan Savage and I grew up in and around the same neighborhoods (and now live in the same far-flung state, how weird is that?). Dan, like I did, found that it got a lot better, and Dan, syndicated sex columnist and the editorial director of The Stranger, just started a new project, It Gets Better, to help support young people in knowing that it can get better, and for so many of us, has gotten better, something it can be so hard to know or believe sometimes. Like Dan, I really feel confident saying that for however bad it is now, the chances are extraordinarily good that it will get better.
Billy Lucas was just 15 when he hanged himself in a barn on his grandmother's property. He reportedly endured intense bullying at the hands of his classmates—classmates who called him a fag and told him to kill himself. His mother found his body....
I wish I could have talked to this kid for five minutes. I wish I could have told Billy that it gets better. I wish I could have told him that, however bad things were, however isolated and alone he was, it gets better.
But gay adults aren't allowed to talk to these kids. Schools and churches don't bring us in to talk to teenagers who are being bullied. Many of these kids have homophobic parents who believe that they can prevent their gay children from growing up to be gay—or from ever coming out—by depriving them of information, resources, and positive role models.
Why are we waiting for permission to talk to these kids? We have the ability to talk directly to them right now. We don't have to wait for permission to let them know that it gets better. We can reach these kids.
If you haven't taken a look at the videos in the project, you really should, whatever your age or orientation. They're powerful, positive and full of love, hope and all the other good stuff everyone needs. If you are queer and young, know that a lot of those powerful-sounding, happy people looked and felt a whole lot like you do once, and as much as it hurt like hell to get through it, they did it, and they want to do what they can to help you get through it, too. Dan took the time to answer some of my questions about the project this morning, and here's what he had to say:
Heather: In your own life, before it really did start to get better, did you have any cues or glimpses that it might get better you didn't recognize at the time?
Dan: It turns out there were gay people in family's orbit—priests, mostly, and a couple of waiters (my mom and dad ran a restaurant for a while)—but they weren't open about it front of us, "the children," because... well, you had to be discreet, right? Because then they would've been shoving it down our throats, etc., etc. And my parents believed, at the time, that they could protect us from becoming gay—me, the momma's boy, in particular—by keeping information about gay people, and gay role models, away from us. They were, as it turns out, pretty spectacularly wrong, huh?
The first clues I got that it wouldn't be so bad came when I was old enough to explore the city on my own. I grew up in Chicago and by the time I was 15, in 1979, I was riding my bike through the gay neighborhood, and I could see gay men and women. But this, of course, was back when gay neighborhoods were still pretty marginal, and most people who were gay were still closeted. So I wasn't seeing a representative sample of gay men and lesbians. I was seeing guys with huge mustaches on their way to the baths. And that wasn't what I wanted for myself. I remember thinking, "But this is all I can have," and being depressed.
Heather: I know I deeply benefitted by changing my community and my school, something I was lucky enough to be able to do. But I also was able to recognize that the problem WAS my community and my school, and not me or my orientation, something not everyone can recognize, especially without family or other supportive people around who are accepting of every orientation and sexual identity. For those who have really internalized every negative message around them, for whom positive messages don't seem real or are hard to hear, what can you offer?
Dan: Look around, look at the people who disprove the lies that you've internalized. Either they're crazy — all those openly gay, happy, successful people out there — or the people who told you being gay is a sin are crazy.
You know, I've always said that what saved was a little voice inside myself that kept saying, "You're fine, Dan, everybody else is fucked in their fucking heads." I don't know where that voice came from. Maybe my mom, maybe my dad, maybe even my Catholic education. I kept saying to myself, "Being gay hurts no one, so it can't be wrong. I don't want to kiss boys who don't want me to kiss them, so where is the harm in this? How can it be evil?"
Heather: Of the videos done for the project so far, which are your favorites?
Dan: Oh, my god. The one with the two guys who realize they're making a video for 15 year old boys and they need to think about what interests them. And suddenly there are really hot gay boys in the room dancing around in their underwear. The one made in SF with crowds of people chanting "IT GETS BETTER!" The one with a gay couple with a daughter named DJ. My son is named DJ. The rural lesbian farmer. The gay Muslim teenager. And on and on.
Heather: You're a writer, so video isn't usually the way you do your thing. Is there a reason you picked video as the medium for this project?
Dan: Yes, because I wanted to show them our lives. And kids use YouTube and understand social media. I wanted adults to talk to them about their lives, to share pictures, to look into their eyes and say, "It gets better."
Heather: I do agree that it usually does get better over time, often a lot better. But in the meantime, what do you suggest for young people trying to cope with the fact that it's not better yet, or where it feels like it's going to take an awfully long time for things to get better, or like they never might?
Dan: You know, if you're in an impossible situation—violently homophobic parents, small town, anti-gay peers — don't kick down the closet door and wind up on the streets. Wait it out. Find the stuff you enjoy, for me it was reading and theater, and pursue that, your interests, while your straight peers are pursuing each other. Instead of bemoaning what your life is like at 15, start laying the groundwork for the life you could have just a few years later at 18.
Leave the house, get involved with something, anything, that you find rewarding. It might be working in a foodbank. A lot of gay kids excel at non-team sports: biking, tennis, swimming. Whatever it is, go and do that. You'll be healthier for it and you just might meet some other gay kids.
Heather: How can young people act in their own interest to MAKE it better, both queer young people, but also young, straight allies? What about older LGBTQ people for whom it is now better: how can all of us best help young people for whom it's not better yet?
Dan: If you're going to a public school, form a GSA. If you're discriminated against, reach out to the ACLU for help. They do amazing work with and on behalf of LGBT teenagers. You have rights. Look around your school for straight allies and friends. If there isn't a community for you at your school, try to make one. If your school environment is so hostile that you can't make one, go find one outside of school.
And if you're being bullied at school and at home and at church, and in despair, reach out to the Trevor Project for help and support. And remember: it ends. School ends. It gets better.
You can also reach out to the people who are posting videos at the It Gets Better Project. If you post a comment to a video, it goes right to the person who posted it. That's one of the really amazing things about IGBP. Mormon teenagers can reach out to the gay Mormon adults whose videos they've watched online, gay Muslim teenagers can reach out to the Muslim gay adults, young trans kids can reach out to the trans adults, and on and on. It's linking people up, giving them help in addition to hope.
Heather: What can we tell schools, specifically, about making it better now? So many schools still are not safe spaces and still outright refuse to be safe spaces, not just peers, but administrations, too.
Dan: Make it better or we're going to sue your asses and it's going to cost you money. Really, that's what it's going to take.
Heather: Which is something young people can do: again, for students in the United States, that's the right time to contact your local ACLU branch and they will help. For students internationally, Amnesty International is a good place to start.
How do you feel about the fact that one way for queer young people to protect themselves is simply not to come out? Do you think the downsides of staying in the closet are worth the protection it can offer?
Dan: I think it's really irresponsible to tell all queer kids to come out without first advising them to take a long, hard, cold look at their particular circumstances. If a 14 year comes out because he's been told that he must, or should, or that's how it gets better, and is thrown out of the house, what then?
Some kids are just not in situations where they can come out. Most of the kids who are being bullied to death were the ones who couldn't hide. I'm sure there are other gay kids in those schools, gay kids who can pass for straight. Would we advise them to come out?
Heather: Working with young people internationally, I have to know that there are many for whom it won't actually get better unless they emigrate elsewhere or completely divorce themselves from their families and cultures, something that's a lot easier for people of privilege to do than for those without. I don't know about you, but I always struggle to know how to best support young people in whole countries or cultures in which the treatment they get in high school really is indicative of -- if not more benign than -- the treatment they'll get after high school. Obviously, just saying, "You need to move far, far away," is only so helpful. Any ideas? (Besides an underground railroad, which I think about every day, but can't visualize how we'd do it yet. Unless you have ideas about how to make that happen.)
Dan: We've seen some gay and lesbian people from repressive societies successfully claim asylum in countries that recognize the humanity, if not the full civil equality, of LGBT persons. My heart aches for LGBT kids condemned to grow up in Iran or Saudi Arabia. Unfortunately the best advice — even though it's not always realistic — is to get out. Flee to a country like the UK or the US or Canada, come out, and file for asylum.
Check out the project. Make your own video if you can, or make your very own project to be supportive: this doesn't just have to come from adults, after all, and hopefully we don't have to tell you about the power a peer talking to another peer can have, something often even more powerful than what older adults can offer.
If you've been at Scarleteen before, you've already identified one safe space for you online. If you're new to Scarleteen, welcome in! Know that this is a safe space for you and we'll always be committed to keeping it that way. Most of our staff and volunteers are queer ourselves, and our straight staff and volunteers are fantastic, supportive allies, as are many young adult users and members of our community. We're not only committed to helping things get better for you and helping you make them better as much as you can, but to listening to you, holding your stories, and giving you whatever support you want that we can give while it's still not better at all. But this isn't the only safe space, nor the only resource available to queer youth. Want some more?
Online, you can check out:
There are some great hotlines that you can use when you need to talk to someone:
Want some books to help you through it? See if you can't find a copy of:
I'm bisexual, and I really would like to tell my friends. I mean, they seem pretty open-minded, being pro-gay rights and generally accepting. The thing is, they're being open-minded from afar. If they found out that one of their closest friends is bisexual, I'm not sure they'd be too keen on the idea of having a bisexual girl friend. One even has said that she wouldn't want to have sleepovers at a girl's house if she liked girls. I'm honestly not attracted to her or any other one of my friends (well, maybe one a little, but I'd never make her uncomfortable or anything) but they don't get that. I don't know how to tell them that I like girls but that doesn't mean I like all girls. I'm not sure they'd believe me. Help, please?
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