Adults must teach gay teens to value life in order to cut risky behaviors

By Deb Price / The Detroit News

What's the life of one gay teen-ager worth? "Not much" says our dangerously backward society.

Listening even when adults think they're not, gay teens get that crushing message. They get it every time their very existence is ignored or ridiculed or bemoaned. They get it when their dreams and fears and safety are assigned no value. It should come as no surprise, then, when large numbers of them react by treating their precious lives as junk and hurtling headlong into self-destructive behavior.

Still, the results of a survey of Massachusetts high school students -- reported in this month's Pediatrics medical journal -- are both shocking and frightening. The confidential poll of 4,159 ninth- to 12th-graders goes far beyond just confirming prior research showing that gay youth are at extreme risk for suicide and HIV infection. It establishes that teen-agers who identify as "gay, lesbian or bisexual" are far more likely than their classmates to be ensnared in a astounding array of high-risk behaviors:

Smoking, drinking, carrying a gun, fighting at school, using smokeless tobacco, smoking marijuana, using crack, attempting suicide, shooting up illegal drugs, sharing needles, promiscuous sex. The disturbing list goes on and on. Researchers found the 2.5 percent of students who said they aren't heterosexual are more likely to engage in a given risky behavior, to do it earlier and more often, and to combine it with many other risks.

High school students whose sexual orientation puts them at odds with our heterosexual culture are, for example, five times more likely to carry a gun (24.7 percent vs. 4.9 percent), 14 times more likely to use cocaine before age 13 (17.3 percent vs. 1.2 percent), four times more likely to drink at school (25 percent vs. 6.2 percent) and five times more likely to report three or more sex partners in the previous three months (37.9 percent vs. 7.5 percent).

Quite clearly, something is desperately wrong. The Pat Robertsons of the world will undoubtedly try to twist these survey results to fit their conclusion that being gay is sick and sinful. But being gay, of course, isn't the problem: Adult negligence is. Gay kids just aren't getting the attention, protection, reassurance and guidance they need.

Teachers, principals and counselors bear much blame. Educators should take responsibility for nurturing gay students so they can grow into healthy adults.

Royal Oak psychotherapist Joe Kort, who works with gay youth, says the survey shows gay teens are using alcohol, drugs and sex to "numb out the hate. They don't see how to get past it. ... These teens are walking around feeling like damaged goods."

Those of us who're gay adults are far from blameless. We aren't doing enough to mentor gay teen-agers. We must show them relationships that last, conduct that's responsible, and lives that don't revolve around bars or sex. By our example -- as openly gay stockbrokers or flight attendants or school teachers -- we can give them hope.

As a society, we're failing gay teen-agers -- just as every generation before them was failed. As individuals, we adults can turn away. Or, we can teach them to value their own lives.

Deb Price's column appears Fridays in Accent. Write her in care of The Detroit News, Accent, 615 W. Lafayette, Detroit 48226. You can reach her by e-mail at accent@detnews.com or by fax at 313-222-2451.

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