"The religious right is seeing the fruit of their efforts: DEAD CHILDREN." Dan Savage

Dan says to gay kids: "Don't believe the lies of the bigoted children of bigoted adults. HERE

Dan Savage Blasts Religious Right As Culpable In Rash Of Gay Teen Suicides

¨Support and other resources for gay young people are out there, sometimes only a click or a phone call away, but advocates said the recent suicide of Rutgers University freshman Tyler Clementi and other teens who were believed to have been victims of anti-gay bullying point to the need for even more widespread help.

In a country of about 12,000 public school districts, the education network known as GLSEN (glsen.org) counts about 4,000 Gay-Straight Alliances, the name for school clubs – mostly in high schools – that register with the group,

“Youth in general are not very help-seeking,” said the organization’s executive director, Eliza Byard. “Getting people to reach out is one of the big challenges.” HERE

Another non-profit focused on lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and questioning youth, the Trevor Project, operates a free, confidential hotline (866 4-U-Trevor) for counselling and suicide prevention around the clock. The hotline, among many crisis lines available, takes an average of about 30,000 calls a year, said a Trevor spokeswoman, Laura McGinnis.

Trevor (thetrevorproject.org) also offers “TrevorChat,” a free, secure online messaging service for counselling between 4 p.m. and midnight Eastern time. The organization’s Trevor Space, a monitored social networking service for gay youth, has about 13,000 registered users, McGinnis said.

“So if your town has only 300 people in it, you’re not alone,” she said.

A search engine on the Trevor website allows users looking for resources or support to search by key word, state, city or zip code. HERE

Parents, Family and Friends of Lesbians and Gays, or PFLAG (pflag.org) is a national support, education and advocacy organization with local affiliates in more than 500 communities around the country and abroad. Support group meetings are available through PFLAG chapters for loved ones or whole communities.

“PFLAG has grown as more Gen X parents are learning about their kids or figuring it out before their kids do. They’re getting more involved,” McGinnis said. HERE

For youth not ready to seek help offline, an outpouring of videos from members of the gay community who have survived bullying and hatred as young people have been posted on a new YouTube channel set up by syndicated columnist Dan Savage, called It Gets Better (youtube.com/itgetsbetterproject). HERE

On college campuses, Campus Pride is non-profit organization of student leaders and groups of gay students and their allies, including an effort focused on fraternities and sororities, lambda10.org. HERE

Off campus, CenterLink (lgbtcenters.org) supports LGBT community centers and helps new centers get started. The organization serves more than 168 centers in 45 states and the District of Columbia. The group’s website provides a directory of centers. HERE

“The single most important line of defence for young people in crisis is a network of visibly supportive adults, in their own community, in school, at home,” Byard said. “We’re talking about a very big country, and far too few young people have access to those supports.” HERE

NOTE:  The Episcopal Church has Gay and Lesbian Bishops as well as Clergy as well as LGBT Laity Leadership (look for the Episcopal Church Parish in your town and ask them if they are ¨inclusive¨) 

· Thanks to Dan Savage, ¨It Gets Better¨, sidebar
· Thanks to 365 Gay, sidebar
· Thanks to LGBT Centers, worldwide
· Thanks to PFLAG
· Thanks to The Trevor Project
· Thanks to GLSEN
· Thanks to Joe. My. God., sidebar
· Thanks to The Canadian Press
· Thanks to The Episcopal Church, United States and Abroad