Dear Jasmine,
My son is 14 years old and has always acted very feminine. He has no real male friends, although he finds it easily to make friends with females. He has been harassed at school about him being gay, his brother has also recently been being harassed because of his older brothers sexuality. Although my son says he is not gay and doesn’t understand why he only has female friends, I still question it and I want to help him and his younger brother deal with the harassment at school. How can I help them and how can I become more informed on this issue.
Estella
Tucson, AZ
Dear Estella,
What you should first do is report this harassment to the school. If your son is being harassed because he is perceived as gay it could be considered a hate crime and should be reported to the police. I would first suggest you go to his school and talk with the principal and his counselor to find a solution to this problem. It may be good if you had a meeting with the parents of the children that are harassing your son. Perhaps the parents could talk to their kids and let them know that what they are doing are wrong. The school should also punish these students if they continue to harass your son.
If after this meeting, you are still unable to come to an agreement or if the harassment continues, you should go to your local police station and document this harassment. Hate crimes should be taken seriously and even though they haven’t physically hurt your son, you never know what they will do because they are basically harassing your son because they think he is gay. Your son could be gay and is not ready to come out yet because of all the harassment he has received from his peers. Whether or not he is gay, there is no excuse for those kids to harass both of your sons.
Get involved with his principal and keep a close eye on your son. If he continues to get harassed, document it and head down to your local police station. These kids needs to know that harassing someone because they think he is gay can be considered a hate crime and they need to learn now before they take it any further.
Always here,
Jasmine
