Pride2019: have the LGBTI conversation with your children
The single most important thing you can do for LGBTI people is to talk to your children about sexual orientation and gender identity
As #WorldPride2019 is being kicked off in New York to coincide with the 50th anniversary of the Stonewall uprising, we must remember that LGBTI suffering is all around us everywhere, every day but also that most of the violence and discrimination happens within the family and at school.
Tonight, there will be millions of gay, lesbian, bi and trans youth lying awake in their bed contemplating suicide. Others wish to be someone else. And what is even worse they have nobody to talk to about it. They learn to hide their suffering from their parents, they learn to hide it from their teachers and their pastors. In doing so, they are gradually disconnecting from their community.
LGBTI children are repeatedly told that they are simply no good.
They are bullied at school by their peers and on national television by political leaders that use prejudice against LGBTI people as political tools to gain votes.
The few statistics available to us are staggering. This week, the Trevor Project released the results of a massive survey of 30,000 LGBTI youth in the US showing that 39% of respondents said they’d seriously considered suicide in the past year.
Other studies have shown that lesbian and gay people are much more likely to attempt suicide than their heterosexual peers: in the US twice as much, In Ireland seven times.
I know this feeling.
I was this child and teenager once.
I “prayed the Gay away” at night.
I lied to my parents, my teachers, my priest and my friends.
And my first crushes instead of being exhilarating moments were tinted of shame and secrecy.
I made several desperate — and unsuccessful — attempts at heterosexuality.
Eventually I left as far from home as I could and came out at 22 years old in Washington, DC.
I feel I spent my twenties recovering self-esteem and rebuilding a community for myself and more recently my children.
The statistics I mentioned not only sadden me as a 41-year old gay man myself — who grew up feeling that isolation from my family and community until I came out in 2001 — but also as the father of six years old boys who I hope will never have to hide from me such deep suffering.
I am conscious that I could only overcome society’s stigma and prejudice because of the privileges of my nationality, birthplace, colour, gender identity and education. Not all of us are so lucky. Many never experience a life of opportunity and dignity — the most basic of human’s desires.
The suffering caused by homophobia, biphobia and transphobia is not limited to LGBTI people.
Their families suffer too.
To this day, most people who have same sex attraction in the World still get married with dire consequences: unhappy marriages, lying, adultery, emotional harm, domestic violence and trauma to children.
Parents of LGBTI people suffer too in their struggle to accept their LGBTI children.
And children of LGBTI people continue to be stigmatized and reminded that they would do better with a mother and father committed to one another in a life-long marriage.
It is nothing less than a gigantic self-inflicted wound to our World when frankly there are so much more pressing issues than keeping LGBTI people invisible and oppressed starting with climate change.
It does not have to be this way. I have had discussion with my sons about gender identity and sexual orientation. We read together books such as “A Day in the Life of Marlon Bundo”. I even read “I am Jazz” at their public school — about a transgender girl named Jazz Jennings — and it went fine. In May, when one my sons decided to paint his nails orange, I encouraged him. My boys know that men and women can have husbands or wives if they feel so. It does not take much for us to change the narrative in talking to our children. If in doing so we save their lives or the lives of their peers, isn’t it worth challenging ourselves a little?
As parents we have a tremendous opportunity to devise new ways to open previously closed minds and hearts starting by arming our children with love rather than hate. We do not have to repeat the errors of our past.
Bio: Fabrice Houdart is a Human Rights Officer at the United Nations in New York since February 2016 where he co-authored the United Nations Global LGBTI standards of conduct for Business, the largest corporate social responsibility initiative on LGBTI issues in the World. Previously, Fabrice was Senior Country Officer at the World Bank where he worked from 2001 to 2016. Fabrice serves on the Board of Outright Action International, Housing Works, Alturi, the KindRED Pride Foundation and the Institute of Current World Affairs (ICWA). In 2019, he received the Golden Gate Business Association Award, the IGLTA Pioneer Award and the Alan Turing LGTBIQ Award for his work. He lives in New York City with twin sons 6-year old Maxime and Eitan.