Obama: It Gets Better - Adressing young gays being bullied

[Drow Denizen]

President Obama: It Gets Better

Thought some people might want to see this.

[HockeyGod]

I'm glad he did it.

[Callie Del Noire]

It can't be said enough. For ALL the bullied kids out there.

NEVER enough times.

[DarklingAlice]

It is very important that we do not let youth persecuted for GLBT status (or really and other reason) lose hope. Because it is so easy, when you are in that situation, to stop believing that it ever gets better. I'm glad this was said and I really hope that it helps.

[Trieste]

Now let's hope that "It gets better" penetrates more effectively than "Just Say No"...  :-\

[Nico]

It is very important that we do not let youth persecuted for GLBT status (or really and other reason) lose hope. Because it is so easy, when you are in that situation, to stop believing that it ever gets better. I'm glad this was said and I really hope that it helps.

+1

[Host of Seraphim]

Saw this just a few minutes ago. I'm so glad he addressed this. Bullying is not just a normal part of life.  :-(

[Brandon]

There are so many lives that have had their potiential destroyed because of bullying. Im glad he took a stand and said that it is not just a phase of growing up. However I think what he doesnt understand is when you're put into this position, when you have been betrayed so many times, you loose the ability to trust in people. Its just not as simple as talking to someone you trust. You need people to stand up for you and to show you that you have worth.

[Wolfy]

Best President Ever?

As far as I know, every other president wouldn't touch the subject of GBLT with a ten-foot pole.

I mean sure, he hasn't done some of the things he promised...but that's natural for politics. >_>

[Brandon]

Pfft, not even close Wolfy. Obama doesnt deserve to stand in the same circle as great men like George washington or Abraham Lincoln, let alone be thought of as above them.

However, I think you're right. I dont think Clinton, or either Bush touched the LGBT community. I sometimes wonder if Regan might have but I dont think there really was a LGBT community during his time

[Wolfy]

Pfft, not even close Wolfy. Obama doesnt deserve to stand in the same circle as great men like George washington or Abraham Lincoln, let alone be thought of as above them.

However, I think you're right. I dont think Clinton, or either Bush touched the LGBT community. I sometimes wonder if Regan might have but I dont think there really was a LGBT community during his time

Well..if George Washington or Abraham Lincoln were around, I wonder what they would have to say on the issue? O_o

[Minkus]

Pres. Washington would have been confused as to how completely messed up the Constitution had become, and would have started another Revolution (or at least told us all where to stick it and left for somewhere else).  History buff here, trying to view Washington through non-rose-tinted glasses.  He was a statesman, but he was a human like the rest of us.  He controlled some 300 slaves at the time of his death (but was against the institution), and  on 10th March 1778 held a court martial to remove a man from the Continental Army on charges of sodomy.  Not simply for in-service, but as an extension of the social standards of the times.  Essentially, since it was 2oo-some years ago, Washington would have said to Obama something along the lines of - "Get the hell out of my country!"  Still, he WAS the best we had at the time, disregarding any 'best US President' lists.

Pres. Lincoln was known for using the Bible for his oratory, but this may have been to appeal to 'the masses'.  He actually believed something closer to Unitarianism - everyone's going to Heaven, not Hell, unless you screw up ROYALLY.  Some people have tried to claim (and write entire books) on the supposed homosexuality/bisexuality/asexuality of Lincoln, but much of the cases used are societal norms, not deviancies.  Having close male friends but few female ones prevents affairs, for example.  Middle- and upper-class couples sleeping in separate bedrooms was also not unusual (watch an old sitcom, marriaed couples each have their own twin bed - same idea).  However, he WOULD have been on the more forgiving side of the nation's spectrum at the time, in regards to sexuality.

TL:DR, Washington would not approve of us in general, Lincoln would 'hate the sin, love the sinner' - pretty normal way to do it.  Both would say bullying is wrong, though.

[Vekseid]

Then again, the insults bigots hurled at Lincoln do look a lot like the ones they hurl at Obama. I'm sure he'd have rather more sympathy for Obama's position (aside from inquiring about Obama's spinal health).

[Noelle]

If the fact that he's addressing gays makes him the best president ever and you don't seem to care that he's fallen a little short on other issues that affect a bigger percentage of the population population and are considerably more important (don't take this the wrong way-- I think preventing suicides is tremendously important, but when a much greater portion of your population is suffering from unemployment, a slow-recovering recession, and is rapidly falling into poverty, it's a tough call, but it's not hard to see which issue is more pressing to spend our resources on) ...I think that's pretty shallow and self-serving ;P Never mind previous decades where we ended slavery, enacted civil rights, gave women the right to vote...Besides, you're forgetting that Obama actually doesn't support gay marriage -- he's in support of civil unions.

Bullying is not unique to gays, and that's one thing that I appreciated about his speech. I was satisfied with the way he addressed LGBT bullying in specific, he also drew it back to show that LGBT victims of bullying can turn it around and use it as a positive experience to help those around them, too. I think that's important to note -- when you address specific groups of victims within a greater demographic, you run the risk of giving them what I like to call the 'special snowflake' status, when really there's a greater problem at hand. Instead of being 'suicides', suddenly they're 'gay suicides'. Anyone who is suffering and is contemplating suicide is worth our time and attention equally regardless of reason and it's great to encourage those who have been bullied to form a system of support with each other.

[Callie Del Noire]

While the issue is big.. I don't think the message should be restricted to just LGBT kids, but all the bullied ones. It's a message I know I can use from time to time when I was in high school. I was the 'nerd', 'white kid', 'protestant', 'yankee', 'new kid' several times from the age of 9 or so. I was the kid who was stuck in the corner FOREVER on year. (I had a learning disability, and back then they were 'no such thing' where I lived. If it hadn't been for a special program that helped me cope with mild dyslexia, I would have never learned to enjoy books and literature. Sadly the program was killed the next year.)

I think the focus should have been as much on the 'it gets better' to everyone than just the group he was SPECIFICALLY addressing. I appreciate him giving the effort, and hope he expands on it.

As for best prez ever. Sorry, one move a perfect prez doesn't make. He's done some good, I like what he did to the lobbyist issue on his staff when he stepped in. Of course I also respect some of the things Lyndon Johnson and Richard Nixon did. No president is ALL bad, though one or two test my confidence on that statement.

[TheGlyphstone]

I'd be interested to see someone argue in favor of Herbert Hoover or William Henry Harrison being good presidents - though the latter's not really fair, considering he was only in office for a few months.

[Minkus]

Gimme a while and I can back up Herbie, but you won't like it.    :D

[Callie Del Noire]

I'd be interested to see someone argue in favor of Herbert Hoover or William Henry Harrison being good presidents - though the latter's not really fair, considering he was only in office for a few months.

I can top that one.. Andrew Jackson.. yes, he broke the centralized bank but what he did to my Cherokee ancestors is awful.

[TheGlyphstone]

I can top that one.. Andrew Jackson.. yes, he broke the centralized bank but what he did to my Cherokee ancestors is awful.

Can't argue with you there. One of the only two presidents to ever be impeached while in office as well, and an alcoholic to boot. he may have been a personal badass in the war, but he wasn't a good President, or a good person.

[Trieste]

Wasn't AJ the one who beat people with his stick?

[TheGlyphstone]

Yeah, I think so (see "not a good person") - the only one I can think of off the top of my head right now, though, is the guy who tried to assassinate him with a couple of pistols that misfired, and AJ promptly clubbed him half to death in retaliation.

[TheLovelyMaid]

I thought it was a lovely speech.  Bullying is unacceptable in ANY capacity.

Did we learn NOTHING from Columbine/a LOT of the subsequent school shootings?  Some don't respond with suicide.  Some respond with raiding their parent's easily accessible gun locker/eBay.

[Oniya]

Wasn't AJ the one who beat people with his stick?

I thought that was TR.  http://www.220.ro/desene-animate/Bugs-Bunny-Ballot-Box-Bunny/g8irLMNfVb/

(about 1:50 in)

[Callie Del Noire]

I thought it was a lovely speech.  Bullying is unacceptable in ANY capacity.

Did we learn NOTHING from Columbine/a LOT of the subsequent school shootings?  Some don't respond with suicide.  Some respond with raiding their parent's easily accessible gun locker/eBay.

Columbine wasn't as cut and dried as it seems. They weren't total outcasts, they were psychos. I really do despise the way the media made those kids into 'nerdy outsiders who snapped'. They were nuts, they had a plan and if it had worked the way they planned the body count would have been scary. They had bombs set up to channel kids into a kill box, and more to get the first responders.

Some of the other shootings were kids who had been pushed too far. I think that something changed over the last 30 years. When I went to school bullies got stepped on by teachers and the principal, of course back then you could paddle folks too. I had it bad, I mean I went through 2 different schools during high school. I was socially isolated in the second one, a certain turd my first week there hinted I was gay. Only my interest in three girls proved that wrong, though as an 'outsider' I never had any luck with them (or any others). If I had been a little less blunt in my interest, which earned me a few bruised ribs, I might have been really beaten up.

Columbine makes me froth at the mouth because those kids weren't social misfits but because of them schools became more afraid of the 'loners' and 'gamers' than the bullies that start most of the true snapping kids. And let's not forget about the ones who suicide to get away from their tormentors.

[Noelle]

You're right about Columbine, that was far more than just bullying, there was plenty of disturbing behavior to be found leading up to the attacks. They were sociopaths (or at least one of them was for sure) with a borderline narcissistic disorder amongst a host of other problems. The sad part is that they'd been in and out of trouble before and it seems like they derailed any suspicions raised about them by just pretending to clean up their act for awhile. It can be difficult to determine when a problem is just temporary (be it bullying or just general misbehavior and can be fixed with discipline or when there's something very deeply disturbed about a person mentally that requires far more than detention or even a stint in juvie. It's important to be vigilant to follow-up on any signs of trouble no matter if it seems necessary or not; better safe than sorry, as they say. Still, teachers have a lot of pressure to deal with as is; their job doesn't simply stop at teaching material, they often have to be kind of secondary parents, guidance counselors, AND closely monitor behavior in children and teen at the same time. They definitely have my sympathy and really need to be paid more :\