State native Molly Wheaton, a “Friend of Dorothy,” spent a semester abroad in London.  She chose to use that time in a journalism class to investigate bullying and hate crimes. What she found was surprising — that many of the hate crimes were being committed by some of the youngest of the community. This is a fight, being waged on both sides of the pond by organizations such as GLSEN here in the United States, to educate children and teachers in schools about the problems arising from bullying and hate crimes.

LONDON — It’s 8 a.m., and your 12-year-old is sitting at the kitchen table eating a too-big bowl of Frosties. He scrambles to finish some last-minute spelling homework before barreling out of the front door, nearly tripping over his untied shoelaces. Forty minutes later, he’s in the yard at school, taking part in a group beating of another young classmate. Violent cries of “Queer!” and “Poofter!” fill the air, your child’s voice among them, nearly drowning out the dull thud of the victim’s head against the pavement.

Poof. Rug-Muncher. Queer. Bender. Batty Boy — the list goes on. Such words are part of the normal vocabulary for many young children today, and tossed around offhandedly without a second thought.

Why is it that such offensive and ignorant words have become everyday vernacular for today’s youth? ‘Fag’ has become everyday slang for many children, some as young as eight or nine.

“Use of the word ‘gay’ as a derogatory term is rife among schools in the UK,” says Guilio Folino, president of City University’s LGBT society. “Because of this negative connotation, pupils will think that being gay is bad.” 

Over 60 percent of the time, another Stonewall figure reveals, nothing happens to homophobic bullies in school. Only in 11 percent of reported cases had the offender gotten a simple detention.

In a 2007 report on schools, Stonewall, Britain’s leading equality organization, revealed that 97% of gay and lesbian pupils hear derogatory phrases such as ‘poof,’ ‘fag,’ and ‘dyke’ used regularly in school. But it gets worse: both the Lancashire Division of the National Union of Teachers and Stonewall have declared homophobic bullying in schools has reached “endemic levels.” In fact, out of 600 pupils Stonewall interviewed in Wales, a shocking 79% said that they felt their school was not safe for gay and lesbian students.

The problem goes beyond verbal abuse and the widespread use of derogatory terms. 41% of young gay and lesbian people in the UK have experienced physical bullying, 30% have had personal belongings vandalized or destroyed.

More frighteningly, 17% have faced death threats, and 13% have been assaulted with a weapon.

According to Scotland Yard, national homophobic hate crime rates have risen by 9% year over year, with 1,372 incidents reported as of April 2009. Since the start of fall alone, several more victims have been added to the list, and many have fallen prey to the hands of children and young teens.

Unsettlingly, more and more children are the offenders in violent homophobic attacks.

In a brutal October beating of Liverpool police trainee James Parkes, twelve young people were arrested, with ages ranging from 13 to 16. On November 18, six boys, aged 12 to 14, attacked a 19-year-old gay man in Liverpool, who had to be hospitalized for internal bleeding and a broken nose. Ian Baynham, a 62 year-old Londoner, died after suffering severe brain damage at the hands of three young people, two of them teenage girls around 16. In yet another case, a 3-year-old and a 9-year-old were caught throwing rocks into a homosexual couple’s living room window.

As rates homophobic hate crimes in the UK continue to rise, many young people are being put on trial and even sentenced to jail, with a large number of attackers aged between 10 and 16 in many recent cases.

“Children are being misled by society,” Folino says. “It appears to be a social taboo in this country to talk about anything sexual in general” to children of “any age, especially those who are young.”

Sexual education is not mandatory in Britain, and many schools do not offer any sexual education classes at all. It is rare that homosexual relationships are discussed when there is some form of sexual education, leaving children uninformed. The unknown and the different — homosexuality — becomes becomes something bad, something to be made fun of, and something wrong. According to Stonewall, 70 percent of pupils have never been taught about homosexuals, nor have homosexual issues been addressed in class.

Aaron Williams, co-principal of Lloyd Williamson School in London, says he would have no problem addressing homosexual relationships with his students. “We’d be very open about it,” Williams said, “and we’d be answering them (the students) very positively.” Williams wants to provide an “open environment” where children will feel safe enough to ask such questions, and answered with a firm and simple, “Yes,” when asked if he thought it was important that children learn about and understand homosexual relationships.

Only a quarter of British schools say homophobic bullying is wrong in their school, Stonewall reported. This leaves gay, lesbian, and questioning pupils open for attack. Race and gender are universally understood as off-limits, and sexuality is rarely approached. By ignoring homophobic bullying — as 62 percent of school faculty members do when an offense is reported, says Stonewall — the offenders are given a pass. They are told that attacking and threatening homosexual, bisexual, or questioning students is fine, leading to the idea that homosexuality itself is wrong.

“I don’t think they’re becoming offenders — I think they always have been,” an anonymous individual replied to an independent survey on the subject. “Bullying is still seen as acceptable in Britain’s schools, and anti-gay attitudes are not systematically stamped on by the school system or government.”

Over 60 percent of the time, another Stonewall figure reveals, nothing happens to homophobic bullies in school. Only in 11 percent of reported cases had the offender gotten a simple detention.

Frustration with the current political and economic standing of the nation easily leads to offhanded, misguided, negative comments concerning homosexuals among adults — comments that are easily picked up by their children.

Whether or not parents truly believe their careless, exasperated remarks doesn’t matter; the words are said, and the impact is quite apparent. Hearing derogatory terms for homosexuals — paired with widespread ignorance on the subject in sexual education classes — children come to believe that homophobia is okay.

“The rise of homophobic crime has matched the growth in the unprecedented divide between rich and poor which has been allowed to happen under New Labor,” another survey respondent said. “When things aren’t good, people find a group to attack,” adds Stella Duffy, an award-winning writer and out lesbian. “Race and gender are off-limits, so who else is left? The gays.”

“When laws get better,” Duffy adds, “people who don’t like it feel threatened. They’re empowered to be violent, and encourage others to be violent.”

“I think we’re living in an age that is increasingly generous and tolerant, but there will always be people who feel insecure about themselves for one reason or another,” London mayor Boris Johnson said in a recent interview with PinkNews.co.uk. Johnson spoke out publicly against homophobia, and pledged to tackle the rise in homophobic hate crime in London. “People who have trouble in their own lives, people who don’t feel quite happy in their own lives for some reason or another... And they will take it out on people they think are different,” Mayor Johnson added, “And there is something very horrible about that. But I’m afraid that’s been part of human nature since the dawn of time.”

“Support for far-right fascism has risen in the UK, in particular the BNP and UKIP,” says Folino. “This is due to a combination of the blue-collar worker being let down by the current Parliament… They feel the major political parties do not cater to their needs.”

In times of crisis, homosexuals may seem like the obvious, and safe, target for aggression. Today’s public has successful, out homosexual role models, something earlier generations in decades past never had. Wealthy icons such as Ellen Degeneres, Elton John, Ian McKellen, Matt Lucas, and even comedienne Wanda Sykes give a face to the masses — and, adversely, something solid to attack.

“Successful gay people do not mean something is fixed,” said Duffy, likening the rise in homophobic crime to Hitler’s portrayal of the Jewish prior to World War Two. Society, for the first time, is presented with wealthy homosexuals. “People see these faces and think, ‘Oh, they don’t need us. They’ve got too much. Let’s get rid of them.’ ”

As hate crime rates continue to rise, activist groups work tirelessly to promote education, understanding, and tolerance among schoolchildren. Just a few years ago, Stonewall launched the “Education for All Campaign,” spearheaded by Sir Ian McKellen, a program designed to raise awareness and acceptance within schools. Including homosexual relationships and sexual orientation in school curriculum would enable all students to understand, and to respect diversity. Casual homophobia — the use of words such as ‘gay’ and ‘fag’ and ‘dyke’ in daily conversation among children — must be stopped as well, which would come with education and enlightenment.

Even though rates are on the rise, not all is lost. Stonewall’s in-school campaigns help encourage diversity and tolerance, and in schools where pupils have been taught about gay and lesbian issues, 60 percent are more likely to feel happy at school, and like they are welcome.

“The fact that Britain is so incredibly diverse in terms of race as well as sexual orientation does show that it is tolerant to an extent,” Folino said. “I believe it does deserve this reputation. As a young gay man living in London, there is so much for me to do, and I rarely come across any kind of homophobic abuse.”

Tags: 2010, 37-05, EARLY MARCH