Barriers to addressing bullying: denial, dilution and fear of reprisal
All respondents expressed concern that lesbian and gay bullying is not ade-quately addressed and identified three main barriers to addressing bullying: denial, dilution and fear of reprisal.
First, respondents referred to denial of the existence of queer youth; con-sequently, bullying of lesbian and gay youth remains unacknowledged. Educators, service providers and other adults were reported frequently to adhere to the belief that youth are not lesbian or gay. As a respondent explained, ‘Because communities think they don’t exist, they don’t feel they need to provide services or protections’.
A second barrier to addressing homophobic bullying is a discourse in which the underlying motivation is not named. As a result, respondents asserted, bullying remains located within a vacuum. Respondents described examples of
discrimination that’s going on”.’ Respondents described this discourse as problematic, as it ignores targeted bullying of lesbian and gay youth. Fur¬thermore, respondents described policies based on this discourse as enact¬ing similar treatment for all infractions. Consequently, policy level responses are often untargeted and ineffective for lesbian and gay youth.
Fear of reprisal emerged as a third barrier to addressing bullying, not only among some lesbian and gay youth, but also among adults and authorities. In particular, respondents referred to educators who do not feel they will be supported by their administration. For instance, a respondent explained that ‘So many teachers are afraid to do this kind of work. You’re terrified of a confrontation with parents, not sure how your administration is going to support you’.
Strategies to address bullying
Respondents identified several strategies to address lesbian and gay bully¬ing. A prominent strategy included additional funding for lesbian and gay youth programming within existing organizations, such as schools and shel¬ters. The emphasis was on ‘helping lesbian and gay youth feel they have a community—a space where they can go and not be bullied, where they can go and just be themselves and where they’re valued and respected’.
Respondents advocated for inclusive school curricula, beginning in kin-dergarten, with a focus on acceptance of individuals and communities and on appreciating differences, reinforced by support throughout the school. A respondent stressed, for instance, that if a youth sees a rainbow sticker in a school window, he or she might assume that it is safe to ‘be totally out’. However, this same respondent pointed to the danger should the youth be victimized and then encounter a lack of support at different levels within the system. A need for school policies that incorporate zero tolerance for queer bullying was identified, ‘to let them know that is not acceptable in any way, shape or form’. Respondents added that to support such policies, educators and other adults must receive training to interrupt homophobia. They repeatedly highlighted the need for ‘clear and immediate action and intervention. It’s about putting a stop to the situ¬ation, followed by discussion’.
Discussion
In this investigation of the perspectives of professionals and youth peer advocates, bullying of lesbian and gay youth emerged as pervasive, occur¬ring across the entire social ecology of youths’ lives, and often in the absence of adult intervention. The gravity of these findings is supported by literature that
the underlying motivations that are operative in the peer victimization of certain populations of youth—based on characteristics such as sexual orien¬tation, gender, socio-economic status, race and ability (Greene, 2006; Rigby, 2002). Pervasive and severe forms of bullying motivated by intolerance towards others based on actual or perceived membership in a particular group, known as bias-based bullying, both reflects and contrib¬utes to a toxic environment, which fosters lesbian and gay victimization (Ryan and Rivers, 2003).
Similar to findings on ‘traditional’ bullying, peer victimization of lesbian and gay youth often goes unreported and is pervasive in the school context, leaving victimized children and youth at risk for internalizing negative self-images. However, several characteristics of bullying that victimizes lesbian and gay youth appear to be unique.
First, whereas traditional bullying and bullying of lesbian and gay youth are both strongly evident in schools, conditions that foster the bullying of lesbian and gay youth appear across their entire social ecology, including peers, siblings, parents, teachers, religious authorities, and coaches, as well as in social policies, laws, institutions and the media. Having no safe space and no adults to whom to turn may render lesbian and gay bullying especially dangerous. Vulnerability due to conditions across youths’ social ecology also may apply to other groups who are victimized based on characteristics such as their race or ability.
A second differentiating characteristic of victimization of lesbian and gay youth is that disclosing one’s sexual orientation, while vital to gaining support, is simultaneously a major risk (Newman, 2002). Often youth are victimized further when they disclose their sexual orientation—to peers and adults, and are at risk of losing social support. The double-edged nature of the coming-out process may be one key component to under¬standing the experiences of lesbian and gay youth and to providing support and interventions.
Third, while bullying is generally underreported, researchers, policy makers, and educators are increasingly acknowledging the pervasiveness of bullying and taking action to intervene. However, the motivations underlying lesbian and gay bullying are often denied or diluted by adults and policy makers. Merely including ‘bias-based’ bullying within the overall category of bullying conceals the underlying motivations and thus reduces the signifi¬cance of the particular bias and its enactment (Greene, 2006; Stein, 2003).
Fourth, while a culture that glorifies violence contributes to all bullying, lesbian and gay youth are specifically victimized by homophobia in the media
social policies that exclude, negate or discriminate on the basis of sexual orientation, is a crucial factor that may render victimization of lesbian and gay youth distinct.
Fifth, the pervasive sexual prejudice embedded in many religious insti-tutions may hold a distinct place in the bullying experiences of lesbian and gay youth. A discourse of ‘conversion bullying’, whereby lesbian and gay youth are subjected to ongoing even if subtle harassment that suggests that they ‘change’ their sexual orientation or become ‘normal’, appears to be unique to bullying of lesbian and gay youth. Underlying the content of some aggression against lesbian and gay youth is the narrative of conform¬ing to heteronormative practices, although such ‘conversion’ has been com¬pletely discredited by the American Psychiatric Association since 1973 (American Psychiatric Association, 2006; King, 2003). While certain dimen¬sions of conversion discourse from well meaning, albeit misinformed parents or religious figures may not be acts of bullying per se, the resulting hostile climate is at times translated into de facto bullying.
Lastly, all youth who are bullied are at risk for internalizing problems such as depression or anxiety. However, lesbian and gay youth face added dimen¬sions of complexity related to the coming-out process—an important poten¬tial avenue to social support and acceptance. The pervasiveness of homophobic images and discourse in the media, and discrimination against lesbian and gay persons in policies and laws, place lesbian and gay youth at higher risk for problems due to internalization of stigma and intol¬erance (Hetrick and Martin, 1987; Hunter and Schaecher, 1987). Recent scholarship also highlights the agency of lesbian and gay youth in under¬standing and navigating unfriendly environments and their efforts to resist dominant homophobic and heterosexist discourses (Hillier and Harrison, 2004; Oswald, 2002). The psychological process of internalization must be understood as inextricably linked to ongoing interactions in the context of social relationships and the external world (Newman, 2002). Addressing ‘internalized homophobia’ merely as a psychological phenomenon risks further victimizing lesbian and gay youth (Newman, 1998, 2002)—as if they remain the focus of ‘treatment’ or intervention—whereas the lion’s share of change should be implemented in families, schools, religious insti¬tutions, social policies and laws to combat sexual prejudice and to provide lesbian-and gay-affirmative and supportive environments for all youth.