My daughter just told me that one of her classmates came

[Midlodemocrat]

out of the closet to her parents. They, RW 'Christian' people, apparently told her that she was going to go to Hell.

Nice, real nice. I hope THEY rot in Hell. What kind of thing is that to tell a teenager?

Fuckers. I'd like about five minutes in a room with that mom. I would give her an ear blistering that would make her cry.

[applegrove]

1. No kidding. That is horrible. Teenagehood is hard enough - without

needless trauma. I too would like to spend some time alone with that mother. I'm not even a mother. Or a lesbian. But I have something to say to her - one human being to another.

[redwitch]

2. that is so sad

I cannot imagine the kind of courage it would take to "come out" to parents like that, and then to have them react like you would expect in your worst nightmare. Damn. Some people do not deserve their kids. And no kid deserves parents like that. :cry:

[FreedomAngel82]

21. Remember what happened with Alan Keyes daughter?

[redwitch]

26. no

another sad story? I am afraid to hear...

edited for an autofill mistake. sorry.

[bluestateguy]

3. They're probably going to send her to one of these "ex-gay" camps

To screw with the kid's mind and make her feel even more insecure.

[Katherine Brengle]

4. too many people are blind like this...

To treat our children with anything but respect and compassion is to commit a great crime against nature...

Your daughter is lucky to have a parent like you.

[GreenPartyVoter]

but not always, thank God. My best friend's family was conservative

evangelical but when her brother came out they saw the light and changed to an inclusive church. This was no small thing because they live in a very clannish part of town where everyone is related to each other, and the mom was the organist and choir director of their old fundy church.

[Maddy McCall]

5. You know, it's because of the hell I've seen friends and family members...

go through, that I tell my son, "I love you forever, no matter who you are or what decisions you make in your life."

Unconditional love. It's not to be earned by children. It just IS.

The saddest thing, Midlo, is that the child in your post will continue to try to seek approval from her parents, to no avail, and it will cause her tremendous pain in her life.

Perhaps, since she can't get acceptance from her own parents, she can get it from her friends' parents. I can remember being a teen and doing things of which my parents didn't approve, and I felt unaccepted by them at times; yet, my best friend's dad always accepted me and made me feel like a worthwhile human. Things are ok--well, pretty good--with my parents these days, but I will never forget what it meant to be accepted by my friend's dad, when my own parents seemed to turn their back on me.

You are a kind, generous person. I hope that the child in your post receives the benefit of your love and wisdom.

[Midlodemocrat]

I told my own children that there was nothing in this world

that would ever cause me to turn my backs on them. Sure, I yell every once in a while, but they are mine, my gifts.

I am going to try to help this kid. There is no gay teen organization at my daughter's school, so I am going to try to organize one.

This just makes me so frigging sad.

[Maddy McCall]

46. Turn your anger into proactivity.

I think organizing the teen group is the best thing you could do. You won't just help this girl--you'll help many youths with this same problem.

God bless you for your kind heart.

[bertha katzenengel]

6. At least I was an adult when my dad told me that.

I weep for that child. How old is she, M.?

[Midlodemocrat]

11. 17.

I told my daughter that this child was always welcome here.

I'd like to have just five minutes alone with that self-righteous SOB of a mother.

This poor little girl. When she told my daughter, she prefaced it with 'you're a liberal, right?'.

Damn right she is. And fucking proud of it.

[Maat]

18. She's proud of being a liberal, and I'm proud of her!

Congrats to you for having a daughter like that, Midlodemocrat!

[bertha katzenengel]

30. Please give your daughter a hug for this dyke, and when you see

her friend, give her one too.

Religion kills. If not the body, certainly the spirit. :grr:

[iamthebandfanman]

7. ugh

its amasing what hatred can motive people to say.
sick bastards.

[CornField]

8. When my daughter informed me she thought she was bisexual

A "Christian" friend asked when I would be throwing her out. LOL!!!

Feel the love...

[GreenPartyVoter]

15. Did you throw the friend out? *eg*

[FreedomAngel82]

25. I guess I missed the part

in my Bible where it says that families should kick each other out. :shrug: The second commandment in Christianity from Jesus is "love thy neighbor as thyself" and your children are your neighbors.

[DURHAM D]

9. If she needs help support is available, including

housing and schooling. I don't know the name of the various organizations but someone will probably post. You might want to post this in the GLBT forum.

[GreenPartyVoter]

10. That poor kid. Listen, pass the word to your daughter so that she

can pass it on to her classmate that there are resources she might want to check into: http://www.hostdiva.com/liberalchristians/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=109&Itemid=31

(Also it wouldn't hurt to hook her up with an inclusive church Pastor to help counter the parents' venom.)

[Maat]

12. Wow - this PFLAGer hopes that your daughter's friend ..

can come over to your house much of the time.

This kid has to think about making other living arrangements; staying in that household will lead to depression.

I have a young family-friend/distant-relative I suspect may be gay; I let him know of my commitment to PFLAG, and that, should he want "to go to school out here in California," there's a room available for him.

She is in my prayers - prayers taught to me by my open, affirming, welcoming, and inclusive church. Positive, affirming energy headed her way!

On edit:
I'd recommend referring the parents to PFLAG - but that only works for parents who are open-minded. The PFLAGers couldn't successfully provide emotional support to close-minded people.

I'd recommend the Point Foundation to her as a potential college resource to be explored.

[DemInDistress]

13. Is there a "heaven"? Is there a "hell"? if so, someone please

show me..Now if you are rich maybe that's heaven and if you are poor maybe thats hell otherwise tell those gopers to shove it up their asses..
I know you cant have kids saying that but parents could..I wish you could have 2 minutes with her too !!!

[FreedomAngel82]

31. I think it all depends on the person's view of heaven/hell

My view of heaven/hell is of who you're with not physical things.

[DemInDistress]

33. I can go for that....nt

[TallahasseeGrannie]

I hope the mother can

recover from her shock and disappointment and get some counseling, maybe, and get real. She is losing her daughter.

And I hope the daughter can forgive her one day.

[theoldman]

14. I would take time to talk to that child.

She needs to be told that you are her friend and that there is nothing wrong with her. It's her parents that have a problem.

[Cleita]

16. A friend of mine in High School was kicked out by her parents

when she came out to them. Well, not kicked out in the street, but they put her in the boarding school I attended and refused to see her ever again. She couldn't go home on weekends or holidays and they never visited her, telephoned her or wrote her letters, or sent her presents for her birthday and Christmas.

I sometimes wonder what happened to her. She seemed to disappear into thin air after graduation.

[redwitch]

55. that is so awful

I hope she is OK. How the hell does someone reject their own child like that? It is completely beyond me.

[BOSSHOG]

17. The parents have a false sense of shame

like they have a false sense of patriotism. The parents fear they will be embarrassed in the presence of their fellow haters. That's just a great reason to treat your daughter thusly. If she came home and said she was involved in the torching of an abortion clinic her parents would have taken her out for Pizza. "Christian Conservatives" - way up on the list of domestic enemies of the constitution.

[Midlodemocrat]

24. I think you are right.

As though they 'failed'. How utterly ridiculous. Living your life through your children is cruel to them. They will never be able to measure up.

[FreedomAngel82]

32. They always have to have some sort of "victim" role

[FreedomAngel82]

19. How sad

I wish there was a way that people can know that not all Christians are that rude and heartless. I hate hearing stories like that because it's so sad. :cry: Sometimes it's things like this that make it so hard to stay in my faith. :(

[LiberalPartisan]

20. The hard part is over

She's come out of the closet. The rest of life is all down hill. Or so I'm told by those who have been through the process. Now all she has to get her parents to a good cult deprogrammer.

[Mythsaje]

22. Hah! With you as parents, I'm already IN HELL! n/t

[John Q. Citizen]

23. And what of the parents who would birth and raise

such an offence to god?

Looks like it's all over for them too.

What a bunch of idiots. Creating their own hell for them and their kid.

[King Coal]

27. Well, maybe she committed mass murder too.

[immoderate]

40. Self delete.

Meant this for the OP.

--IMM

[SoCalDem]

28. They must have not been much good as parents, eh?

It always cracks me up when people can't see the truth right in front of them. If parents are god-fearing right wingers and still ended up raising a gay child, it must not be "nurture", or THEY are failures..:sarcasm:....maybe that's what freaks them out so much..at the core of it all..

They must be very scared people to not "trust" their god enough to know what he/she is doing, by making all people different.. :)

If God made their child different (but not to THEIR liking) it must eat at their very souls to know that..and if their child "became" gay afterwards, then it must be their "fault"..

[Occulus]

29. I wish I had it to do over again.

I'd earn the assault charges I'd receive.

Note my phrasing.

I had everything set up for my future: I knew where I was going to go to school, and what I was going to go to school for, by my freshman year of high school.

Five years later, my parents kicked me out for being gay. Oh, sorry- "for lying about being gay," as my female child-rearer (I won't call her a "mother") tells it.

A year later, they yanked my funding for school- such as it was- in the middle of the semester, after financial aid had already been awarded. Living with them at the time (this was after getting kicked out and after "letting" me move back in), they made me get a full-time job- or have to pay them rent (which- surprise!- meant getting a full-time job).

Goodbye, future. Goodbye, career. What they did, in sum, was ripped a great gaping hole in my heart. Music was the only reason I was getting up in the morning- it was the only thing I was ever any good at- and they saw that, and used it to punish me.

Now, twelve years later, I can't look on my teen years with anything but shame. I was a damn good musician, too- oboe, voice, piano, percussion. More awards, medals, and certificates than I care to list. My directors each told me I was the best music student they had taught since coming to that school system.

I can't even go to concerts of any sort... there's just still even now too much pain in it for me to deal with.

I tried to play my oboe again last summer, and I couldn't even get it to make a sound louder than a first-year squeak.

Let me tell you all something: there is nothing worse that you can do to your kid than to deny them the future they are setting up for themselves... unless it's keeping them clueless about their own gifts, from a very young age... the way my parents did to me.

They knew I was musically talented from the time I was FIVE. They didn't- ever clue me in; I had to figure it out for myself. They wouldn't LET me take piano lessons (where other parents have to force their kids to do so). They wouldn't LET me go to Interlochen or Blue Lake... but mentioned other kids, fellow music students, going there.

Can someone please tell me, point blank, whether or not all this could be called abuse?

[FreedomAngel82]

35. I'm sorry

:hug: It's psychological abuse. On edit just know this Christian doesn't hate you and will always stand up for everyone. :hug:

[wicket]

34. So glad my church flies the rainbow flag

Which gays would Jesus hate?

[MadMaddie]

36. If she was like me

Of course I didn't come out until after college but....I was brought up not to lie to my parents and the burden of having this secret and not being able to tell my parents was so stressfully.

I finally did tell them and of course we went through the-

My mom-what did I do wrong as a parent, you must be going through a phase...okay
My dad-I don't want those people in my house
My sister-not acknowledging my partner

Well 13 years later and still with the same partner they have softened a bit. And they realize that they didn't do anything wrong and that I am happy.

I saw a movie last week on cable called "Saved" with McCauley Caulkin-if you want a true depiction of a fundie environment and it's impact on high school kids please watch the movie.

I send my hope that she isn't shattered by her parents indifference to her needs. They are not worried about her they are more worried about what their fundy community is going to think!

[Midlodemocrat]

37. I'm worried about this child.

My daughter said for the last two weeks, since she came out, she has just come into French class and put her head down and done nothing.

I am really worried that she is a suicide risk.

[MadMaddie]

38. Is what the parents doing considered mental abuse in your state?

How old is the teenager?

Her parents are probably telling everyone in the church to pray for her, which will destroy her even more.

This is abuse no matter how you look at it.

The damage these fundie people are doing to the youth is mind boggling.

I would look up the oranizations that the others have recommended, these groups will have experience in helping teens in this situation.

[Occulus]

41. She's thinking about it- believe me, she's thinking about it

It took every ouce of will I had to not kill myself after my parents found out. For the next two years, I had to find a reason to keep going every day.

Part of that was because (as related in my other post above and a thread or two I've posted on this same subject) it just didn't stop. As it turned out, there were a hundred little ways they kept punishing me.

If I had it to do over again, when they kicked me out, I would have simply walked away and never spoken to them again. But I didn't, because I love them both. So, I stuck around, and kept family ties up... and a year later, they yanked my school funding.

And I still kept in touch. I wish now I had never forgiven them; I wish now I'd beaten the piss out of both of them. I wish now I'd taken what I had and split... but what I was going to school for was the only thing I was any good at, and they knew it.

I'd encourage this girl to simply leave. Disappear, without warning, without a note, without a goodbye. Forget them, and concentrate on herself. Why do I say that? Because that's what I didn't do.... and I've been paying for it ever since.

[FreedomAngel82]

39. I'm so glad things worked out with your parents

:)

[immoderate]

42. Google up some "knowledge of heaven and hell for her.

For instance:

Robert A. Heinlein:
How you behave toward cats here below determines your status in Heaven.

Mark Twain:
Go to Heaven for the climate, Hell for the company.



--IMM

[mzteris]

43. One of my daughter's friends

nearly came to live with us when he came out to his parents. The dad kicked him out, but fortunately the mom came to her senses and got them all some family therapy. (Though I think secretly she hoped he'd suddenly not be gay if he got therapy - but that didn't happen and the parents - well the mom anyway - accepted him the way he was.)

He and my daughter and some other friends started a GSA at their school after that. Does your daughter's school have one? Or see if there are any GLBT organizations around the area - like PFLAG for the parents or Lambda for the kid maybe.

If you know them, maybe you can TRY and be a "friend" to the mom and talk to her - not lecturing, just offering up some suggestions that aren't hatefilled and "religious". Let her know that there are people in the world who won't be "judging them for having a gay daughter", ya know? Ofttimes the parents themsselves fear rejection and a label of "being a bad parent" that "caused the kid to be gay".

:hugs: to you and your daughter as well as the friend. Thanks for being there for her.

[Midlodemocrat]

44. My daughter's high school is the only one in the county

without a gay/lesbian support group. I am going to change that. I made some calls already and come hell or high water, that school is going to have a support group for these children.

[mzteris]

47. YAY!

Get the girl involved if you can - it will give her a positive focus.

[mzteris]

57. you probably already have this, but . . .

http://www.gsanetwork.org/resources/start.html

[Fleshdancer]

45. Write her a letter

She's not getting the emotional support she needs from her parents. If I were you, I would write her and praise her for her strength and courage. Let her know she has a place to go to if she needs to talk. Advice without judgement is such a precious thing and it sounds like she needs it more than ever.

[cally]

48. I just can't stand the pain these teens face

As many of you know, my daughter came out recently that she is bi. She took a long time to come out because a friend came out a few years ago and was ostracized by her parents and beat up so badly that she almost died by classmates. I just can't handle the hate. I hope your daughter offers her compassion and friendship.

[donheld]

49. I was told I was going to hell for various reasons

from the time I was old enough to know what Hell was.

[bliss_eternal]

50. That is child abuse!

:mad: :grr: :mad:

Seriously, what kind of asshat tells their child they are going to hell when they bare their soul and try to tell them who they are?

If there is a Hell, those parents will go for sure.

Oh and Middledemocrat--I would applaud you giving that woman an ear blistering. She deserves it. She sounds hateful and sick--addicted to religious dogma and missing the messages of love and acceptance. I hope that girl has some other supportive people in her life.

[ncrainbowgrrl]

51. That sickens me. How do you do that to your kid?!?!?

Even if you believe it, deep down... how do you tell your kid that they're going to go to hell for just being the way she was born?

:cry:

I hope the classmate is okay... that must have been pure hell for her. It's so hard to come out in the first place...having that rejection tossed at you only makes it so that each and every time the opportunity of coming out again to someone else, you doubt if they're going to be supportive, or if you're going to get a reprise of that absolutely insane reaction.

I swear... the only ones going to hell are the parents- for speaking such cruel words to their child.

[Horse with no Name]

52. That is so horrible--those parents need to be horsewhipped

Reminds me of a bi-racial child my daughter hung around with several years ago.
Several of them had a ballgame and I invited them to all stay at the house.
This little girl who couldn't have been more than 11 or 12 came up and asked me if I meant her too.
She looked down at the ground and said she was half black.
I cried that this child thought she would be unaccepted because of who she is.
But I cried more because certainly something had made her feel that way.

[Rocknrule]

53. Family values in action

[TriMetFan]

54. These people are not "Christians". They would hate Jesus if he was

standing in front of them. I feel sorry for your kids friend. I just couldn't even began to understand any parent kicking their kid out of their home for being gay/lesbian. I guess I was one of the lucky one's. Both of my parents have always said that to love a child to love them with all your heart. I never had to come out to my folks, I just brought home my girlfriends so they could meet them. And that was back in 1979 when I started dating.

[foreigncorrespondent]

56. God that is so sad!

Just yesterday my mum mentioned that it was gay pride march here in Melbourne on Sunday. I said I knew that, but she said she didn't, and had she known she would have marched with PFLAG. I was so touched by that, and am glad that I have her support. Unfortunately I realize that many with in the gay community don't have the same support I do.

Let me join you for that five minutes in the room with that mother.