Sen. Scott Brown (R-Mass.) is the only Massachusetts member of the state delegation that has refused to take part in a “It Gets Better” promotional video to gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered youth. Massachusetts lawmakers released a video for the project, promising young people who are getting bullied that life will eventually get better. Brown, the only Republican member of the group, declined to participate.

State Rep. Carl Sciortino (D-Medford) pointed that Brown’s latest move is just part of a pattern to neglect the fights of LGBT individuals during a press call. Sciortino stated that in 2006 when Brown was a state senator, he was the only member to vote to uphold Gov. Mitt Romney’s veto of a Commission on Gay and Lesbian Youth.

“Sen. Brown’s absence in our congressional delegation’s video sends a message that he supports kids being bullied or harassed,” said Sciortino. “Now, I don’t think that’s the message that Sen. Brown wants to send. I’m asking him, as a senator for the commonwealth, to stand up and show some leadership on behalf of his LGBT constituents, our young people that are facing violence in our schools, our young people that are being bullied in our schools.”

Brown’s office argued that the senator has had a “strong record” on bullying and said his “main focus right now is on creating jobs and getting our economy back on track.”

Meanwhile, Republicans offered a different response, attacking the founder of the “It Gets Better Project” Dan Savage. “Senator Brown believes all people regardless of sexual orientation should be treated with dignity and respect. He has been a leader in fighting for anti-bullying legislation at the state and federal level.

His main focus is creating jobs and getting the economy moving again. In this case, the individual behind the video has made vile and sexually crude comments about Senator Brown. It’s reprehensible for Senator Brown’s opponents to associate with this person in order to score cheap political points,” said Eric Fehrnstrom, a political adviser to Brown.

He pointed to Savage’s nationally syndicated sex column in February 2010 in which he joked about shoving a “Coke bottle, Oscar statuette, [or] Scott Brown action figure” up “someone’s ass and/or twat.”

Dan Savage released a statement later on Thursday night.

I am not the IGB project. The project has had the reach and impact that it’s had thanks to tens of thousands of people from all over the world who’ve participated. And no one who participates is required to crawl into bed with me. ..:

It is interesting, though, that not a single GOP elected official can bring himself or herself to make a video, or participate in the creation of one. No GOP elected official can risk being seen letting bullied LGBT kids know that life isn’t high school and that it will get better for them. it doesn’t require signing off on the entire gay agenda (the president made a video, and he doesn’t support gay marriage).

No GOP elected can back the seemingly radical notion that LGBT kids shouldn’t kill themselves, that they should have hope for their futures.

Image Courtesy of  http://www.flickr.com/photos/1energy/

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On September 22, 2010, eighteen-year-old Tyler Clementi, a freshman at Rutgers University, jumped off the George Washington Bridge after a video of him in an intimate encounter circulated on the internet. Clementi’s roommate had secretly filmed Clementi with another man and posted these videos online. Earlier that year, fifteen-year-old Phoebe Prince from South Hadley, Massachusetts, committed suicide on January 14 after months of torment and embarrassment by the “Mean Girls” of her school. Both stories hit national headlines and started long months of revisiting bullying.

On March 10, 2011, President Obama and the First Lady hosted the first-ever White House Conference on Bullying Prevention. The goal of this conference was to dispel the myth that bullying is a rite of passage or an inevitable part of growing up. Exactly five months earlier, Obama had produced a video, as part of the LGBT youth project: It Gets Better Project. The project’s message is simple: no matter how difficult or hopeless life may seem when you’re a young person who’s been tormented by your peers or feels like you don’t fit in: life will get better. President Obama is committed to ending bullying, harassment, and discrimination in schools and communities.

Excellent, a president so devoted to dismissing the myth of “rite of passage.” Now the question comes down to: If our own president is dedicated, then why is it so hard to get legislatives passed for anti-bullying, such as the Tyler Clementi’s bill? Why is it that the country’s current laws against bullying and cyber-bullying have loopholes that only protect children under specific conditions? For example, child abuse laws state that any act on the part of a parent or caretaker that results in physical and/or emotional harm, sexual abuse, serious injury or death, as well as exploitation is considered child abuse. However, isn’t peer abuse amongst children still a form of child abuse? In both scenarios a CHILD is being harmed physically and/or emotionally. Yet, the child abuse laws apply ONLY to actions taken by a PARENT or CARETAKER. Loophole!

By now, most people are members of many different social networks, from Facebook to Twitter to Tumblr. As a user of Twitter, I have been looking for a Twitter account whose sole purpose is bullying of any form. While there are hundreds account, many are government based while others are users who want to stop bullying. As I browsed through different accounts, each one discussed recent bullying stories and suicides, how to confront the issue (as a parent), and how to prevent yourself in becoming a victim. I came across one account, BullyingTruth, which did not talk about such things but talked about the real issue behind it: loopholes. This account discussed the shocking facts that no one else seems to talk about. Of course, I began following them, even though they didn’t have many followers. I figured the reason is because 1) they don’t know or 2) they are scared. But, someone needs to stand up and talk about the facts that no one is willing to. Bullying can be stopped if people take actions and be bold. Only then can we put a stop to the torture that many children go through every day, which by the way is not any rite of passage in life.

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