Ann Coulter, of course, was “just kidding,” no doubt, when she wrote today via Twitter, “Last Thursday was national ‘coming out’ day. This Monday is national ‘disown your son’ day.”
Ha ha! Wow, that is so funny. I’m sure that the more than 100,000 homeless LGBTQ youth — who literally have been disowned and kicked out of their homes by their parents just because they are LGBTQ — are laughing. Hysterically.
Â
There are 2.9 million children in America living with no parents – and 1.6 million American children are homeless. 2.9 million is almost 1 percent of the entire U.S. population – and that figure is eight years old. Half a million U.S. children live with foster parents.
Those half a million foster kids? Only half will graduate high school, only 2% will earn a Bachelor’s degree. The day they turn 18, 30% will have no health insurance and will be on public assistance.
LGBTQ kids and teens are four times as likely to be homeless and up to eight times more likely to attempt suicide as their heterosexual peers.
We know Ann Coulter isn’t funny. She wasn’t funny last week when she claimed on Bill Maher’s show that racism in America has disappeared.
Ann Coulter, you’ll remember, headline a fundraiser for the gay Republican Tea Party group, GOProud, then went on to tell them that civil rights are only for Blacks — something she’s been repeating on her recent book tour appearances.
Last month, Coulter went on “The View†and said the O.J. Simpson verdict was good for Black America, and that Liberals have race-mongered. Coulter also claimed “Republicans have never†engaged in voter suppression, which, as we learned later that same day, is remarkably false.
Fortunately, Whoopi Goldberg told Coulter her views on race and Black America are “bullshit.”
And that what Coulter’s “joke” today is. Bullshit.
Of course, we all know that Coulter does this because she’s lonely, desperate for attention, and wants to sell more books. So, let’s indulge her need for attention and take this opportunity to help shed some light on the subject of LGBTQ kids and teens and what they face.
“I recognize that this is a joke, and that she is not really taken seriously in any context anyway, but with this coming right after National Coming Out Day, at the start of Ally Week and just days before Spirit Day, I thought this would be a good opportunity to talk about this idea of hers,” Aaron McQuade, Director of News and Field Media at GLAAD writes:
There was a time in our culture’s history when, if thousands of LGBT kids were to come out on the same day, the next week genuinely would be exactly what Ann describes, all across the country. Fathers disowning their sons and kicking them out onto the street. Mothers locking up their daughters or sending them to charm school. Children forced to undergo electro-shock or even worse forms of “therapy” to rid themselves of their orientation. To learn how to not be true to themselves.
And although we’ve come a long way from those ideas as a cultural collective, I have no doubt that last week, more than a few American households experienced the tragedy that Ann joked about. Approximately 50% of LGBT youth experience some degree of family rejection. There are as many as 100 thousand homeless LGBT youth on our nation’s streets, and it’s estimated that LGBT youth make up as much as 40% of our nation’s homeless youth population. LGBT youth who are completely rejected by their parents are more than 8 times as likely to have attempted suicide. Pretty funny, right?
Since Coulter is such good buddies with the folks at GOProud, I’m sure we can expect them to denounce her comment immediately, right?
Hat tip: Truth Wins Out, via Towleroad
Related:
New Study Confirms 4 In 10 Homeless Youth Are Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender
2.9 Million Orphans, Happy Father’s Day
Gay Marriage, Abortion Aren’t Problems. Child Homelessness, Poverty Are.
Â