Excellent article. Seriously it made tears flow!! As a human who grew from child to adult, i have seen bullying in action on the playground and the halls of high school. I can’t say I was ever bullied that I can recall with any specificity. However as the parent of an LBGTQ youth through their teens and now into adulthood. I am well educated in bullying. However, my son was in martial arts (helps with not only impressive skill but is a great escape from life’s malevolence and to gain confidence) I was not too concerned with his physical safety. But I know and saw first hand how difficult it was was for him to simply understand, acknowledge and navigate what this description of sexual orientation meant to him and for him. Relationships to peers, friends, society and parents. My son had many issues within himself to deal with being raised in a very hypocritical evangelical home. My son had few (thankfully) peer bullying. 6’2 and an outward confidence put most of that to rest and he was not publicly out in high school. To me, but to this day, not to his mother formally. But she was a bully. As a bat shit crazy evangelical hypocrite, she loved to spout fire and brimstone anti gay messages. Support the ban on gay marriage state propositions and generally loved to spew anti-gay fundamentalist hate propaganda about gay people gong to hell, being cursed, etc. She did this knowing he was gay (we all knew by the time he was 7). She was his live in bully. Parents are the worst kind of bully, he became convinced he was evil and going to hell. Before he was even sexually active. He became suicidal.

Happy ending. He came to live with me. It was not easy in the Begining. However, a nice dinner and me telling him it was fine if he was gay, straight, bi, tri or anything else. I loved him unconditionally, as did my whole side of the family. It took time but he did come out to me, and all I said was, I know. At that time a safe sex talk under all circumstances was the unbreakable rule. The same thing I would have said to him regardless of sexual preference. I was very lucky. My son is now a very loving and generous person. Comfortable in his own skin and building a successful future. He has a long term partner and they are very compatible. My son is my best friend, even now in his thirties and we chat nearly every day! I thank God always that things turned out well in the end. Parent bullying or psychological abuse is unforgivable in the human condition (I think her god may have some surprises in store during her judgment) as we will all be judged in the end. That’s Gods department. My job was to protect my son, full stop. He and me succeeded in that together. For that I am extremely grateful. I pray for those poor parents that through no failt of their own, ended up with dead children. A waste of the loved and a loss to humanity. May the lord bless them and bring then peace!