Spirit Day to honor recent homosexual suicide victims
Carina Ice / THE STATE NEWSIn response to recent suicides, Spirit Day aims to raise awareness of harassment against the LGBT community. Supports are urged to wear purple on Oct. 20.
In the wake of several suicides by gay teens, a teenage girl from Canada sent out a call for a worldwide lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender Spirit Day. Posted and re-posted from blogs to Facebook to other social networking sites, her call for remembrance spread across the Internet in a matter of days.
With the use of her Tumblr account, the announcement asks people to wear purple on Oct. 20 in memory of those bullied and harassed for their sexual orientation.
“On October 20th, 2010, we will wear purple in honor of the seven gay boys who committed suicide in recent weeks/months, many of them due to homophobic abuse in their homes or at their schools,” Brittany McMillan said. “Purple represents Spirit on the LGBTQ flag and that’s exactly what we’d like all of you to have with you: spirit. Please know that times will get better and that you will meet people who will love you and respect you for who you are, no matter your sexuality.” __ Tumblr is like the Twitter of the blogging world where users are able to post text, photos, quotes, audio, and video with speed and ease. Using her account, McMillan was able to spread her request with chain-letter like speed.The Tyler Clementi tragedy at Rutgers University was the most widely reported of the suicides. Clementi jumped off the George Washington Bridge three days after footage of Clementi’s sexual encounters from a webcam were streamed across campus.
Sex advice columnist Dan Savage, will be visiting the Student Center Ballroom Oct. 13 at 7 p.m.
“There are accomplices out there: uncaring teachers, criminally negligent school administrators, classmates