Prejudice in HE

[faceslikemine]

I know there are very few students here, but I would appreciate your views on this.

I know university students are supposed to be more open minded, but I have had a few instances of discrimination, ignorance, or downright hatred towards LGBT people. Anyone else experience students being like this?

Aside from the occasional casual joke, One of my flatmates really didn't like gay people. He expressed dislike for one of his classmates to us when he recalled discussing transgender people. I wasn't paying attention to the rest of the conversation but he said that "a woman having a penis is a kinda a relationship-ender", to which his supposedly gay classmate said (and he imitated his voice in a lisp to ensure we all knew he was gay) "or starter." His reaction to this wasn't favourable. This classmate may as well have just stood up and crapped on the table. Another time we were watching a random show (IDK what it was about or even called) and there was a stereotypical gay man in it acting all fruity, limp wrist etc. and suddenly he said "I don't wanna watch this anymore". Again he actually sounded queasy.

Another incident I found a bit peculiar was with one of my female flatmates, who was recalling something that happened that day. She donated money to a charity collector in the street and the gay one put a sticker on each of her boobs (LOL). Her reaction was that this was unnatural because he is gay and so should have no interest in her breasts But she actually looked a bit creeped out, like he was gonna take her home and wear her skin. I thought it was a bit odd.....

Those are pretty much the only experiences of sexual discrimination I have witnessed from students. Does anyone have first-hand experience of being bullied or stigmatised as a student because of their sexuality? Would love to hear.

Thanks,

J.

[mrk2010]

To be honest I don't think there is a gay prejudice as such in higher education only prejudiced people. To be quite frank nobody at my university in Newcastle cares whether you are gay, it's not that much of an issue. Our university has loads of societies and one of them is the LGBT society and like I said at our university it isn't an issue and any forms of bullying be it homophobic or racial are dealt with. Like I said people are prejudiced and may not conform to the more liberal stereotypes students are presumed to have.

[ceez]

I found something interesting when I was in college, there were three discussion on LGBT when we had time to talk in class. the first time was on gays in the military (lots of ex military at the school) and the guys who served in the military all knew at least one guy that was gay and they all said that they didn't care just as long as they could shoot.

the second time was when a classmate was hit on by a guy and it was actually pretty funny, my classmate just gave him an innocent "hey what's up" and the guy took it for a little more . back in the classroom the topic came up again and just about everyone said they didn't care as long as they weren't being hit on.

now I don't mean to sound rude, and I know I'm definitely not the smartest person in the world, but the homophobic people I've met are not the brightest people in the world. actually most of them just seemed trashy. someone was talking about an ad for a gay dating site that they decided not to show in the Superbowl and one side of the room (not so bright people) sounded outraged and were disgusted that they would even attempt to show anything like that on TV. the side I was sitting on where most of my friends were just kept quiet and laughed to our selves.

that was my experience, I'm actually surprised gay people haven't had a tougher time here on the bible belt, where there's literally a church on every street. most people in town just keep their opinions to themselves. the only tragic thing I've heard happen was a guy shot up a gay bar an hour and a half from where I live killing one person and injuring a few others, and the guy said he did it because the bible told him to :mad:.

[OrphanPip]

Well I'm in the humanities, pretty much half of the men in my department are gay anyway.

[pellaz]

recall the Tyler Clementi/ Dharun Ravi, Rutgers University affair. After a while the hate comes to a bad end. Maybe not a school related situation but at work I have a pic of my partner on my desk at work. I find it clears up a lot of thinking automatically.

[DerJack]

I've never really run into any prejudice at my university. We have a pretty good LGBT group and host a week long event every year, which involves a huge rainbow gateway for people to leave the closet through and a pretty awesome drag show too!

Although my friends used to have this one friend who threw shit around about fags all the time, but he also liked to tell racist jokes and claimed he wasn't racist. A couple of times he used inappropriate words enough to make my blood boil and I just exploded at him. He didn't say much along those lines around me again... and soon enough the rest of my friends realized what a jerk he truly was...

[matty7]

as im most situations - if a bully has an audience then they will play their games of racism or knock minoritys - its what they do untill people call them out on it in en mass - then they wilt away , good chance half of them are gay or curious anyway and its there way of denying it - i hope your friends gay or straight stand up if u take some flack off an idiot m8

[azulai]

My uni is pretty liberal. No one cares or gets into people's personal lives. The LGBT Group spans across undergrad, grad/med/dental/vet/health schools and law school, so we get a good mix of people and our Ally group is very active. A lot of professors go to events and are supportive.

I've only had one weird thing happen with friends. My bf and I were out with some friends playing pool/drinking; we were the only gay couple. A girl that was dating one of our friends kind of was obsessed with us the whole night. It just felt creepy. We weren't doing any PDA! :tongue: We weren't the only ones who noticed and the joking got pretty raunchy after they left.

The only thing I could figure was she went to one of the smaller religious colleges nearby and she was uncomfortable but tried to overcompensate. IDK.

[Pix]

I experienced one college student who insisted on talking to me at a vegetarian cafe. While educated, she was one of the most ignorant, brain dead people I ever met. At one point she mistook me for a conservative and I corrected her by pointing out what a typical conservative would've actually said as opposed to what I'd just said. In doing so I snarked how conservatives feared gays and she went (just one of many examples of her idiotic assumptions), "You don't like gays?"

"I AM gay," I replied.

And then her eyes opened wide and she leaned away from me. I'm not sure if she was consciously aware of herself doing that or not. I barely resisted the urge to lean forward to compensate (especially as I wasn't thrilled to be talking to her in the first place).

[Bowyn Aerrow]

I know university students are supposed to be more open minded, (snip)

Really? How do you know this? And why on earth do you think they are supposed to be more open minded?

An education doesn't make a person less of a bigot. Unfortunately more often than not it only makes them more clever in how they express that bigotry. No matter how many letters a person adds to the end of their name, they are still a human being. Still full of the confusion, fears, worries and petty hatreds that everyone else, even those without any letters at all behind there name have.

Two people - um I mean two bigots - is all you have met in university. My how the world has changed. A few days have passed since I walked on Berzerkeley's campuses (Berkeley, Calif.) It was and I think is still considered one of the most liberal and open minded (yes brains fell out everywhere, that is how open minded it was/is) campuses in the USA, if not on earth - and I met dozens of bigots - and not just haters of the rainbow crowd - haters of many peoples.

What you have witnessed so far is mild compared to what I have witness on and off campus. Back in my day they literally took base ball bats and literally bashed gays (blacks and various other minorities).

And they (those bigots) went around in packs, like wild feral rabies infected dogs always on the prowl for their next victim. Not just an individual getting an upset tummy because he is face to face with the reality that he loves cock. Oh wait, I ain't supposed to point out that many homophobes have a tendency to be at the very least bi if not fully queer.

Whole packs of them raging at the world, at themselves and looking for a target to beat to demonstrate to themselves and others that 'we ain't that way - we hate that way thus can't be that way.'

The worst ones were not the unwashed, uneducated masses. It was and I take it still is the educated ones, those who learned new ways to pick on and bully. The worst ones don't carry baseball bats either. Skin heals, broken bones mend. Its the ones who get that higher education and learn to hide their bigotry and learn how to drip it out in their words, half disguised but so toxic it burns the very soul of those they hate.