Written By: Frederick Martin-In-The-Fields
Mentoring programs do indeed provide safe learning environments for gay and lesbian youth because I have seen, and experienced it first hand. There is nothing like the empirical argument, in spite of its subjective nature, but an individual generally trusts things he/she can experience first hand. Or, he/she can trust the knowledge of another person they can confide in, rather than rely on theory or untried hypothetical situations. However, since I have grown up knowing and working with gay and lesbian persons, I can write categorically about this subject, and can profess my conviction without fear of contradiction.
There is nothing sadder and more lamentable in an individual life than to find oneself alone and isolated for fear of persecution, and lack of care and affirmation. As a group, Gays have been, generally speaking, one of the most isolated and persecuted in any given society, and for what? Their sexual preference? Anyone with half a brain and some visible maturity on his/her brow will profess that there is so much hypocrisy and falsehood in their given society.
Everybody, I choose to believe, knows somebody else that comports him/herself in a manner that is considered dissolute or corrupt according to the conventions of their own community, therefore why all the fuss about gays? It is, many would argue, the very public exposure or shameless display of behavior that is considered abnormal, or extra-normal which they find to be so reprehensible. Fear of the unknown, or what is accepted as wrong, bad, sinful, corrupt, or is accepted as outlaw, even if those laws that sanction the bigotry are religious, has always been the motivating factor behind the accepted modes of persecution against minority groups, which particularly include gays and lesbians. And yet, they are human too, have typical needs and concerns, and must function in, and contribute to the individual society to survive. Many prosper quite invidiously despite the existing prejudices against them.
No one I have known, or have known about, has walked away disappointed with their exposure to mentoring programs and their respective environments. All have been grateful for the opportunities they were presented with, or the chances to rectify their lives. They have vociferously praised the very security, affection, affirmation, and concern they felt, individually or collectively, and received from the very nurturing environments provided by respective gay and lesbian mentoring programs, especially those established for the youth in particular.
Nevertheless, many gays still face scrutiny, criticism, rejection and hate within the communities they live in. This is where mentoring programs play their most significant role. Gays must know and feel that they are not alone, that there are many, many others who are just like them, suffer the same concerns and mistreatment, and are there to affirm their very existence. Gays must, like all human beings, be exposed to the love, caring and nurturing necessary for a complete and fully realized life.
It has been noted by many academic communities that gays, especially in Western societies, contribute enormously towards the artistic, literary, musical life of their society. They are known to be quite creative and innovative compared to other, heterosexual examples. It has been revealed more recently that they abound in the military, in sports, and, more scandalously, in the clergy of many Christian denominations, Roman Catholics specifically ~ the very group which has unpardonably implanted that heinous prejudice against gays in the hearts of their laity over many centuries, thus their role in perpetuating hatred and persecution is all the more evident as well as despicable.
Gays are also affirmed in such mentoring programs by learning of their role in history: men such as Alexander the Great, Julius Caesar, William the Conquerer and son, William Rufus, Frederick the Great, Leonardo Da Vinci, Michelangelo, Caravaggio, Tchaikovsky, Mendelssohn, et cetera, were well known gays, or at least bi-sexual, which to many people the latter label bears little difference to an avowed gay. The knowledge thereof is uplifting to the ignorant gay who has no idea that their situation, their preference is not unique, therefore they are not the freaks they think,or have been taught to think, that they are.
Mentoring programs, especially in small communities where most people know each other by name, are of great importance and make an enormous difference in the lives of gays, who are typically marginalized because of their misunderstood identity, even if the reason thereof is much derided. It is curious to discover, to the individual researcher, that many would-be hate-mongers don't fully understand what a real gay person is; many who have been asked the question in the U.S,. have petulantly replied that a gay person is an overtly effeminate man, or, conversely, a very masculine woman, a transvestite, or simply a person who willingly plays the ¨bottom¨ or submissive role in a given sexual relationship. Naturally, homosexuality is much more complicated than that. Yet, prejudices are so much easier to cling to for the average person than the knowledge gained by counsel and experience. Mentoring programs and the environments of positive affirmation they provide help enormously to dispel these prejudices and fears, for the heterosexual as much as the gay person.
As the son and brother of a gay father and brother, respectively, I was left with the wish that my relations had sought mentoring programs, but they did not, were persecuted in the second case, or remained in the closet, bitter and angry against the society that bore him in the first case. Whilst others I have been acquainted with who did seek and found mentors were most grateful for their experiences, and to their individual mentor for setting them on the path that led towards a fully realized and productive life.
That is the principal difference between those who have not benefited from such a program, and those who did ~ a bitter retarded life as opposed to a happy, vigorous and prosperous one.
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