First Day of Silence Blog

First of all, I’m so grateful to have been invited to participate in GLSEN’s official Day of Silence Blog. I am a Media Studies and English major at Southern Connecticut State University (SCSU); have served on the executive board of the chapter for more almost four years; and have presided as Co-chair of my chapter for almost four months. I’m not and have never been a regular, uber-diligent blogger (I stink at keeping a LiveJournal), but I care so profoundly about the Day of Silence and have been working for almost a month (and have a week and a half to go) to have SCSU’s event be one of the most powerful and moving expressions of solidarity and hope the campus community has ever witnessed and felt.

Very few people can deny the power of a group of people who stop talking because they feel marginalized, excluded, and dehumanized. Such a form of protest urges the viewer to confront his or her own prejudices (hence, the silent person serves as a sort of mirror to the other person who is looking at or trying to talk to the silent demonstrator) and hopefully find some process of healing where he or she will no longer fear people because they are different, But, like all social movements, the Day of Silence is not only being challenged by the radical religious right and “Day of Truthers” but also by those LGBT rights advocates and activists who ask, “Why be silent when all we should do is scream out against a society that considers us second-rate citizens? Aren’t you giving the homophobes and bigots more power remaining silent? Is being silent really standing up for yourself and your LGBT family, friends, and allies? Will people get that the gesture is supposed to be ironic?” These are all valid questions, of course, and I intend on exploring them in this blog. As a firm believer in the power and veracity of the message of the Day of Silence, I’m hoping I will be able to learn as much from other bloggers as they may or will learn from me.

I’m currently working very hard to help coordinate the Day of Silence at my university, since it will be the first time the event is being co-sponsored by LGBT Prism, of which I am Treasurer, and Amnesty International. More significantly, for the last couple of years, PRISM has usually stood silently with posters and placards for a couple of hours on the bridge that joins one side of campus with the other. This year, we’re not only planning to stand on the bridge holding posters with important quotes, statistics, and insights about hate, but we’re also asking more than twenty other clubs, including the NAACP and the Black Student Union, to help us spread the word and support the Day of Silence around campus. We’re also marching afterward in a gesture of solidarity and empowerment. Our next event is the Breaking the Silence party, where I hope those students who silently protested will share and reflect on their experiences being silent and develop a deeper appreciation of diversity. Third, we’re having guest speaker Marjorie Agosín, human rights activist and author of Secrets in the Sand: The Young Women of Juárez, discuss the injustices and abuse against the women of Juárez, who are forced to work and die in sweatshops and are physically and sexually abused by male employers daily. Our last, and perhaps our largest and most significant event, is the community vigil that commemorates not only the memory of Lawrence King but also the thousands of victims of hate crimes nation/worldwide.

As you can see, we’re aiming to promote an awareness of prejudice and discrimination at a global level. All of these oppressions- sexism, homophobia, transphobia, racism, classism, religious intolerance, and many more- are connected and need to be recognized and challenged, not silenced and apathetically accepted. I’ve been told that indifference is more cruel and damaging than hate, and, perhaps, this is true when it comes to schools overlooking the bullying and harassment against students and just ascribing it to “kids being kids.” If Lawrence’s school had instituted some kind of enumerated safer school policy that added gender identity/expression and sexual orientation to their anti-discrimination, bullying, and harassment policy, would such a tragedy have occurred? Schools such as Larry’s need to take the steps necessary to protect all children from the effects of bullying and harassment that can very often lead to full-blown violence and, in Larry’s case, death.

I encourage my fellow bloggers who are planning Day of Silence events at their schools to share their experiences, problems, and questions. What’s important to note is that the Day of Silence is different at every school. For example, some students stay silent for an entire day, and others just for a couple of hours; in addition, some students elect to have vigils while others don’t. However, the message is still the same: No one, no matter who they are, deserves to be devalued, disrespected, and dehumanized simply for being different and not conforming to societal standards and conventions. Yet, our society, including many of our schools, demoralize youths’ sense of safety and freedom of expression by not recognizing the immense courage it takes to go against the grain and truly be oneself.

To liberate ourselves from the prison of our own externalized and internalized oppression, we need to promote an awareness of the consequences of hate even after the Day of Silence is over. The fight against bigotry is not done; there are so many injustices we need to acknowledge that we constantly ignore because of our “busy” lives and schedules, our own fears and insecurities, and, worst of all, our own apathy. The murder of Lawrence King made me question my purpose and effectiveness as an advocate and ally for LGBT and Ally youth. Was I doing a good job? Did I really have the tools, both external and internal, to make a difference in communities? I felt powerless, but after wrestling with it in my mind, I realized that I could not give up on myself or Larry. It’s time to lift the veil off hate and foster an environment of peace, justice, and freedom. I know I can’t help deconstructing the world the way I do and exposing it for its follies. But I’m not becoming jaded; rather, I realize that the world, while incredibly flawed, is capable of so much beauty. I see this beauty in all of those who stand up for the rights of others and are not afraid of challenging the status quo, including Larry King. If the Day of Silence demands anything, it is a challenge to our current system of socializing our children to bully and harass others in an effort to assert unjust power and authority over others.

In my next blog entry, I will talk about the media’s role in either “adding” or “subtracting” hate to our country’s discourse. Why was the murder of Lawrence King reported on most mainstream TV networks two weeks after his death? How do the media add to the silencing of oppressed people? What can we do to counter such effects? Being a media studies major, these issues are very important to me, and I hope you intend on exploring them with me.