The recent, tragic death by suicide of Rutgers student Tyler Clementi, one of five deaths by suicide among gay youths around the country reported in the last few weeks, has stirred up conversations about the importance of tolerance on college campuses. Homophobic bullying has played a prominent role in some of the deaths, which have left some scratching their heads, wondering how homophobia and bullying are still rampant when so much energy has been dedicated to eliminating them.
While we might think we're ready to put an end to these tragedies, our society has not yet eliminated the culture of insensitivity and hate that permits such bullying to take place.
The root of incidents such as these is not the social media websites where the bullying takes place or the parents who abhor homosexuality. On college and school campuses, we often use our words and cameras irresponsibly, forgetting just how out of control our actions can get.
Whether or not someone puts up a video or spreads a rumor out of vengeance or simple carelessness, our society's recklessness with words and ideas will remain toxic and even deadly until we internalize their potential for harm.
We can never know what will get to someone, so why take the risk? Whether it's spreading seemingly innocuous rumors or equating disgust or disdain with homosexuality by using the word "gay" as a synonym for stupid or "faggot" as a common insult, we must realize that our words are not only insensitive but also incredibly offensive to those about whom we do not necessarily think when we say them.
It is also appalling that in a society that devotes considerable attention to homophobia and other gay rights issues, we are not by now acutely aware of the potentially major harm our utterances can have on someone's life.
People have never been more exposed to the existence of gay rights issues than they are today; there is no longer an excuse for ignorance. Actions like those taken against Tyler Clementi last month must therefore be labeled as malicious so that people will be made to realize the injury they are capable of causing. Strong measures must be taken to deter further acts so that no one can make a claim of ignorance or social acceptability.
It might be convenient to blame the resurgence of teen suicides related to homophobia on social media sites, digital cameras and other technology that give bullies new methods to spread hate. But these are just modern tools that aid the spread of a problem that is not new.
Rather, we need to be cognizant of our own actions, fierce in our criticism of others' harmful words and devoted to establishing a counterculture to social carelessness and viciousness.
We need to ask ourselves not why these kids died by suicide there and then, but why it hasn't yet happened here. We must encourage ourselves, our peers and our university leaders to crack down on recklessness and insensitivity.
