HomeTop StoriesOhio's new exit law will leave more LGBTQ+ youth homeless

Ohio’s new exit law will leave more LGBTQ+ youth homeless

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If more Ohio teens are forced out of the closet to families who reject them, more Ohio teens will be forced into homelessness as a result of the new law passed by Republican lawmakers and signed by Governor Mike DeWine.

Lawyers told them what would happen if young people were forced out of the closet in unsafe homes. Members of the Ohio School Psychologists Association and the Ohio School Counselor Association provided testimony against the bill, warning that it violates the professional ethical standards of the National Association of School Psychologist.

Hundreds of Ohioans submitted testimony in opposition, outnumbering the bill’s proponents by a margin of more than 100 to 1.

None of that mattered to Ohio’s Republican lawmakers or to DeWine.

They felt compelled to make a political point about victimizing LGBTQ+ people, and they don’t care who they hurt or how much they hurt them in the process.

In this case, they are harming vulnerable young people who are already facing open, cruel, ruthless hostility in America.

It’s no surprise that crisis hotline calls from LGBTQ+ youth in Ohio have skyrocketed.

The Rainbow Youth Project USA Foundation said its crisis hotline received 579 calls from LGBTQ+ youth in Ohio on Jan. 8, the day DeWine signed the bill, WCMH’s David Rees reports. That compares to an average of 284 calls from Ohio per month.

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So the average per month was almost doubled one day.

For many LGBTQ+ youth, school is relatively safe compared to what they encounter at home. In fact, a 2022 survey from The Trevor Project found that 51% of trans youth consider school a safe place, compared to just 32% who felt safe at home.

Although school was considered a safe place only half the time, even that was intolerable for Ohio Republican lawmakers and DeWine. They have now also imposed a culture of fear there, for young people who often already feel incredibly isolated, alone and misunderstood.

Why do less than a third feel safe at home? Well, a study from Lesley University shows that half of all LGBTQ+ teens experience a negative reaction from their parents when they come out, and more than 1 in 4 are forced to leave their home.

The fear of being kicked out of their homes is the reason many LGBTQ+ teens remain in the closet until they can safely escape toxic, intolerant, and abusive environments.

Forcing someone out of the closet for any reason is a horrible thing, but to do it when their safety is at risk is a truly horrible thing to do to someone else. That is why all experts speak out clearly and unanimously against these types of laws.

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For many LGBTQ+ teens, being forced out of the closet ultimately leaves them homeless.

According to the National Coalition for the Homeless, a survey from the Williams Institute School of Law at UCLA found that 17% of LGBTQ people in the survey said they had been homeless at some point in their lives, while 20% of told them they had been homeless before the crisis. age of 18 years. The Williams Institute survey also found that 68% of LGBTQ+ respondents experienced rejection from their family.

A study by Chapin Hall at the University of Chicago found that LGBTQ youth are more than double the risk of becoming homeless compared to non-LGBTQ youth, which is often the result of escalated tensions within the home over time . While the study showed opportunities for intervention, it also showed that LGBTQ+ youth experiencing homelessness are twice as likely to die prematurely.

Of LGBTQ+ youth experiencing homelessness, approximately 64% experienced discrimination from their families, 62% were physically harmed by others, 25% committed self-harm, and 38% were forced to have sex. All of these figures were much higher – sometimes almost double – those of non-LGBTQ+ peers.

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Do Ohio Republican lawmakers and DeWine know anything about this? Do they care?

Obviously not.

The politics of spreading fear about LGBTQ+ people and using transphobia as a cultural wedge to fuel blatant lies, propaganda, paranoia, hatred and division at election time is more important to them than this human suffering.

When I was a reporter, I interviewed LGBTQ+ youth who had been kicked out of their homes by intolerant families, so this isn’t theoretical to me. These are Ohioans with hopes, dreams and joy who want to live authentically without constant fear, hurt, pain, insult, intolerance and hatred.

Ohio Republican lawmakers and Mike DeWine have—no matter what rationalization they try to package—created a law that appears to inflict real harm and suffering on real people in a way that these reckless politicians themselves have never come close to enduring.

This cruelty, causing so much pain in the lives of others, creating more unnecessary suffering in the world, besmirches itself and our state.

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