NEWS
A Promising Future Creating place, making space for homeless queer youth in the Bay State By
Michael Anthony Fowler
ulation, a staggering 33.4 percent identify “It’s not about me; it’s about the kids.” as lesbian, gay, bisexual, or unsure. Any who have invited Boston Pride These days, youth feel comfortable comGrand Marshal Erica Kay-Webster to dising out at younger ages than ever before. cuss her tenacious efforts to open a resiWe now find pre-teens telling their famdential school for LGBTQ homeless ilies that they are queer. Unlike their youth on the Cape have likely heard her young adult counterparts, these youth are utter this refrain. Having experienced firstnot at an age at which they can live indehand the anguish and hardships of living pendently. As Reed Christian and Anya as a rejected transgender teen on the streets Mukarji-Connolly pointed out in a 2012 of 1960s New York City, it’s easy to underarticle, “The mainstream LGBTQQ stand why Kay-Webster’s personal story is movement organizations generally enoften a focus in these discussions: she lends a prominent face and voice to a group of Erica Kay-Webster and super volunteer Youth Ambassador Kegan courage young people to come out, usually people who have long gone unremarked. In prepare backpacks of clothing and supplies for the Foundation for with no real comprehension of the hostile the end, through her own resilience and the International Justice’s weekly unaccompanied youth drop-in cen- forces they are likely to confront, and ter. Like Kay-Webster, Kegan experienced homelessness as a youth. without strong material commitments to compassionate support of two strangers Credit: David Webster addressing their needs.” Herein lies a bitwho would become her adoptive parents, she was given a second chance. And it is this chance that she wishes ter irony: as our youth are coming out in greater numbers and at earlier ages, responding to signs of growing acceptance of LGBTQ people to pay forward to today’s homeless and runaway queer youth. The available statistics on homelessness among LGBTQ youth on a societal level, they are met with rejection and mistreatment at are alarming: while queer people account for roughly five percent of home and end up on the streets without the means to support themthe US population, among the nation’s homeless youth they represent selves. This unfortunate fact is borne out by the National Homeless as much as 40 percent (Williams Institute 2012). The reality is stark: Youth Provider Survey (2012), which found that seven out of every Homelessness is disproportionately experienced by queer youth in this 10 queer youth cite family rejection of their sexual orientation or gencountry. According to the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency der identity as the reason why they are homeless or runaway, while Prevention (2002), each year there are between 1.6 and 2.8 million half report abuse or mistreatment at home. Moreover, after fleeing rejection, hostility, or outright abuse at runaway and homeless youth on the streets. Among these youth, around 600,000 identify as LGBT or gender non-conforming. This home, our youth seek out shelters, foster homes, and related service “epidemic” of queer youth homelessness, as the National LGBTQ providers, where they frequently experience similarly motivated misTask Force aptly characterized it eight years ago, continues unabated. treatment and discrimination by staff or peers. For example, at many And it is taking its greatest toll on youth of color (Center for American shelters, trans and gender non-conforming youth are assigned to beds, Progress 2012), who suffer the twofold iniquities of systemic homo- bathrooms, and other facilities based on their sex rather than their gender, placing them at greater risk for physical and sexual abuse by /trans-phobia and racism. The Commonwealth of Massachusetts – despite being a trail- their peers. Situations like these make queer youth much more likely blazer in LGBTQ rights – has not fared better than other states in than their straight counterparts to stay with a stranger, to “couch surf ”, curbing the rates of youth homelessness. The Department of Housing or to squat. Youth in unstable housing situations are preoccupied by the exiand Urban Development recently determined that, from 2007 to 2014, Massachusetts experienced the nation’s second highest increase in gencies of day-to-day survival, which expose them to great hazards: homelessness. In the same study, Massachusetts ranked fourth for the sexual exploitation, drug and substance abuse, and HIV and STIs, largest increase in unaccompanied youth population from 2013-2014, among others. In fact, 44 percent of homeless queer youth report havwith a sobering 25.8 percent growth. Furthermore, a representative ing been propositioned by a stranger for sex in exchange for money, sample of high schools in Massachusetts (2012) suggests that one shelter, food, drugs, or clothing (Van Leeuwen et al. 2005). Some of quarter of lesbian and gay teenagers and 15 percent of their bisexual the activities to which our youth resort for survival, such as sex work, peers are experiencing homelessness; among the homeless youth pop- are illegal, which leads to their introduction into the correctional sys68 | Boston Pride 2015
