Understanding

"To understand everything makes one tolerant."

-Germaine de Stael

In 1986, at sixteen, I had my first experience working with a therapist. I told him I was there because I thought I was gay and didn’t know what to do. He quickly reassured me that I was not gay and that I was most likely going through a “phase” and had low self esteem. He prescribed rubber band therapy to “control” my “inappropriate” thoughts which involved:

A. wearing a rubber band around my wrist; and

B. flicking it whenever I had a homosexual thought.

Apparently he did not get the memo that the American Psychiatric Association had removed homosexuality as a “disorder” in 1973. Needless to say, the rubber band only gave me welts.

I am now a therapist and I look forward to the day that when “being gay” is not the reason someone comes to my office for help. But until then, I will do my best to mend the spirits of LGBT people bruised by ignorance and continue to do my part fighting inequality and promoting tolerance.

If only it was so simple to eradicate fear and bigotry with the snap of a rubber band………

From the illustrator-- if only it were. But it's not. It's patience and education and exposure with communication that will eventually eradicate the prejudice. It's like President Obama wrote in his memoir, "The Audacity of Hope": the point is not to solve every problem, but to make the effort, to engage and increase your understanding of others even if it's just a little. Little by little, over generations, the change takes place as the understanding grows.

Writer - Brett Kennedy - Manhattan, New York
Illustrator - Sara Dilliplane - Boston, Massachusetts
http://the1104studio.com/