The murder of two Israeli teens and the wounding of several others at a Tel Aviv gay community center reminded me of a 1984 conversation I had with a prominent Baltimore rabbi.
AIDS was very much on the rise. Though it was impacting intravenous drug users to children to married women to everyone everywhere, it seemed as if gay men were the audience targeted by religious fundamentalists. It was called the “gay men’s disease” at the time, and there were those convinced that it was HaShem’s punishment for male homosexuality.
What the rabbi simply told me was that there were young adult Jewish men on their death beds here in town dying of AIDS. But what shouldn’t have been such a stunner, yet it was back then, was the rabbi telling me that some of these young men were coming out to their parents literally on their death beds. So the rabbi not only had to give pastoral counseling to a dying Jewish young man, but also help the child and his parents process all of this.
Even on their death beds, the young men sometimes feared that they could hurt their parents. They also feared the unknown, not certain of how their parents would react to the news that their son was gay, and that this illness was possibly caused by his sexual lifestyle.
News reports coming out of Tel Aviv have shown that while Jewish gays and lesbians have become more at ease with their self images and identities, there is still among some that worry of stigma and social rejection. In this case, parents of some of the wounded didn’t know until they were summoned to hospitals that their teen-age child was/is gay.
One can accept homosexuality, one can deplore it. A child, however, should never, ever be afraid to show their mother or father who they are.
I want the monster who fired the shots to be caught and convicted.
But I also want another “monster” eliminated.
Fear.
Gay teens have a disproportionate amount of suicides. These are children who fear sometimes just the act of going to school each day. They listen quietly and sadly at gay jokes or one kid calling another “gay” as if that were some sort of knock.
As parents we might not agree with what directions our teenage and adult children sometime take.
But a home should be a place of unconditional love where children especially can be themselves and speak truths that they know are safe, especially safe with their moms and dads.
Sadly, a person can be motivated by hate to pull a trigger against another person.
Sometimes our attitudes, our feelings, our own lack of knowledge is enough ammunition to wound another person.
I never want to hear or read again that a parent learns their child is gay on his hospital bed.
That to me is almost as bleak as a hater holding a gun.
I’m glad that Tel Aviv has a place where gay teens can learn that they are not monsters, but they are beautiful. I’m glad there’s a place that builds up their image of self.
One day, I hope the kids can bring their parents and show them.
And I hope that their parents come away with pride.

Kol ha Kavod!

I only wish that the audience for this blog could be expanded to the print edition, so those less likely to be on the internet, or accustomed to following blogs can be enlightened by the column.

Fortunately, I was far too young—or not even born—to be aware of the hatred spewed and violence of the late 1930s and early 1940s.  But the politically motivated vilification and images of the era seem have acquired new wrapping and be thickly polluting the air we need to breath today.

Very well said.