ABSTRACT
This kind of teasing, which centers on insulting someone’s sexuality or gender presentation, happens daily in schools across the country. According to a year-long Des Moines, Iowa study (www.youth.org/loco/PERSONProject/Alerts/States/Iowa/slurs. html), high school students hear anti-LGBTQ (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgendered, and questioning) slurs an average of once every seven minutes in a typical school day. More than half of teens surveyed in 2002 by the National Mental Health Association (NMHA) said classmates use terms such as “fag” and “dyke” on a daily basis-and not just to refer to LGBT students. Three of four students targeted for harassment are straight.
