There is ample social science research available that points to an increased risk of suicide in the gay community, so when the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA), part of Bush’s HHS, planned a session on the issue during a conference on suicide, it hardly seemed controversial.
That is, until other Bush administration officials decided it didn’t like certain words in the name of the discussion.
A federal agency’s efforts to remove the words “gay,” “lesbian,” “bisexual” and “transgender” from the program of a federally funded conference on suicide prevention have inspired scores of experts in mental health to flood the agency with angry e-mails.
The fact that they were flooded with angry responses is the only good news here. SAMHSA is funding the conference, which is good, but telling presenters they should remove the GLBT words from the title of the talk is ridiculous.
The talk was originally titled “Suicide Prevention Among Gay/Lesbian/Bisexual/Transgender Individuals.” Now, it’s “Suicide Prevention in Vulnerable Populations.”
Notice, the substance of the discussion hasn’t changed. Panelists will still address suicide rates in the GLBT community; they just won’t be able say so in the talk’s title. People can talk about gays, as long as they’re not advertising that they’re talking about gays.
Indeed, administration officials prefer discussion of “sexual orientation.”
So it came as a surprise to Ron Bloodworth — a former coordinator of youth suicide prevention for Oregon and one of three specialists leading the session — when word came down from SAMHSA project manager Brenda Bruun that they should omit the four words that described, precisely, what the session was about.
Bloodworth was told it would be acceptable to use the term “sexual orientation.” But that did not make sense to him. “Everyone has a sexual orientation,” he said in an interview yesterday. “But this was about gays, lesbians, bisexuals and transgenders.”
Moreover, he noted, transgender people differ from others in terms of sexual identity, not sexual orientation.
“Unless you use an accurate term, the people you are trying to reach don’t recognize themselves and don’t attend,” he said, adding that the agency told him he should not use “gender identity.”
Bush’s America is an increasingly scary place.