'I Saw Him Making Out With a Dude. Yay'

Like I'm sure most of you, I'm sickened and saddened about the news of a third gay youth committing suicide after being taunted about his sexuality, this time Rutgers freshman Tyler Clementi, who jumped off the GW bridge after his pathetic roommate secretly taped and streamed live on the Web footage of Clementi fooling around with another guy, "Roommate asked for the room till midnight. I went into Molly's room and turned on my webcam. I saw him making out with a dude. Yay," Dharun Ravi tweeted. 

 The minute I saw the breaking news headline that the "invasion of privacy victim" at Rutgers was a man -- I had somehow assumed it was a woman and that a man had done this to her, not and man/woman team -- who had taken his own life, I had a sinking feeling that there was a malicious gay angle involved. The blood of every gay-bashing, gay-baiting and gay-oppressing politician is all over this poor kid. 

 These senseless tragedies are a real wake-up call to me -- and I hope a lot of us -- that even in the post-"Will & Grace," "Glee"-and-Lady-Gaga-are-on-top era, the belittling, humiliating and dehumanizing of LGBT youths is every bit as cruel and vindictive as it was when we were kids. Kudos to Dan Savage and his hubby, Terry, who made a touching video for the It Gets Better Project. I've always felt like being a successful openly gay man was my way of doing "my part" in this matter, but suddenly I feel like we all must do more.