Wednesday, June 1, 2011

[Peckers_Pics] Male/Gay Health-Discussion-PICS Model Wars-PICS-Health-News-Jun 2, 2011-Boycott Trump-NBC-TARGET



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Alert: Target + Minnesota Forward + Tom Emmer = Support for a rather dangerous and radical political philosophy that diminishes LGBT people to pests that should be murdered. And "Target" is cool with this? ...Now Target is suing the LGBT community for their peaceful demonstrations in front of their stores. ....Our answer: BOYCOTT "TARGET"

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Special Report: An end to AIDS?

By Kate Kelland - LONDON - Jun 1, 2011 - Reuters

For his doctors, Timothy Ray Brown was a shot in the dark. An HIV-positive American who was cured by a unique type of bone marrow transplant, the man known as "the Berlin patient" has become an icon of what scientists hope could be the next phase of the AIDS pandemic: its end.

Dramatic scientific advances since HIV was first discovered 30 years ago this week mean the virus is no longer a death sentence. Thanks to tests that detect HIV early, new antiretroviral AIDS drugs that can control the virus for decades, and a range of ways to stop it being spread, 33.3 million people around the world are learning to live with HIV.

People like Vuyiseka Dubula, an HIV-positive AIDS activist and mother in Cape Town, South Africa, can expect relatively normal, full lives. "I'm not thinking about death at all," she says. "I'm taking my treatment and I'm living my life."

Nonetheless, on the 30th birthday of HIV, the global scientific community is setting out with renewed vigor to try to kill it. The drive is partly about science, and partly about money. Treating HIV patients with lifelong courses of sophisticated drugs is becoming unaffordable.

Caring for HIV patients in developing countries alone already costs around $13 billion a year and that could treble over the next 20 years.

In tough economic times, the need to find a cure has become even more urgent, says Francoise Barre Sinoussi, who won a Nobel prize for her work in identifying Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV). "We have to think about the long term, including a strategy to find a cure," she says. "We have to keep on searching until we find one."

The Berlin patient is proof they could. His case has injected new energy into a field where people for years believed talk of a cure was irresponsible.

THE CURE THAT WORKED

Timothy Ray Brown was living in Berlin when besides being HIV-positive, he had a relapse of leukemia. He was dying. In 2007, his doctor, Gero Huetter, made a radical suggestion: a bone marrow transplant using cells from a donor with a rare genetic mutation, known as CCR5 delta 32. Scientists had known for a few years that people with this gene mutation had proved resistant to HIV.

"We really didn't know when we started this project what would happen," Huetter, an oncologist and haematologist who now works at the University of Heidelberg in southern Germany, told Reuters. The treatment could well have finished Brown off. Instead he remains the only human ever to be cured of AIDS. "He has no replicating virus and he isn't taking any medication. And he will now probably never have any problems with HIV," says Huetter. Brown has since moved to San Francisco.

Most experts say it is inconceivable Brown's treatment could be a way of curing all patients. The procedure was expensive, complex and risky. To do this in others, exact match donors would have to be found in the tiny proportion of people -- most of them of northern European descent -- who have the mutation that makes them resistant to the virus.

Dr Robert Gallo, of the Institute of Virology at the University of Maryland, puts it bluntly. "It's not practical and it can kill people," he said last year.

Sinoussi is more expansive. "It's clearly unrealistic to think that this medically heavy, extremely costly, barely reproducible approach could be replicated and scaled-up ... but from a scientist's point of view, it has shown at least that a cure is possible," she says.

The International AIDS Society will this month formally add the aim of finding a cure to its HIV strategy of prevention, treatment and care.

A group of scientist-activists is also launching a global working group to draw up a scientific plan of attack and persuade governments and research institutions to commit more funds. Money is starting to flow. The U.S. National Institutes of Health is asking for proposals for an $8.5 million collaborative research grant to search for a cure, and the Foundation for AIDS Research, or amfAR, has just announced its first round of four grants to research groups "to develop strategies for eradicating HIV infection."

THE COST OF TREATMENT

Until recently, people in HIV and AIDS circles feared that to direct funds toward the search for a cure risked detracting from the fight to get HIV-positive people treated. Even today, only just over five million of the 12 million or so people who need the drugs actually get them.

HIV first surfaced in 1981, when scientists at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention discovered it was the cause of acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS). An article in the CDC's Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report of that June referred to "five young men, all active homosexuals" from Los Angeles as the first documented cases. "That was the summer of '81. For the world it was the beginning of the era of HIV/AIDS, even though we didn't know it was HIV then," says Anthony Fauci, director of the U.S. National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, who has made AIDS research his life's work.

In the subsequent three decades, the disease ignorantly branded "the gay plague" has become one of the most vicious pandemics in human history. Transmitted in semen, blood and breast milk, HIV has devastated poorer regions, particularly sub-Saharan Africa, where the vast majority of HIV-positive people live. As more tests and treatment have become available, the number of new infections has been falling. But for every two with HIV who get a chance to start on AIDS drugs, five more join the "newly infected" list. United Nations data show that despite an array of potential prevention measures -- from male circumcision to sophisticated vaginal or anal microbicide gels -- more than 7,100 new people catch the virus every day.

Treatment costs per patient can range from around $150 a year in poor countries, where drugs are available as cheap generics, to more than $20,000 a year in the United States.

The overall sums are huge. A recent study as part of a non-governmental campaign called AIDS2031 suggests that low and middle-income countries will need $35 billion a year to properly address the pandemic by 2031. That's almost three times the current level of around $13 billion a year. Add in the costs of treatment in rich countries and experts estimate the costs of HIV 20 years from now will reach $50 to $60 billion a year.

"It's clear that we have to look at another possible way of managing of the epidemic beyond just treating everyone forever," says Sharon Lewin, a leading HIV doctor and researcher from Monash University in Melbourne, Australia.

In some ways, we have been here before. Early AIDS drugs such as AZT came to market in the late 1980s, but within a decade they were overtaken by powerful cocktail treatments known as HAART, or highly active antiretroviral treatment. HAART had a dramatic effect -- rapidly driving the virus out of patients' blood and prompting some to say a cure was just around the corner.

But then scientists discovered HIV could lie low in pools or reservoirs of latent infection that even powerful drugs could not reach. Talk of a cure all but died out.

"Scientifically we had no means to say we were on the way to finding a cure," says Bertrand Audoin, executive director of the Geneva-based International AIDS Society. "Scientists ... don't want to make any more false promises. They didn't want to talk about a cure again because it really wasn't anywhere on the horizon."

GENE THERAPY

The ultimate goal would allow patients to stop taking AIDS drugs, knocking a hole in a $12 billion-a-year market dominated by Californian drugmaker Gilead and the likes of Pfizer, GlaxoSmithKline and Merck.

It's unlikely to happen anytime soon, but Brown's case has opened the door to new ideas. "What it proved was that if you make someone's cells resistant to HIV...then all the last bits of HIV, that hang around for a long time in patients on treatment, did in fact decay and disappear," says Lewin.

Now scientists working on mimicking the effect of the Berlin patient's transplant have had some success. One experimental technique uses gene therapy to take out certain cells, make them resistant to HIV and then put them back into patients in the hope they will survive and spread.

At an HIV conference in Boston earlier this year, American researchers presented data on six patients who had large numbers of white blood cells known as CD4 cells removed, manipulated to knock out the existing CCR5 gene, and then replaced.

"It works like scissors and cuts a piece of genetic information out of the DNA, and then closes the gap," says Huetter. "Then every cell arising from this mother cell has this same mutation."

Early results showed the mutated cells managed to survive inside the bodies of the patients at low levels, remaining present for more than three months in five. "This was a proof of concept," says Lewin. Another potential avenue is a small group of patients known as "elite controllers", who despite being infected with HIV are able to keep it under control simply with their own immune systems. Researchers hope these patients could one day be the clue to developing a successful HIV/AIDS vaccine or functional cure.

Scientists are also exploring ways to "wake up" HIV cells and kill them. As discovered in the late 1990s, HIV has a way of getting deep into the immune system itself -- into what are known as resting memory T-cells -- and going to sleep there. Hidden away, it effectively avoids drugs and the body's own immune response.

"Once it goes to sleep in a cell it can stay there forever, which is really the main reason why we can't cure HIV with current drugs," says Lewin. Her team in Melbourne and another group in the United States are about to start the first human trials using a drug called SAHA or vorinostat, made by Merck and currently used in cancer treatment, which has shown promise in being able to wake up dormant HIV.

WHAT ABOUT PREVENTION?

As scientists begin to talk up a cure, the old question of whether that's the right goal has re-emerged. Seth Berkley, a medical epidemiologist and head of the U.S.-based International AIDS Vaccine Initiative (IAVI) is concerned.

"From a science point of view, it's a fabulous thing to do. It's a great target and a lot of science will be learned. But from a public health point of view, the primary thing you need to do is stop the flow of new infections," says Berkley. "We need a prevention revolution. That is absolutely critical."

Vuyiseka Dubula agrees. The South African activist finds talk of a cure for HIV distracting, almost disconcerting. "This research might not yield results soon, and even when it does, access to that cure is still going to be a big issue," she says. "So in the meantime, while we don't have the answer on whether HIV can be cured or not, we need to save lives."

(Additional reporting by Julie Steenhuysen in Chicago, editing by Sara Ledwith and Simon Robinson )
Take Action:
  • Update: DADT has been repealed. President Obama has kept his promise!
  • Boycott Bill O'Reilly and FOX News and their advertisers. Bill discussed a French commercial by McDonalds that was meant to show that McDonalds is Gay Friendly. Bill said what is next? Is McDonalds going to be Al-Qaida friendly as well? Imagine - Bill O'Reilly compares Gays to Al-Qaida! In conclusion, O'Reilly expressed out-right Hatrad of the LGBT Community.
  • Boycott Arizona the home of "hater" - U.S. Senator John McCain. Arizona's Hateful anti-Immigration Law - encourages racial profiling and increases hatred towards minorities. A remedy: Demand Republicans to support Immigration Reform (The Dream Act). Further, Senator McCain voted against ending DADT and Blocked Immigration reform!
  • Boycott Target, Best Buy, Gold's Gym - for donating money towards anti-gay political candidates/organizations. Update: (12/26/2010): Target is continuing to donate to anti-gay groups/causes/politicians. Update 03/08/11 - Lady Gaga Ends Target Partnership, Reportedly Over Target's Poor LGBT Stance. Update 3/25/2010 - Target displays their hypocrisy and Sues California Gay Rights Group for Lobbying Outside Stores. Target is attempting to block the LGBT right of free speech! STOP SHOPPING AT TARGET!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Update 4/8/2011: Target lost it's case to stop the LGBT from canvassing in front of their stores. A huge PR Disaster for TARGET! Perhaps Target should go out of business as they betrayed their investers and customers. Target contributed massive funds to a politician who would like to exterminate gays. Now, Target can not stop us from Boycotting them, nor picketing, nor talking to customers near their stores; although, Target allows a anti-gay company such as the Salvation Army to stand outside their door and speak with customers and raise money. Isn't this a double standard? Perhaps TARGET would better understand the issue if they cared about David Kato - Uganda, who was slain because he is gay! That is because Uganda wants to kill gay people. Again, TARGET invested in a political candidate that would Kill the Gays!
  • End DOMA (Defense of Marriage Act). Prevents Federal employees and Gays in the Military from gaining equal benefits. Prevents Gay Partners from gaining equal benefits.
  • Pass ENDA (Employee Non-Discrimination Act). ENDA would prevent employment discrimination of LGBT workforce.
  • Boycott Salvation Army as they will not hire Gays! "DO NOT DONATE TO THEM."
  • BOYCOTT "Chick-fil-a" for donating to anti-gay marriage groups.
  • BOYCOTT KOCH INDUSTRIES PRODUCTS- to include their products: Angel Soft toilet paper / Brawny paper towels / Dixie plates, bowls, napkins & cups / Mardi Gras napkins and towels / Quilted Northern toilet paper / Soft 'n Gentle toilet paper / Sparkle napkins / Vanity fair napkins / Zee napkins / Georgia-Pacific paper products & envelopes / All Georgia-Pacific lumber & building products (INVISTA Products) / Lycra / Stainmaster Carpet. The billionaire - Koch brothers are ultra republican - tea bag founders/supporters that do not support causes of the LGBT community.
  • Boycott WALMART - The National Gay and Lesbian Task Force, force criticized Wal-Mart for denying employee benefits to same-s-x partners and for failing to prohibit discrimination based on gender identity. By comparison, the group said two other chain stores with a strong presence in New York, Costco and Walgreens, did much better.
  • NEW: "Tune Out Trump", Boycott all Trump Hotel, casinos, holdings, The Apprentice and NBC Network! At CPAC, Trump said he is considering a run for president as a Republican. In a interview with the Des Moines Register, Trump added that he opposes all forms of legal recognition for gay couples, not just marriage. "They should not be able to marry," he said. So why does NBC keep the Apprentice when Donald Trump has stated he may run for president? After making racist remarks about Obama and recv'g public backlash, Trump decided not to run for president after NBC renewed his awful TV Show. How can NBC renew the clown's show after he pulled all such low-class shenanigans? Boycott NBC! Boycott advertisers of The Apprentice and Trump's other business's. Don't shop at any bullding with Donald Trump's name to include Trump Hotels, Casinos, Condo's, Offices, Shops! The Donald has expressed extreme Hatred towards gays and blacks with his birther remarks and anti-gay rhetoric. Remember how poorly Trump treated Rosie O'Donnel? Now we know why he did that! It was hate against a lesbian as we now know he is biget. Unforgiveable! Dump NBC because they re-newed Donald Trump's "The Apprentice"! NBC, Really? Update June 1, 2011: Trump now claims that Obama's long form, original birth certificate is fake.   And NBC keeps this hater?  NBC, You Kidding Us?

And Now, Model Wars!

This group is called "Peckers Pics." The English - slang definition of "pecker" is to pluck at the truth. Therefore, we peck at items such as Gay Men's Health, Male Fitness, Gay (LGBT) Politics & Issues. In this section you may peck at each photo in order to decide the winner of the "war of the fittest!" Whereas, who is the model that may inspire you to exercise and "get fit?" Warning: This may stoke you!
 
Your participation in discussion of health / news articles - appearing in this message is greatly appreciated.
 
MARTIN PICHLER
 
VS
MARLON TEIXEIRA
 
You Decide!
2011.05.29 Pensacola Gay Pride; Fl, USA
Stoked?
2011.05.29 Pensacola Gay Pride; Fl, USA
Obama Administration Seeks To Address Homeless Crisis Among Gay Teens
Jason Cherkis - Huffington Post - June 1, 2011

WASHINGTON -- Jonathan had spent nearly a decade in Louisiana's child welfare system. The safest places, the gay teen discovered, were the moldy homes he squatted in after Hurricane Katrina.

Roofs sagged, floors caved in, mold veined walls and there were always rats. "It was very uncomfortable," said Jonathan. "Old, dark, lots of insects, rodents. ... It was times I cried." Often, he lit fires to keep the rats away.

At 18 years old, Jonathan had just aged out of foster care and was essentially homeless. But those boarded-up dwellings were peaceful refuges compared to the facilities he experienced as a state ward.

Jonathan had logged time in group homes, foster homes, shelters, a secure detention center and even a military boot-camp-style school. It didn't matter where he ended up. He said he always felt the sting of homophobia.

There were very few adults who hadn't given up on him.

His parents had left him with a set of grandparents who then abused him over his effeminate demeanor. On one occasion, Jonathan said, his grandmother attacked him with a two-by-four.

In the system, he didn't fare any better. Group home staff and residents taunted him with anti-gay slurs. At one point, a staffer broke his arm during a restraint. He was jumped at school and left battered and bruised. Foster parents evicted him out over his sexuality.

Safety meant being alone with his pens and paper. He'd spend hours drawing lions and tigers or sketching his self-portrait -- his face hidden in a hoodie.

"I felt abandoned because of my sexuality," Jonathan said. "[State workers] weren't trying to help. They were trying to get me out of the way."

No one ever seemed to want him for very long. By his count, he had stayed in dozens of facilities. When Jonathan ended up homeless, he shocked no one.

It has become an all-too-common trajectory for a significant number of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and questioning (LGBTQ) kids in the system.

This all-too-common story is now finding listeners in the White House. In April, the Obama administration sent out a lengthy memorandum calling on child welfare agencies to develop the kinds of interventions Jonathan needed most.

Jonathan, now 21, is still just scraping together a meager existence without much of a fixed address. He said he lives with a transgendered girlfriend. He doesn't have a phone.

Just last year Jonathan tried to kill himself, slashing his wrists with a razor blade. Friends found him and called the police, he said. He spent the night in a hospital.

"I felt like it wasn't worth it -- being in this world," Jonathan recalled. "Like I was nothing, like I was empty inside. It felt like I wasn't meant to live."

THE FEDERAL RESPONSE

The U.S. Department of Heath and Human Services' Administration on Children, Youth and Families sent out a memo on April 6 directly addressing the crisis facing gay teens in the system and encouraging local child welfare agencies to ensure their protection.

"This Information Memorandum (IM) confirms and reiterates my fundamental belief that every child and youth who is unable to live with his or her parents is entitled to a safe, loving and affirming foster care placement, irrespective of the young person's sexual orientation, gender identity or gender expression," wrote ACF Commissioner Bryan Samuels. "I encourage child welfare agencies, foster and adoptive parents and others who work with young people in foster care to ensure that their physical and emotional well-being are protected."

Samuels cited a numbing list of statistics showing just how vulnerable LGBTQ youth are in the system. Although five to 10 percent of the general population is estimated to be gay, anywhere between 20 and 40 percent of homeless youth are gay, according to the National Network of Runaway and Youth services. They are also far more likely to age out of the child welfare system without finding an adoptive family.

"The data demonstrates that efforts to support these youth are warranted," Samuels wrote. "It is the caseworker's responsibility to assess and serve the needs of each child without bias and to ensure the safety of all children in foster care."

Samuels goes on to mention that the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) funded several efforts to develop resources for local child welfare agencies that address homophobia.

The Samuels memo explicitly states that LGBT parents "should be considered" as foster and adoptive parents, a sentiment that has been hotly debated by state legislators across the country.

"[LGBTQ kids] need all the protection we can provide," Samuels told The Huffington Post. "That was what the memo aimed to do -- to give people immediate, practical strategies that they could take to better serve this population."

Samuels said he has received no push back over the memo. "We've got nothing but positive reaction. Nothing," he explained. "I have traveled around the country and met social workers who came up to me and shook my hand and said, 'finally, finally, finally.'"

Under the previous administration, advocates couldn't recall the phrase LGBTQ being uttered once. It was as if those kids just didn't exist.

"Literally in the last administration you were not allowed to talk about this," explained Gerald P. Mallon, a professor at New York's Hunter College School of Social Work who began researching LGBTQ kids in the mid-'90s. "If you put 'lesbian' or 'gay' in a workshop, you were guaranteed it wasn't going to be approved. It's night and day."

The feds are intent on making up for lost time -- and not with memos. The Obama administration is spending millions on a pilot program in L.A. County aimed at assisting LGBTQ youth in the child-welfare system, Samuels said.

Congress has taken up the issue as well. On May 3, Rep. Pete Stark (D-Calif.) reintroduced legislation that would ban discrimination of gay parents in adoption and foster care placements. Rep. Illeana Ros-Lehtinen (R-Fla.) signed on as the first Republican co-sponsor of the bill at the end of the month.

"My home state of Florida had discriminatory laws in place that were preventing caring parents from adoption," she said in a statement. "This Federal bill is a step in the right direction so that the proper match between responsible parent and needy child can take place regardless of the parent's sexual orientation."

In mid-May, Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.) introduced the Reconnecting Youth to Prevent Homelessness Act. More than 40 organizations and nonprofits signed on in support of the legislation.

Tucked into the bill, which calls for stronger supports for state wards, is a provision that HHS must create a five-year pilot program aimed at preventing families from rejecting gay children. The accompanying press release highlighted this angle. "There are common sense reforms we can implement to help make things better for LGBT youth," Kerry wrote.

The traumas facing LGBTQ youth have not been a silent ones. For nearly two decades, researchers have conducted listening forums all over the country and published their findings in dozens of reports. Task forces have been created and seminars have been held.

Caitlin Ryan, the director of the Family Acceptance Project, met with Kerry's staff a year ago to work on the bill. Ryan's research has shown that rejection can cause high rates of depression and other mental health problems in LGBTQ youth. Ryan's work has also proven that rejection rates among parents go way down when they're given proper supports.

"There's a long history of abuse and neglect in the child welfare system," Ryan said. "Really in the last six years, there's been much greater attention and realization that this is a very serious problem."

CITY AND STATE REFORM EFFORTS

Mainstream organizations like the Child Welfare League of America and the American Bar Association have published guidelines for front line workers and lawyers. The National Alliance to End Homelessness recommended a set of best practices.

Some state agencies created "safe zones" like New Jersey or hired staff to focus solely on LGBTQ youth like Illinois and Connecticut. Before Samuels joined the feds, he tailored programs for LGBTQ kids as the head of Chicago's child-welfare system.

But progress has been piecemeal.

"It's great to see at the federal level there's more attention being paid," said Rob Woronoff, the former director of the LGBTQ services with the Child Welfare League of America. "This is a case of the federal government playing catch up."

Despite all the nonprofit advocacy and local reforms, child welfare agencies are only as good as their staff and their pools of foster parents. And as more and more kids are coming out at younger ages, agencies are finding few foster homes willing to take them in.

An advocate in Tampa recalls the gay youth who experienced 48 placements in four years.

Another worker remembers the D.C. foster parent who kicked out a gay teenager because he liked his jeans creased a certain way.

In Connecticut, social workers recall the exorcism performed on a gay teen. In video clips, one preacher can be seen holding the teen to the floor by his neck while another one screams for the "homosexual demon" to "get out in the name of Jesus!" His is not the only exorcism case, the social workers say.

In New Orleans, kids have been placed temporarily behind bars after being rejected by their biological families. With a shortage of traditional foster homes, a detention facility can be their first placement. There just aren't enough traditional options, said BreakOUT! Director Wes Ware, whose Juvenile Justice Project of Louisiana youth organizing group works with Jonathan and other LGBTQ young people.

Ware said Jonathan's story is typical of what he sees. "Every out LGBT kid that I've had has been in nearly every placement in the state," he said, referring to the youths who'd ended up at juvenile detention facilities.

The Kerry and Stark bills could, advocates say, create safer placements for gay kids in the system -- and provide them with a better shot at a permanent home.

"Anything that gets the issue on the map and opened up into mainstream society" is beneficial, said Jill Jacobs, executive director of Family Builders in Oakland which finds permanent families for youth in foster care. More than half the families they work with are LGBT families. "Why are we allowing kids to be discriminated against in schools and institutions and mental health settings and group homes, homeless shelters?"

Cindy Watson, who directs a center for gay youth in Jacksonville, said the Stark bill could be particularly key in Florida. Last year, a Florida appeals court lifted the ban on gay adults from adopting. The implications of the ruling are still being studied.

Watson said it still remains unclear if same-sex couples could adopt. "Any federal laws that can come down is really important in Florida," Watson said. "The reality is that a lot of your young people continue to be rejected and thrown away by their families."

The federal legislation can't come fast enough.

True Colors Executive Director Robin McHaelen, whose nonprofit works to helping gay kids in the Connecticut system, said she fielded multiple calls recently about LGBTQ youths in peril.

One 18-year-old boy had been kicked out of his house by his biological parents over his sexuality. His parents, McHaelen recalled, told their son that "he was dead to them." It was Easter morning.

The youth tried to kill himself, McHaelen said. He had to remain hospitalized for an extended period of time while authorities attempted to find him a suitable home.

Even kids who are their own best advocates have a difficult time. Kianni Leigh Jones, the transitioning 20-year-old female living in D.C. and pictured above, has starred on teen panels and rainbow-flagged pamphlets. She gave a speech at her high school graduation that preached tolerance. She could be the bravest kid to ever wear lipstick inside family court.

But discrimination, the poor job market, and the District's high rents have all prevented Kianni from finding permanent living arrangements. She turns 21 in September, at which point she will no longer be a D.C. ward and will lose the city's child welfare housing supports.

Kianni is not sure where she will end up. Housing is a constant worry -- one that she has struggled with for years.

Kianni's family shunned her years ago. Before she identified as female, cousins stole her clothes after teasing that they were too feminine. An aunt Kianni was living with threatened her with a pistol and told her that she needed be more thug-like -- to get "scarred up."

After a move to a group home in 2006, a judge ordered that the facility provide Kianni with her own room, citing safety concerns, records show.

High school was even more perilous, according to Kianni's records. After a number of violent assaults, administrators quarantined Kianni in a guidance office for her protection. When school administrators were forced to return her to regular classes, they hired a bodyguard to trail her.

"You don't really know who's going to be there for you," she said. "I've been rejected so many times. I've been through the comments. I've been through the fights in the streets, at home, in school -- whether it was verbal or physical."

Kianni's traumas at home and school were well known. Court records fleshed out her struggles in the flat script of social workers: "Therapist also recommended a self-defense class for the client as a means of building [her] level of safety around intimidating persons."

She has been kicked out of the same foster home twice over her sexuality. Each time, Kianni was able to crash with her godmother. But after a night, the godmother would start complaining about her, and she had to return to the foster home.

Kianni's isolation got so acute that she began calling her cellphone carrier's help line with imaginary complaints, just so she could vent to somebody about something. She would even text herself encouraging messages like "good job," or "damn you so strong."

Social workers rarely understood Kianni's needs. Often her concerns about safety were met with smirks and eye-rolling. Some counselors refused to refer to her as a female. And no amount of self-defense classes could prepare her for navigating the apartment rental market without much, if any, family or government support.

Her social worker and city-appointed life coaches suggested during a recent meeting that Kianni consider living in a shelter for LGBTQ youth.

Kianni instantly rejected the idea of a shelter -- for now. "I don't understand why at 21, I have to deal with a shelter," she said. "I didn't want to look like I was going to cry -- it was in me. I wanted to let them know, and also let myself know, that that might be the worst-case scenario. I did that so I could feel more hopeful."
Every gay and lesbian person who has been lucky enough to survive the turmoil of growing up is a survivor. Survivors always have an obligation to those who will face the same challenges."
....Jake
 
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"Every gay and lesbian person who has been lucky enough to survive the turmoil of growing up is a survivor. Survivors always have an obligation to those who will face the same challenges."

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