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It is the damage done to us by growing up strapped inside a cultural straitjacket – a tight-fitting, one-size restraint imposed on us at birth – that leaves no room to grow. As therapist and author Joe Kort states so well in his book 10 Smart Things Gay Men Can Do to Improve Their Lives, what’s wrong is not our sexuality, but our experience of growing up in a society that still does not fully accept that people can be anything other than heterosexual and cisgendered (ie born into the physical gender you feel you are). The British Crime Survey 2009 showed that gay men used illicit drugs three times more than heterosexual men. More and more statistics reveal that LGBT people have higher levels of depression, anxiety, addiction and suicidal thoughts. What’s wrong is not our sexuality but the damage done by growing up inside a cultural straitjacket Culturally, homosexuality and misery have been linked so tightly by the haters over the years that they have become an offensive cliché to the point where any discussion is dismissed as prejudice.
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Talk of this is painful and flies against the zeitgeist. Despite more LGBT people than ever leading happy, successful lives (thank goodness), it is becoming increasingly clear that a disproportionate number of us are not thriving as we should. I didn’t have to go looking for Rob’s story. Despite how it may look, something isn’t working. I share Rob’s story with you because his experience is not unusual. The day after Thatcher’s death, Andy called the office to tell us that Rob had written notes to his parents and a birthday card to Andy, then gone to the seafront where he and his brothers and sister used to play as children, and hanged himself. Indeed, gay culture seemed to celebrate partying as a central tenet of our identity and Rob was smiling and laughing in the sexy Facebook pictures of him out clubbing, surrounded by friends. Lots of gay men, like straight people, drank a lot and took drugs. Together these things sound like a huge alarm bell, but spread across years they didn’t feel like an emergency lots of gay men, like straight people, had transient relationships. He had lost his job and moved back in with his parents. He had suffered a homophobic attack after getting off a bus. In May 2008, I was working more closely with Andy, and I asked after Rob from time to time.