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Last Night's Demonstration

Today's news related to last night's demonstration here in Salt Lake City, Utah (in support of vulnerable LGBT youth affected by the anti-gay discrimination perpetuated by LDS leaders like Elder Boyd K. Packer's right on the heels of numerous LGBT teenage suicides):


And also, from the Huffington Post today:

4 Bullied Teen Deaths At Ohio School

MENTOR, Ohio — Sladjana Vidovic's body lay in an open casket, dressed in the sparkly pink dress she had planned to wear to the prom. Days earlier, she had tied one end of a rope around her neck and the other around a bed post before jumping out her bedroom window.

The 16-year-old's last words, scribbled in English and her native Croatian, told of her daily torment at Mentor High School, where students mocked her accent, taunted her with insults like "Slutty Jana" and threw food at her.

It was the fourth time in little more than two years that a bullied high school student in this small Cleveland suburb on Lake Erie died by his or her own hand – three suicides, one overdose of antidepressants. One was bullied for being gay, another for having a learning disability, another for being a boy who happened to like wearing pink. Read More >

Discrimination is an ugly, tragic thing. I'm relieved that so many people are speaking out against hate speech and highlighting the dire impact it has - including fearless non-homophobic Mormons who love and accept their LGBT family members and friends and speak up amongst their discriminatory leaders and peers.

Update: The LDS Church published an edited version of Packer's talk; altered from what he originally said. I find it interesting that the president of the quorum of the twelve, the next in line to be the president of the church, has to have his words edited before they're published.


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