Anti-gay attitudes have almost vanished from UK schools; for boys "homophobia bears the same stigma as racism." I'm sure this news will cause campaigners who decry lad culture and portray all young men as sexist rapists-in-the-making to pause....

2014-03-25T21:20:37+00:00

I'm not surprised, honestly.

When I was in high school 10 years ago, while 'gay' was a generic term used to express contempt towards anything or anyone you didn't like, nobody actually bullied the gay kids. Not even the lisping one with the purse.

We still used 'gay' to mean something negative, but you never said it to someone who was actually gay. It was a word used to jab at people at things, but if you used it against a someone who was actually gay... well, then you'd either look stupid or excessively spiteful.

2014-03-25T20:50:19+00:00

I'm going to send this to one of my best friends back in the UK - he'll like it, and I don't think he keeps up with the Economist all that much.

He and his fiance are really getting active at our old local school to support LGBT students. We went to school there together around the 1990-2000 period (I can't remember the dates, hazy brain) and I remember there was a lot of homophobia in the halls. For the boys, the great 'Target Factor' was being gay, and for girls, it was being bisexual. My friend tells me it's getting better there, since the school has cooperated with their request to open up the conversation about sexuality.

Sorry. Random life story there, but it's nice to see this touching close to one of my homelands.

Scrotorium · 2014-03-26T07:45:20+00:00

McCormack's sample was exactly three schools, only one of which the article claims was a rough school.

He clearly didn't go to mine. I left school early because of the shit time I had.

Perhaps it is getting better, in fact, I'm sure it is, but there's still a fucking long way to go.

Deficio123 · 2014-03-27T15:27:28+00:00

Good to hear this. Hopefully it transfers over to the states and people stop using 'gay' as a synonym for something being bad or stupid.

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