Coming out three years ago was one of the most terrifying yet satisfying experiences of my life. The ability to express one’s identity with confidence and joy to the world is what I consider the ultimate freedom for an individual. Living in a city like Vancouver — usually regarded as a liberal and gay-friendly metropolis — it is not difficult to feel safe and recognized most of the time, in the same ways that I imagine a heterosexual person does.

Growing up however, I moved around a lot due to my Dad’s career. A couple of years into elementary school, the Spice Girls dominated the pop charts, and became an important topic of conversation on the playground. Seeing the young boy fighting with the girls over who got to play which Spice Girl had my homeroom teacher worried. I vividly remember my father that evening insisting that my girly toys be removed from the storage box. This was the first time I had ever felt like my Dad was ashamed of me.

The idea that a teen’s identity issues can be dealt with through song is not accurate.

By high school, I was used to feeling like the outsider; the days were rare when I was not attacked verbally or found my locker decorated with homophobic slurs. Fear kept me closeted throughout my teens.

Not once during my childhood did I read any books or watch any television programs that showed anyone other than straight people being treated fairly in a classroom setting. Being unable to see anyone like myself represented in my education of the world led me to fear that there was no one else like me.

Acting to the best of my abilities like the other kids ensured some level of security. Moving away from the small town that I grew up in for university provided me access to the community I needed to establish my identity as a gay man.

Even though the media landscape directed at youths today offers representation of teens identifying outside of heterosexuality, these images are not cohesive with the actual experiences of youth in elementary and high schools across the country. The idea that a teen’s identity issues can be dealt with through song, or that a young gay teen can go from a bullied, closeted kid, to an emblem of the LGBT community, is not an accurate vision of men and women who must decode and place themselves within the straight world.

In high school, the days were rare when I was not attacked verbally.

Instead of encouraging the ideal that waiting through grade school in fear is the solution to youth identity problems, one solution should be including comprehensive gender education programs in elementary schools. These would focus on preventing homophobic, transphobic, and heterosexist oppression at younger ages, thereby instilling a sense of pride in identities in the same ways that heterosexuality is honoured.

Efforts of such education have been made in BC with the passing of policy 5.45 in Burnaby in 2011, which provides legislation to combat homophobia and heterosexism in schools through increased knowledge of those defining outside of the heterosexual norm.

However, starting education at an earlier age of those who are not heterosexual would likely reduce the discrimination caused by silencing questioning youth.

Vancouver may offer a safe environment to an extent in presenting oneself as a gay person, but fear remains in many situations, which do not incite the same trepidation for heterosexuals. Non-heterosexual people must survey their settings prior to holding a partner’s hand or stealing a kiss. Fear could be eliminated entirely if these were actions we were accustomed to seeing all people as free to perform, whether in liberal Vancouver or a small-town in Alberta.