Conservative celebrity Ann Coulter is
being criticized for joking about parents rejecting their gay sons.
The 50-year-old Coulter on Monday
messaged to her more than 228,000 Twitter followers: “Last Thursday
was national 'coming out' day. Monday is national 'disown your son'
day.”
Aaron McQuade, director of news and
field media at the Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation
(GLAAD), didn't find the humor in the tweet.
“I recognize that this is a joke, and
that she is not really taken seriously in any context anyway, but
with this coming right after National Coming Out Day, at the start of
Ally Week and just days before Spirit Day, I thought this would be a
good opportunity to talk about this idea of hers,” McQuade wrote in
a blog post. “There was a time in our culture's history when, if
thousands of LGBT kids were to come out on the same day, the next
week genuinely would be exactly what Ann describes, all across the
country. Fathers disowning their sons and kicking them out onto the
street. Mothers locking up their daughters or sending them to charm
school. Children forced to undergo electro-shock or even worse forms
of 'therapy' to rid themselves of their orientation. To learn how to
not be true to themselves.”
“And although we've come a long way
from those ideas as a cultural collective, I have no doubt that last
week, more than a few American households experienced the tragedy
that Ann joked about. … LGBT youth who are completely rejected by
their parents are more than 8 time as likely to have attempted
suicide,” he added, referring to a 2009
San Francisco State University study.
“Pretty funny, right?”
(Related: Ann
Coulter repeats claim that liberals would abort gay babies.)