Gay teen Graeme Taylor is headed to the
Ellen DeGeneres Show on Monday, November 22.
Taylor
is the 14-year-old boy who came to the defense of a teacher suspended
for booting an anti-gay student from his classroom.
“Last week, an incredible 14-year-old
named Graeme Taylor gave an inspirational speech defending his
teacher for stopping gay bullying,” the show said in announcing the
booking. “Today he's here to tell Ellen what motivated him to do
it.”
Jay McDowell, an economics teacher at
Howell High School in Michigan, was disciplined with a one day
suspension without pay for removing a student from his class after
the student said he doesn't accept gays.
Taylor was among the dozens of people
who showed up Monday at a school board meeting to support McDowell.
Taylor said he was gay and bullying had
driven him to a suicide attempt.
“I've been in classrooms where
children have said the worst things,” the boy told the board. “The
kinds of things that drove me to a suicide attempt when I was only 9
years old.”
“These are the things that hurt a
lot,” Taylor said. “There is a silent holocaust out there, in
which an estimated 6 million gay people every year kill themselves.”
“He did an amazing thing,” Taylor
added. “He did something that inspired a lot of people.” (The
video is embedded in the right panel of this page.)