We Are Different, Yet The Same

There are many artiste in Taiwan who supports the LGBT community and Jolin Tsai, a famous Taiwanese singer is one of them. She played the documentary during her concert in Taipei and brought many to tears.

Many face discrimination and having trouble coming out to either their friends or family which cause them to do harm to themselves. Madam Yap is one of the victim whose son committed suicide during third grade and now an activist supporting LGBT rights.

“When he was in third grade, his teacher told me that my son had hobbies like girls’ and asks me to take him to see the doctor. However, the psychiatrist told me “. I have to tell you that your son is very normal” if anybody thinks he is weird, he is the one who is abnormal.”  Yung-Chih(her son) never dared to go to restroom during break time because some schoolmates always mocked him as a sissy. They would take off his pants to check his gender.  My son said, “Mom, they take off my pants every day.” “They try to catch me and take my pants off” They took his pants off.  That’s how they bullied my son.

Once he wrote a note to me. He wrote, “Mom you have to rescue me” “They want to beat me”. I was so angry that I went to the school to argue.  Because I called the teacher several times they never paid attention to it at all.

In the morning of April, 20th, 2000 Yung Chih left the classroom 5 minutes before the bell rang. Then, he was found lying in a pool of blood. He died after being taken to the hospital. When they took him to the emergency room, his mouth and nostrils were non-stop bleeding. I said, ‘its doomed’ .The school cleaned up the blood in the restroom without reporting to the police.

There was once a high school student who wrote a letter to me. He said it’s a miracle that he could survive until today. So many kids committing suicide and jumping off the windows. Are they guilty?  I would ask, ‘are they guilty?” I lost my kid. However, I have to save their kids like him. If I can rescue them by declare my stands, I am willing to.  Be yourself. Don’t be afraid. My kids don’t cry. Do not cry. Your tears show that you are weak. But we do nothing wrong at all. We have to face the sunlight to fight for our right. Though you are different from others, there is always someone behind you.”