Sorry it's been so long since I last made one of these, as a college student, I quickly get overwhelmed by life offline and put off my duties online, but make no mistake I don't forget you guys. So I took a break from midterm studying to make one of these weekly monthly discussions. Ugh so much good material passed since our last talk, so its hard to think of a topic but I find its better to just start writing and let the questions come out by themselves. Hopefully we can make and break some conclusions here. Also mention some topics you guys want to discuss on here for next month, I apologize for my poor editing once again.

First of all read this.

Beautiful letter, right? It emulates the progressive change in parenting as we come to a more and more sexually inclusive era of societal thinking. It's great isn't it, to see that in such a short time, we can become so accepting as a society of our kids and their sexual identities. But this is not to ignore the still growing mass of LGBT youth thrown out of their homes for being gay. I hope this number did not blindside you, that 40% of youth on the streets are there because they are gay. Even worse, so considering that only %7 of the population is gay, that means for every one letter like this several tens of young gay teenagers are finding themselves on the streets to fend for themselves.

Are we, as a gay community, forgetting about these poor homeless LGBT youths?

When we look at the front pages of websites like www.queerty.com, or www.advocate.com, we see the latest tweets of some good-looking gay actor, the latest happenings with RuPaul, and hear of the increasing homophobia of places like the Middle East and Western Africa. But gay teen homeless shelters go unnoticed and are few and far between, large ones like the Ali Forney Center barely makes bill each month and are vying for the same humble aspirations every year. The big dead ringer for the gay community is that now we have marriage, now we've won. Although many gay teens hope more for a home than a piece of paper, prostitution, and incarceration are eminent for these poor teens whose chance at life were dashed the moment they realized that they were gay. The few dissenters lack the means and power, and many simply forget about the troubles of this forever poor subclass.

I have a gay friend-with-benefits who lives similarly in this situation. Barely above twenty he lives in essentially the Latin projects in the underside of downtown Houston. He was an L.A. Born hopeful who first piqued my interest when he hit me with some of his intelligent discourse after a nice evening in his economy flat he shares with another person, he looked purely like a hoodlum, with a shirt two sizes too big, a shoddily done tattoo running down his left forearm, gawky beer stained teeth, and big baggy jeans, and a brandless pair of sneakers. He'll go on and on about how much he loved L.A. and hopes to save the money to go back, he'll never tell you about where he came from, but hit with you some searing sarcasm with a line from Walden or Palahniuk's work his favorite author. As you can imagine his past is trivial now, memories won't replace his worn down sneakers, or make up for the big brown scar above his thigh that he's so anxious about. Salvation army is closing early tomorrow and if he gets there late all that'll be left are the XLs, he needs a ride to the HEB by the car store because he can't afford to lose this job, he has a safe of weed that has to be gone by tomorrow and if he cashes this batch he'll lose his head. He's tired, but it is a life.

How do you think you would've been if it wasn't for your parents' opinions of homosexuality?

I ask this, in question of all the gay teens who didn't reveal themselves. Who hid in fear and indignity into their late-twenties when they were unbridled with adult independence. But still felt the rigors of their parents heavy hands, as we make it seem as if it's simply a choice between our parent's accepting us or renouncing us. But it's much more than that, there is the quiet in between where we hide until we're ready, or until it's time. According to John Panchankis we over-achieve, at least for gay men, we try to make up for our lies, our depreciated self worth, by excelling in competitive areas of academics and sports. In which these closeted gay men find themselves so entrenched that they can't come out in the face of no danger for the simple reason of keeping face. To hide from our raw animal sexuality, we lose ourselves the large bounds of society and its contests. We come self important with the awards of society because of the lack of acknowledgement from our parents. Luckily, our society makes its attempts to counteract this negativity. With over-the-top additions of gay characters and innuendos. With good intentions of course gay teens nowadays can find themselves in these gay archetypes and their plight and struggles, however vapid and 2D and generalized these characters its not about the character, but the feeling they and we feel through the struggles we closeted men and women don't get to experience. Even video games and joining in on this untapped emotion It is evident that society is growing in progressive liberal views, but will that ice over big brown scars we carry over our abdomens, will that make up for the words our parents never said?

I leave you with this one last question:

What is the most powerful statement your parents said about sexuality?

• Donate to the Ali Forney Center here
• Beware the Ides of March guys! - Esosa O.