Why Spirit Day, the Trevor Project, and others like it are important to me.
I'm omnisexual. You could have both, either, or neither when it comes to plumbing and it won't affect your chances of dating me a bit. (My being married does affect those chances, but you know what I mean.) I started having my suspicions when I was twelve or thirteen and caught myself thinking about girls the same way I thought about boys.
I was also raised militant Catholic and heavily involved in my Catholic church's youth group. You can see where the dilemma came in. I was conflicted as to what to do about it until I nearly kissed my best friend at a concert our church band put on right after mass where the sermon had been about the evils of homosexuality. That's when I realized, "This isn't the place for me."
I really didn't completely understand how dangerous and scary it is to be, for all appearances, gay until I had my first girlfriend. We were in our mid-teens and stupid, teenagers "in love." You know what I mean. We held hands everywhere and blushed and giggled and it was very apparent that we were a couple. That's when I realized just how judgmental people were.
Wherever we went, there were dirty looks and whispered comments. Sometimes the comments weren't whispered. It was awful and, pretty soon, we stopped going on dates in public because I couldn't deal with it. I would shake and have to fight back tears when I'd hear some of the awful things that were said about us.
I've heard horrible things said from one straight family member to a gay one. Brothers! Just because of who he fell in love with, his brother said he was a terrible person and that the car accident that put him in the hospital was part of his punishment. (They weren't even Christian, either.)
I've listened to my lesbian friends tell me about how they're terrified to walk on campus without a male friend because they were afraid of being attacked after they heard a security guard "joking" with a group of frat boys about how "all they need is a good dicking."
I can't even begin to describe what my transsexual friends have told me. I've sat in my bed and cried for hours for them. I was scared for them and I wasn't even there! I literally can't imagine how scary it would be to have such hateful, violent things said about me.
When I worked retail, I would get these terrified glances from same-sex couples when they realized I knew they were together. It broke my heart to know that they were even terrified that people paid to serve them would judge them or say something.
I got lucky. I was involved in online communities when I started realizing my sexuality, so I found a very strong, reliable support network. Not everyone has that chance, though. To me, Spirit Day isn't about "protecting the gays" or stopping them from killing themselves, it's about letting them know that someone, not matter how far away or obscure, cares. That people have been through it and overcome it.
It's about letting people know they're still human and they're still loved.