What Do You Think You're Doing Here?
An Examination of Othering in American Society Towards LGBTQ+ Individuals
Ray Carmody
In November of 1993, Brandon Teena was in love. He met Lana Tisdel in Falls City in southern Nebraska shortly after driving there from Lincoln. Their young relationship bloomed quickly over the coming weeks. Soon he even saw her bedroom.
He found Lana drunk outside a convenience store, yelling at the attendant inside for not selling her beer (Boys Don’t Cry). She was nineteen, but Brandon was twenty-one. Even if he were underage, though, it was likely that he would have stolen it for her anyway. He was the type of romantic who would give someone anything—even if it meant stealing or using that person’s money. He liked to see women happy. His ex-girlfriends describe how sensitive and thoughtful he was, getting them flowers and teddy bears. Photocopies of notes include: “Just because. Here you go. Love Brandon” (The Brandon Teena Story).
Brandon handed Lana a beer and brought her home. Her mother lay on the couch in the living room; Lana was embarrassed to the point of pushing him away. But he led her to her bed. Lana’s room was filled with cow-objects. She had numerous ceramic cows, cow t-shirts, a cow alarm clock, and a lamp with a cow base. As she drifted to sleep, he might have looked around the room, smiling to himself at the eccentric, beautiful person he found. Their relationship continued, and Brandon became friends with Lana’s friends and mother. John Lotter and Tom Nisson were his male compatriots, whom he met through Lana. They included him in games like turf surfing, where they would hold a rope as they rode on the tailgate of a truck. The driver drove in circles over bumps in the dirt until the rider fell off. Lisa Lambert, another new friend he met there, offered to let Brandon stay at her house in Humboldt, a few towns away, along with her infant son Tanner. Lana’s mother threw a birthday party for him on December 12. Everyone came. Brandon found a new family in this small town, where he could escape from a lifetime of bad memories.
Most of this hospitality ceased when people found out Brandon was born female.
On December 31st of 1993, John Lotter shot Brandon in the head. He died instantly. Then Tom Nisson stabbed him (Boys Don’t Cry).
* * *
There is a nation-wide crisis occurring in America. People who are lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, intersex, queer, questioning or even an ally are being made enemies of the “mainstream.” There are groups, societies and individuals who condone, perpetuate and sometimes participate in bullying, violence, and rarely, murder. Brandon Teena, who was transgender, is but one victim.
There are a variety of reasons why people bully or are violent towards others, but one of the most prevalent reasons is to gain or maintain a sense of power. Catherine Bradshaw, a developmental psychologist at Johns Hopkins University, describes bullying as “a way of pulling your core group closer and putting someone else out of it” (Marshall). LGBTQ+ people are those already considered on the fringes of society in many situations across the country, so they are some of the easiest to make “the other.” Othering is a technique anyone can use to differentiate oneself from another group of people.
Not only are individuals from the queer community being bullied and made outsiders, but relentlessly so, to the point that many actually commit suicide. I personally have not known anyone who has been murdered or has committed suicide for being LGBTQ+, but I do know individuals who have been bullied, and I have seen the reports of such occurrences, which seem to be ever increasing. Bullying is painful, and I can understand why it would drive someone, especially a student, to suicide in particular. Incessant taunts at school, humiliation, and rejection from peers is devastating to anyone. Yet, unfortunately, the bullying does not always stop there.
LGBTQ+ individuals are reportedly stalked, threatened and even injured. One study found that “they hear anti-gay slurs such as ‘homo,’ ‘faggot’ and ‘sissy’ about 26 times a day or once every 14 minutes. Even more troubling, a study found that thirty-one percent of gay youth had been threatened or injured at school in the last year alone” (Mental Health America).
In the past few years, teen suicides have skyrocketed. A study published by the Center for Disease Control in 2007 found that “suicide was the only statistically significant increase in child death over this time. Overall, the suicide rate increased by 18.2 percent from 2003 to 2004” (“CDC Finds Increase”). And this is just the most recent study the center has conducted.
Many people have addressed this poignant issue. In the fall of 2010, a friend, who happens to be gay, posted a video on his Facebook that I watched. It was a recording of a council meeting in Fort Worth City, Texas from October 12, 2010. The back row is filled with men in pink shirts. The moderator calls for order and gives Councilman Joel Burns, a little-heard of person even in his district, the floor. The pink shirts are for breast cancer awareness, he explains, but he wants to use his announcement time to address another issue. A picture appears on the overhead screen of a young boy, smiling. The name Asher Brown is below it. Burns’ voice is calm and steady, that of a councilman. “The parents of Asher Brown complained to school officials in the banks outside of Houston that their son was being bullied and harassed in school. The bullies called him ‘faggot’ and ‘queer.’ They shoved him; they punched him. In spite of his parents’ calls to counselors and principals, the harassment, intimidation, and threats continued. For years, it continued.” The video switches back to a view of Burns. “A couple of weeks ago, after being bullied at school, Asher went home, found his father’s gun, and shot himself in the head. His father found Asher dead when he came home from work. Asher was thirteen years old.” He pauses, looks up. His voice changes slightly. The shot of Asher comes back into view. “I—I’d like for you to look at his face” (“Joel Burns”).
Silence.
The quiet comes over the room for only a few seconds, but it stretches long enough to see the boyish young grin, the eyes squinting in the sun. In that space, in the photograph, one could almost see him or herself.
And then he is gone.
I thought about how much a bully needs to work to harass someone so much for so long. When this same friend, Jim, came back to the suite, I told him I’d seen the video with Joel Burns. He sat down with me, and we talked about the prominence of bullying and violence. Many students are bullied for varying differences from others. Take having an accent, for example, or developing early. Being a teen who is LGBTQ+ or having any other unconventional sexuality or gender identity is one of the most pertinent factors in a teen committing suicide. Soul Force, a website dedicated to the LGBTQ+ community, cites a finding by a study appearing in The Archives of Pediatric and Adolescent Medicine that “teenagers who are gay or bisexual are more than three times as likely to attempt suicide as other youth” (Soul Force).
Jim described being the only person who came out as gay in high school and enduring a lot of harassment for it. Two girls even ambushed him on a sidewalk, trying to kick and punch him. He got away, but he will never forget the hate he endured that day. There was no community of other teens or teachers that could shift the balance of power. Mostly, the adults did not even care. So when someone like Joel Burns takes ten minutes to talk about the issue of bullying, Jim couldn’t help but cry. That was the kind of recognition he could have used four years ago.
* * *
Brandon Teena was born Teena Renae Brandon and was raised as a female. The best current documentation of his experience in life and the years leading to that fateful December morning is The Brandon Teena Story.
He was born December 12, 1972. After openly identifying as male in his teenage years, he began introducing himself as Brandon Teena. In straight relationships, he dated several teenaged girls.
“I thought Brandon was attractive… when I thought it was Brandon,” Daphne, one of Brandon’s ex-girlfriends, says, “until I find out Brandon’s Teena.” As she says this, Daphne points to one side and then to other, her voice inflecting with subtle surprise on the name Teena. “Teena Renae instead of Tenna. Ray. Brandon. I found all that out, and I was like, oh my god, what am I doing?” She holds the index and middle fingers of each hand to her temples (The Brandon Teena Story).
As I watched the documentary, I was fascinated by the different reactions to Brandon’s identity and behavior. Some tolerated him, but others considered his gender expression to be deception (The Brandon Teena Story).
When there was a large enough group of people he knew didn’t trust him anymore, and too many people found out he was biologically female, he made a rash decision. He escaped the best way he knew how. He stole a car and drove 105 miles to Falls City without notifying a soul (The Brandon Teena Story).
* * *
Driving into the Falls City line, Brandon saw the welcoming sign broadcasting the humble little town’s name. Under it read, “A great place to live. Good people, churches, schools.” He passed long acres of fields where the cows might have grazed in the coming winter, the local Hinky Dinky convenience store, Christmas bells hanging above the streets, and the people holding hands, working, or walking the streets. There were trains loaded with coal traveling down the tracks, rodeo shows with men in caps and beer cans in hand sitting on the benches, and women with long hair and stud earrings beside them.
“Falls City is a white community,” Lana says in an interview. “There may have been a family or two that was black, but as far as us having gay people come in, Falls City would, I’m sure, escort ‘em out of town.” John Lotter agrees, adding with a smirk that one would be lucky if he or she, “especially a girl,” didn’t end up with kids and on welfare for the rest of his or her life. “That’s Falls City for ya” (The Brandon Teena Story).
Here is where he met the people who would become his friends, surrogate family, and girlfriend. They treated him as such too, and he must have felt deeply at peace. Until, that is, he was arrested for forgery—he’d written a bad check, and he was charged as female. Lana wanted to bail him out, but she was underage, so she gave Tom and John the money to do it. They got Brandon and brought him back to Tom’s house. But not everyone thought things should go back to the way they were.
John’s sister, Michelle, voices her opinion in the documentary. Her voice is accusing. “Let him do his time. Then he can get the hell out of here; I said, what does he think he’s doing, bringin’ this shit to a small town like this, y’know. He just needs to get the fuck out of here. I told her [Brandon], something’s gonna happen if you don’t get out of here.” She takes a moment, shifting to the side in her swivel chair and flicking the filter side of the cigarette with her thumb. “I was mad at him, but I was worried about what would happen to him if he stayed there.” For Michelle and many other of Brandon’s once-friends, running was the solution. “I was not happy about it,” Linda Gutierres, Lana’s mother, says, “I did not want Lana in the situation with Brandon any longer.” If they express concern for Brandon, it is an after thought. They know their town. And they know he should not have come. So do John and Tom.
That night, on Christmas Eve, John and Tom pull down Brandon’s pants and underwear. John grabs Lana, demanding that she look, that Tom won’t let go of Brandon until she looks. She peeks, and then closes her eyes again. Linda demands that Lana never see Brandon again. “She told me to get away from him,” Lana recalls, “because them kind of people have AIDS.”
Later, John and Tom drive Brandon to an open field a few miles away and take turns raping him.
Eerie enough is that JoAnn, Brandon’s mother, predicts this poignant event. “I figured some guy would find out that she was female, if he didn’t know right away, y’know, and just rape her. And it was… what do I want to say? I kind of felt like it would happen, but I didn’t… I was trying to put the fear of God in her. Y’know, more or less, because… cause people are cruel.”
It seems everyone expects this. It is the natural and expected outcome for someone like Brandon. It is natural to rape someone, as if to put him or her in his or her place. After John and Tom were done, they all got back in the front seat, and Tom asked if they were still friends. What Tom must have actually been asking was, “So, are you going to tell on us?” John and Tom stared at him. Brandon must have sensed that his safety was in jeopardy. If he said no or stayed quiet, they might rape him again—or kill him. So he replied, “Yeah.”
He likely felt angry, confused, horrified, and numb all at once. Why did they do that? Did they really just do that to prove he was a girl?
* * *
Harassment and violence are everywhere. Instead of condemning that behavior, though, there are groups like Focus on the Family that condone it. Focus on the Family actually blames individuals who have sexual orientations and/or gender identities that fall outside the norm. The site writer demeans the LGBTQ+ movements as falsely seeking “legitimization—not just tolerance—of homosexual behavior, resulting in changing societal mores and values that deeply impact Americans in their day-to-day relationships with family members, neighbors and coworkers” (Focus on the Family).
How exactly do these changing norms impact society so negatively? Dobson does not address this point other than to say that these individuals “undermine the fundamental order established by God himself” (Focus on the Family).
Yet the results of desperately trying to maintain the norm are in fact far-reaching and deeply impacting people everywhere who feel that they are wrong, somehow, fundamentally, for being themselves. Groups like Focus on the Family perpetuate myths, like that LGBTQ+ people are perverts, abnormal, and prone to sexually abusing others. They tell parents that their children can be counseled out of it. Soul Force disagrees.
Like Joel Burns, a family that is part of Soul Force takes a nonviolent stand against prejudice. They walk in unison up to the yard of Focus, where they are stopped by an officer and told if they continue they will be arrested for trespassing. Crowds have gathered around them. With brevity, the son in the group explains what they want to show Dr. Dobson.
“This is what a family is supposed to be. A family is supposed to be about love and acceptance. I am so proud to be standing here today, with people who love me and accept me as a gay man. They understand what it means to be a parent. Dr. Dobson teaches people that if their son or daughter comes out as a gay or lesbian person, that they need to not accept that part of them. And that destroys families” (“Soul Force on Focus on the Family”). The family, arms over shoulders, walks onto the field. And then they are peaceably arrested. As they are loaded into the police cruiser, chants of “Praise God” can be heard from the crowds. Praise God, praise God (“Soul Force”).
When people don’t accept others, and instead turn to harassment and violence, teens especially suffer from extreme distress. Mental Health America reports that LGBTQ+ youth are even “unable to receive an adequate education” because of the extent of the bullying. They feel “unsafe,” and as much as 28% “of gay students drop out of school. This is more than three times the national average for heterosexual students” (Mental Health America). Some do not make it to drop out.
* * *
As soon as he could, Brandon came back to Lana’s house. Linda didn’t want him there, but when she saw that he was hurt, she acquiesced. She was angry, she said, but no one deserved to be kidnapped and beaten. Lana said he was quieter, never quite the same. He went to the police station to press charges and give his testimony. Sheriff Laux took it. In the recording in The Brandon Teena Story, Laux is just as confused as the other people in Falls City. He asks Brandon if the boys had “fondled him any,” or why he “runs around with girls instead of guys, being a girl.” Brandon responds quietly but defiantly to the latter question. “What does this have to do with what happened last night?” In the morning he went to a hospital and had a rape kit done. The chief of police found that the injuries were consistent with rape and wanted to investigate further, so no arrests were made. Afterwards, Brandon went to stay with Lisa Lambert.
Lotter and Nisson found out that Brandon had told the police. They knew they’d be arrested the next morning. So, very early on December 31, they went to Lisa’s house. Consider the scene. Consider everything leading up to it, the feelings, complacency and othering done by many he met.
“They saw it as, ‘How dare she tell on us. How dare she’,” One of the sheriffs recalls.
They broke in through the back door.
“I didn’t think it was gonna go down the way it did. They wanted to scare him,” Michelle says in an interview.
John Lotter had stolen a gun the night before.
An interviewer asks Nilsson, “Did you ever say, ‘we’re just getting rid of a couple of dykes?’” Nisson responds, “I believe at one time I referred to Teena as a lesbian, yes.”
Tanner, Lisa’s infant son, cried in his crib.
“I wanted him to get the fuck out of here.”
Lotter found Brandon, grabbed him, and shot him. The bullet went underneath his chin and out through the top of his skull. Lisa screamed, begging them not to hurt her baby. Nisson shot her so close to her eye that it was burned. Then Nisson asked for the knife Lotter had. Nisson grabbed Brandon and stabbed him once in the navel area. Finally, Lotter found another person, Phillip DeVine, in the living room. DeVine happened to be there because he had a fight with his girlfriend, Lisa’s sister, the night before. Lotter shot him. Tanner was the only survivor.
“Why did you do that?” A lawyer asked Nilsson during the trial about stabbing Brandon. “To make sure she was dead,” Nisson responded.
“The lives of five people were ruined that night,” said Deputy Sheriff Jon Larson. “Three dead and two in jail.” Lotter and Nisson were arrested for rape in the morning. Prosecuting them for murder took another two years. The communities of Humboldt and Falls City mourned the tragedy, mostly for Lisa and DeVine. As for Brandon, the media broadcasted news reports with inflecting voices at a twist to the triple homicide story: one of the victims was a woman posing as a man. The families receive some form of closure when Nisson is sentenced to life and Lotter to death, but even in interviews there is some space. There are people saying that Brandon should never have been trusted, because he was a liar. Lotter says that Lana is probably still delusional, calling Brandon a “he.” Nisson refuses to answer specific questions about the rape and murders because it could endanger his appeal process. Everyone is surprised that it came to murder.
“But I’ve seen it time and time again,” says US Marshall Ron Shepherd. “They don’t view people… they don’t view homosexuals, people that are different from them, as equal. They think it’s okay. They think, I can shoot her, y’know, she’s a lesbian. A cross dresser. She’s a dyke. She’s less than human. And they rationalize it that way. I’ve seen it before” (The Brandon Teena Story).
* * *
Stories of violence, bullying and pain are not limited to the news. They are a reality. I see it in my friends, and I see it in society. I see the pain of kids who are struggling with their sexuality or gender identity from performing in Reality Check, a social action troupe at Franklin Pierce University. We have a tolerance skit that unabashedly describes the violence, physical and emotional, that results from othering and condoning of the behavior. Three kids alone, during our tour to several high schools over our spring break of 2011, admitted that they were contemplating suicide and sought out help. One even had a plan. Brandon Teena and the few specific suicides mentioned in this essay are extreme examples of the larger problem. Brandon Teena serves as a reminder that bullying and hate are a big deal. Because they can lead to murder.
Though there are groups like Focus on the Family, there are also Soul Force, Mental Health America, Joel Burns, the “It Gets Better” campaign, and Reality Check that educate and encourage love and acceptance. As Joel Burns says in his address to the council, “The bullying needs to stop” (“Joel Burns”). And with each one of these small voices, perhaps it will.
They become the voices that sweep across America.
In memory of:
Asher Brown
Seth Walsh
Billy Lucas
Justin Aaberg
Tyler Clementi
Raymond Chase
Brandon Teena
And everyone else who has fallen to suicide, murder, or silence.
Years after Joel Burns came out as gay, and after struggling with bullying and a near suicide attempt, his tough cowboy-type father held Burns’ hand.
His father said, “Joel, I’m so glad you’re here today.”
Burns choked: “I am too, Dad. I am too.”
(“Joel Burns”)
Bibliography
Boys Don't Cry. Dir. Kimberly Peirce. Perf. Hilary Swank, Chloë Sevigny. Fox Searchlight
Pictures, 2009. DVD.
The Brandon Teena Story. Dir. Susan Muska and Gréta Olafsdóttir. Docuramafilms, 1998. DVD.
"Bullying and Gay Youth.” Mental Health America. 2011. Web. 2 May 2011.
“CDC Finds Increase in Teen Suicide; NYU Child Study Center Responds—Identifies Warning
Signs and Provides Tips for Parents.” Medical News Today. 6 February 2007. Web. 10 April 2011.
Dobson, James. “Pro-Gay Revisionist Theology.” Focus on the Family, n.d. Web. 2 May 2011.
“Joel Burns tells gay teens ‘it will get better.’” Perf. Joel Burns. Youtube. 13 Oct. 2010. Web. 25
Mar. 2011. <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ax96cghOnY4>.
Marshall, Jessica. “Why Do People Bully?” Discovery News. 1 April 2010. Web. 2 May 2011.
“Soul Force on Focus on the Family.” Perf. Soul Force. Youtube. 11 February 2010. Web. 2 May
2011. <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t2sDv6b_mmY>.
“Study Shows Gay Teens at Greater Risk.” Soul Force. 18 May 1999. Web. 10 April 2011.
He found Lana drunk outside a convenience store, yelling at the attendant inside for not selling her beer (Boys Don’t Cry). She was nineteen, but Brandon was twenty-one. Even if he were underage, though, it was likely that he would have stolen it for her anyway. He was the type of romantic who would give someone anything—even if it meant stealing or using that person’s money. He liked to see women happy. His ex-girlfriends describe how sensitive and thoughtful he was, getting them flowers and teddy bears. Photocopies of notes include: “Just because. Here you go. Love Brandon” (The Brandon Teena Story).
Brandon handed Lana a beer and brought her home. Her mother lay on the couch in the living room; Lana was embarrassed to the point of pushing him away. But he led her to her bed. Lana’s room was filled with cow-objects. She had numerous ceramic cows, cow t-shirts, a cow alarm clock, and a lamp with a cow base. As she drifted to sleep, he might have looked around the room, smiling to himself at the eccentric, beautiful person he found. Their relationship continued, and Brandon became friends with Lana’s friends and mother. John Lotter and Tom Nisson were his male compatriots, whom he met through Lana. They included him in games like turf surfing, where they would hold a rope as they rode on the tailgate of a truck. The driver drove in circles over bumps in the dirt until the rider fell off. Lisa Lambert, another new friend he met there, offered to let Brandon stay at her house in Humboldt, a few towns away, along with her infant son Tanner. Lana’s mother threw a birthday party for him on December 12. Everyone came. Brandon found a new family in this small town, where he could escape from a lifetime of bad memories.
Most of this hospitality ceased when people found out Brandon was born female.
On December 31st of 1993, John Lotter shot Brandon in the head. He died instantly. Then Tom Nisson stabbed him (Boys Don’t Cry).
* * *
There is a nation-wide crisis occurring in America. People who are lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, intersex, queer, questioning or even an ally are being made enemies of the “mainstream.” There are groups, societies and individuals who condone, perpetuate and sometimes participate in bullying, violence, and rarely, murder. Brandon Teena, who was transgender, is but one victim.
There are a variety of reasons why people bully or are violent towards others, but one of the most prevalent reasons is to gain or maintain a sense of power. Catherine Bradshaw, a developmental psychologist at Johns Hopkins University, describes bullying as “a way of pulling your core group closer and putting someone else out of it” (Marshall). LGBTQ+ people are those already considered on the fringes of society in many situations across the country, so they are some of the easiest to make “the other.” Othering is a technique anyone can use to differentiate oneself from another group of people.
Not only are individuals from the queer community being bullied and made outsiders, but relentlessly so, to the point that many actually commit suicide. I personally have not known anyone who has been murdered or has committed suicide for being LGBTQ+, but I do know individuals who have been bullied, and I have seen the reports of such occurrences, which seem to be ever increasing. Bullying is painful, and I can understand why it would drive someone, especially a student, to suicide in particular. Incessant taunts at school, humiliation, and rejection from peers is devastating to anyone. Yet, unfortunately, the bullying does not always stop there.
LGBTQ+ individuals are reportedly stalked, threatened and even injured. One study found that “they hear anti-gay slurs such as ‘homo,’ ‘faggot’ and ‘sissy’ about 26 times a day or once every 14 minutes. Even more troubling, a study found that thirty-one percent of gay youth had been threatened or injured at school in the last year alone” (Mental Health America).
In the past few years, teen suicides have skyrocketed. A study published by the Center for Disease Control in 2007 found that “suicide was the only statistically significant increase in child death over this time. Overall, the suicide rate increased by 18.2 percent from 2003 to 2004” (“CDC Finds Increase”). And this is just the most recent study the center has conducted.
Many people have addressed this poignant issue. In the fall of 2010, a friend, who happens to be gay, posted a video on his Facebook that I watched. It was a recording of a council meeting in Fort Worth City, Texas from October 12, 2010. The back row is filled with men in pink shirts. The moderator calls for order and gives Councilman Joel Burns, a little-heard of person even in his district, the floor. The pink shirts are for breast cancer awareness, he explains, but he wants to use his announcement time to address another issue. A picture appears on the overhead screen of a young boy, smiling. The name Asher Brown is below it. Burns’ voice is calm and steady, that of a councilman. “The parents of Asher Brown complained to school officials in the banks outside of Houston that their son was being bullied and harassed in school. The bullies called him ‘faggot’ and ‘queer.’ They shoved him; they punched him. In spite of his parents’ calls to counselors and principals, the harassment, intimidation, and threats continued. For years, it continued.” The video switches back to a view of Burns. “A couple of weeks ago, after being bullied at school, Asher went home, found his father’s gun, and shot himself in the head. His father found Asher dead when he came home from work. Asher was thirteen years old.” He pauses, looks up. His voice changes slightly. The shot of Asher comes back into view. “I—I’d like for you to look at his face” (“Joel Burns”).
Silence.
The quiet comes over the room for only a few seconds, but it stretches long enough to see the boyish young grin, the eyes squinting in the sun. In that space, in the photograph, one could almost see him or herself.
And then he is gone.
I thought about how much a bully needs to work to harass someone so much for so long. When this same friend, Jim, came back to the suite, I told him I’d seen the video with Joel Burns. He sat down with me, and we talked about the prominence of bullying and violence. Many students are bullied for varying differences from others. Take having an accent, for example, or developing early. Being a teen who is LGBTQ+ or having any other unconventional sexuality or gender identity is one of the most pertinent factors in a teen committing suicide. Soul Force, a website dedicated to the LGBTQ+ community, cites a finding by a study appearing in The Archives of Pediatric and Adolescent Medicine that “teenagers who are gay or bisexual are more than three times as likely to attempt suicide as other youth” (Soul Force).
Jim described being the only person who came out as gay in high school and enduring a lot of harassment for it. Two girls even ambushed him on a sidewalk, trying to kick and punch him. He got away, but he will never forget the hate he endured that day. There was no community of other teens or teachers that could shift the balance of power. Mostly, the adults did not even care. So when someone like Joel Burns takes ten minutes to talk about the issue of bullying, Jim couldn’t help but cry. That was the kind of recognition he could have used four years ago.
* * *
Brandon Teena was born Teena Renae Brandon and was raised as a female. The best current documentation of his experience in life and the years leading to that fateful December morning is The Brandon Teena Story.
He was born December 12, 1972. After openly identifying as male in his teenage years, he began introducing himself as Brandon Teena. In straight relationships, he dated several teenaged girls.
“I thought Brandon was attractive… when I thought it was Brandon,” Daphne, one of Brandon’s ex-girlfriends, says, “until I find out Brandon’s Teena.” As she says this, Daphne points to one side and then to other, her voice inflecting with subtle surprise on the name Teena. “Teena Renae instead of Tenna. Ray. Brandon. I found all that out, and I was like, oh my god, what am I doing?” She holds the index and middle fingers of each hand to her temples (The Brandon Teena Story).
As I watched the documentary, I was fascinated by the different reactions to Brandon’s identity and behavior. Some tolerated him, but others considered his gender expression to be deception (The Brandon Teena Story).
When there was a large enough group of people he knew didn’t trust him anymore, and too many people found out he was biologically female, he made a rash decision. He escaped the best way he knew how. He stole a car and drove 105 miles to Falls City without notifying a soul (The Brandon Teena Story).
* * *
Driving into the Falls City line, Brandon saw the welcoming sign broadcasting the humble little town’s name. Under it read, “A great place to live. Good people, churches, schools.” He passed long acres of fields where the cows might have grazed in the coming winter, the local Hinky Dinky convenience store, Christmas bells hanging above the streets, and the people holding hands, working, or walking the streets. There were trains loaded with coal traveling down the tracks, rodeo shows with men in caps and beer cans in hand sitting on the benches, and women with long hair and stud earrings beside them.
“Falls City is a white community,” Lana says in an interview. “There may have been a family or two that was black, but as far as us having gay people come in, Falls City would, I’m sure, escort ‘em out of town.” John Lotter agrees, adding with a smirk that one would be lucky if he or she, “especially a girl,” didn’t end up with kids and on welfare for the rest of his or her life. “That’s Falls City for ya” (The Brandon Teena Story).
Here is where he met the people who would become his friends, surrogate family, and girlfriend. They treated him as such too, and he must have felt deeply at peace. Until, that is, he was arrested for forgery—he’d written a bad check, and he was charged as female. Lana wanted to bail him out, but she was underage, so she gave Tom and John the money to do it. They got Brandon and brought him back to Tom’s house. But not everyone thought things should go back to the way they were.
John’s sister, Michelle, voices her opinion in the documentary. Her voice is accusing. “Let him do his time. Then he can get the hell out of here; I said, what does he think he’s doing, bringin’ this shit to a small town like this, y’know. He just needs to get the fuck out of here. I told her [Brandon], something’s gonna happen if you don’t get out of here.” She takes a moment, shifting to the side in her swivel chair and flicking the filter side of the cigarette with her thumb. “I was mad at him, but I was worried about what would happen to him if he stayed there.” For Michelle and many other of Brandon’s once-friends, running was the solution. “I was not happy about it,” Linda Gutierres, Lana’s mother, says, “I did not want Lana in the situation with Brandon any longer.” If they express concern for Brandon, it is an after thought. They know their town. And they know he should not have come. So do John and Tom.
That night, on Christmas Eve, John and Tom pull down Brandon’s pants and underwear. John grabs Lana, demanding that she look, that Tom won’t let go of Brandon until she looks. She peeks, and then closes her eyes again. Linda demands that Lana never see Brandon again. “She told me to get away from him,” Lana recalls, “because them kind of people have AIDS.”
Later, John and Tom drive Brandon to an open field a few miles away and take turns raping him.
Eerie enough is that JoAnn, Brandon’s mother, predicts this poignant event. “I figured some guy would find out that she was female, if he didn’t know right away, y’know, and just rape her. And it was… what do I want to say? I kind of felt like it would happen, but I didn’t… I was trying to put the fear of God in her. Y’know, more or less, because… cause people are cruel.”
It seems everyone expects this. It is the natural and expected outcome for someone like Brandon. It is natural to rape someone, as if to put him or her in his or her place. After John and Tom were done, they all got back in the front seat, and Tom asked if they were still friends. What Tom must have actually been asking was, “So, are you going to tell on us?” John and Tom stared at him. Brandon must have sensed that his safety was in jeopardy. If he said no or stayed quiet, they might rape him again—or kill him. So he replied, “Yeah.”
He likely felt angry, confused, horrified, and numb all at once. Why did they do that? Did they really just do that to prove he was a girl?
* * *
Harassment and violence are everywhere. Instead of condemning that behavior, though, there are groups like Focus on the Family that condone it. Focus on the Family actually blames individuals who have sexual orientations and/or gender identities that fall outside the norm. The site writer demeans the LGBTQ+ movements as falsely seeking “legitimization—not just tolerance—of homosexual behavior, resulting in changing societal mores and values that deeply impact Americans in their day-to-day relationships with family members, neighbors and coworkers” (Focus on the Family).
How exactly do these changing norms impact society so negatively? Dobson does not address this point other than to say that these individuals “undermine the fundamental order established by God himself” (Focus on the Family).
Yet the results of desperately trying to maintain the norm are in fact far-reaching and deeply impacting people everywhere who feel that they are wrong, somehow, fundamentally, for being themselves. Groups like Focus on the Family perpetuate myths, like that LGBTQ+ people are perverts, abnormal, and prone to sexually abusing others. They tell parents that their children can be counseled out of it. Soul Force disagrees.
Like Joel Burns, a family that is part of Soul Force takes a nonviolent stand against prejudice. They walk in unison up to the yard of Focus, where they are stopped by an officer and told if they continue they will be arrested for trespassing. Crowds have gathered around them. With brevity, the son in the group explains what they want to show Dr. Dobson.
“This is what a family is supposed to be. A family is supposed to be about love and acceptance. I am so proud to be standing here today, with people who love me and accept me as a gay man. They understand what it means to be a parent. Dr. Dobson teaches people that if their son or daughter comes out as a gay or lesbian person, that they need to not accept that part of them. And that destroys families” (“Soul Force on Focus on the Family”). The family, arms over shoulders, walks onto the field. And then they are peaceably arrested. As they are loaded into the police cruiser, chants of “Praise God” can be heard from the crowds. Praise God, praise God (“Soul Force”).
When people don’t accept others, and instead turn to harassment and violence, teens especially suffer from extreme distress. Mental Health America reports that LGBTQ+ youth are even “unable to receive an adequate education” because of the extent of the bullying. They feel “unsafe,” and as much as 28% “of gay students drop out of school. This is more than three times the national average for heterosexual students” (Mental Health America). Some do not make it to drop out.
* * *
As soon as he could, Brandon came back to Lana’s house. Linda didn’t want him there, but when she saw that he was hurt, she acquiesced. She was angry, she said, but no one deserved to be kidnapped and beaten. Lana said he was quieter, never quite the same. He went to the police station to press charges and give his testimony. Sheriff Laux took it. In the recording in The Brandon Teena Story, Laux is just as confused as the other people in Falls City. He asks Brandon if the boys had “fondled him any,” or why he “runs around with girls instead of guys, being a girl.” Brandon responds quietly but defiantly to the latter question. “What does this have to do with what happened last night?” In the morning he went to a hospital and had a rape kit done. The chief of police found that the injuries were consistent with rape and wanted to investigate further, so no arrests were made. Afterwards, Brandon went to stay with Lisa Lambert.
Lotter and Nisson found out that Brandon had told the police. They knew they’d be arrested the next morning. So, very early on December 31, they went to Lisa’s house. Consider the scene. Consider everything leading up to it, the feelings, complacency and othering done by many he met.
“They saw it as, ‘How dare she tell on us. How dare she’,” One of the sheriffs recalls.
They broke in through the back door.
“I didn’t think it was gonna go down the way it did. They wanted to scare him,” Michelle says in an interview.
John Lotter had stolen a gun the night before.
An interviewer asks Nilsson, “Did you ever say, ‘we’re just getting rid of a couple of dykes?’” Nisson responds, “I believe at one time I referred to Teena as a lesbian, yes.”
Tanner, Lisa’s infant son, cried in his crib.
“I wanted him to get the fuck out of here.”
Lotter found Brandon, grabbed him, and shot him. The bullet went underneath his chin and out through the top of his skull. Lisa screamed, begging them not to hurt her baby. Nisson shot her so close to her eye that it was burned. Then Nisson asked for the knife Lotter had. Nisson grabbed Brandon and stabbed him once in the navel area. Finally, Lotter found another person, Phillip DeVine, in the living room. DeVine happened to be there because he had a fight with his girlfriend, Lisa’s sister, the night before. Lotter shot him. Tanner was the only survivor.
“Why did you do that?” A lawyer asked Nilsson during the trial about stabbing Brandon. “To make sure she was dead,” Nisson responded.
“The lives of five people were ruined that night,” said Deputy Sheriff Jon Larson. “Three dead and two in jail.” Lotter and Nisson were arrested for rape in the morning. Prosecuting them for murder took another two years. The communities of Humboldt and Falls City mourned the tragedy, mostly for Lisa and DeVine. As for Brandon, the media broadcasted news reports with inflecting voices at a twist to the triple homicide story: one of the victims was a woman posing as a man. The families receive some form of closure when Nisson is sentenced to life and Lotter to death, but even in interviews there is some space. There are people saying that Brandon should never have been trusted, because he was a liar. Lotter says that Lana is probably still delusional, calling Brandon a “he.” Nisson refuses to answer specific questions about the rape and murders because it could endanger his appeal process. Everyone is surprised that it came to murder.
“But I’ve seen it time and time again,” says US Marshall Ron Shepherd. “They don’t view people… they don’t view homosexuals, people that are different from them, as equal. They think it’s okay. They think, I can shoot her, y’know, she’s a lesbian. A cross dresser. She’s a dyke. She’s less than human. And they rationalize it that way. I’ve seen it before” (The Brandon Teena Story).
* * *
Stories of violence, bullying and pain are not limited to the news. They are a reality. I see it in my friends, and I see it in society. I see the pain of kids who are struggling with their sexuality or gender identity from performing in Reality Check, a social action troupe at Franklin Pierce University. We have a tolerance skit that unabashedly describes the violence, physical and emotional, that results from othering and condoning of the behavior. Three kids alone, during our tour to several high schools over our spring break of 2011, admitted that they were contemplating suicide and sought out help. One even had a plan. Brandon Teena and the few specific suicides mentioned in this essay are extreme examples of the larger problem. Brandon Teena serves as a reminder that bullying and hate are a big deal. Because they can lead to murder.
Though there are groups like Focus on the Family, there are also Soul Force, Mental Health America, Joel Burns, the “It Gets Better” campaign, and Reality Check that educate and encourage love and acceptance. As Joel Burns says in his address to the council, “The bullying needs to stop” (“Joel Burns”). And with each one of these small voices, perhaps it will.
They become the voices that sweep across America.
In memory of:
Asher Brown
Seth Walsh
Billy Lucas
Justin Aaberg
Tyler Clementi
Raymond Chase
Brandon Teena
And everyone else who has fallen to suicide, murder, or silence.
Years after Joel Burns came out as gay, and after struggling with bullying and a near suicide attempt, his tough cowboy-type father held Burns’ hand.
His father said, “Joel, I’m so glad you’re here today.”
Burns choked: “I am too, Dad. I am too.”
(“Joel Burns”)
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“CDC Finds Increase in Teen Suicide; NYU Child Study Center Responds—Identifies Warning
Signs and Provides Tips for Parents.” Medical News Today. 6 February 2007. Web. 10 April 2011.
Dobson, James. “Pro-Gay Revisionist Theology.” Focus on the Family, n.d. Web. 2 May 2011.
“Joel Burns tells gay teens ‘it will get better.’” Perf. Joel Burns. Youtube. 13 Oct. 2010. Web. 25
Mar. 2011. <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ax96cghOnY4>.
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“Study Shows Gay Teens at Greater Risk.” Soul Force. 18 May 1999. Web. 10 April 2011.