The Gouda Life

It’s rare that I stray from the words that spew from my belly, but today I find the words from my heart are speaking much louder.

This past Saturday a youth from our community, 15 year old Jamie Hubley, tragically took his life after what sounds to have been a long and hard battle with being openly gay as a high school student. I didn’t know Jamie, or anyone in his immediate circle of family and friends, but the heartbreak is felt and the tears have been shed regardless. This is not the first time we’ve lost youth as a result of senseless bullying in our schools, on the streets, or even in our own homes. It happens far too often.

I can’t help but mutter ‘It’s not fair..’ over and over in trying to make sense of it. How can this be happening so frequently? How can we still be so far behind and have so far to go in accepting each other’s differences? It’s more clear than ever that although times are changing, we are not doing enough to bring light to this situation. So long as members of our community are taking their own lives as a result of bullying, or simply a lack of awareness and education surrounding homosexuality or mental health, it’s not enough.

I can’t say that I’ve been proactive in creating awareness in our city and I, for one, am going to make a change in that regard. Acceptance isn’t enough anymore, we need to be more diligent in shedding light and creating awareness of these situations so that we, the future of Canada, can live in a country where we are all accepted, all equal, and we all have a fair chance at succeeding in making something amazing of ourselves. We all have a voice in our community, let’s collectively try and use them for the betterment of our city. And if not for that, so that no more of our community feel so helplessly lost that the only solution is death.    

I’m begging the community of Ottawa to please, please, just do something. Anything at all to shed light. Talk to your neighbours, talk to your children, talk to anyone who will listen. Just start talking. Sharing. Creating awareness about what’s going on and what we can do to stop it and help support our peers, friends, youth, family, and community. Until our education system adopts a better way of teaching our youth about diversities in sexuality, it’s the best way to raise awareness. We’re all in this together.

I’ll be making a donation to Jer’s Vision; Canada’s Youth Diversity Initiative, in honor of Jamie. Should you wish to do the same, just follow the link.

Please feel free to leave any and all comments below. If you know of a way that those who wish to get involved in something can help, please share it with me.