138 Part 1 Basic Communication Processes❶ Consider how the It
Gets Better Project offers
LGBTQ teens who are
feeling isolated the
opportunity to envision
their lives as part of a
co-culture. Can the Project
help them find peers and
role models?
❷ Thank about how
technology allows indi-
viduals to connect with
others who share narrowly
defined interests (e.g.,
graphic novels) or face
similar but uncommon
challenges (e.g., a spe-
cific physical disability).
How can connecting with
others who share these
interests and challenges
via the internet enrich their
lives?
➌ The Project is aimed at
a very specific co-culture—
and yet, the videos posted
come from people from all
walks of life. Is it important
for LGBTQ teens to hear
messages of encourage-
ment from outside the co-
culture? Do the messages
posted have value for
straight teens as well?The It Gets Better Project
Columnist Dan Savage was stewing. He’d just heard about the suicide of an
Indiana teenager, Billy Lucas, who had hanged himself in his grandmother’s
barn at the age of fifteen. Lucas, who may or may not have been gay, was
perceived as gay by his classmates and bullied harshly because of it. Savage
felt heartbroken and angry. Nine out of ten gay teenagers experience bully-
ing and harassment, and like most other gay men and women, Savage had
endured bullying during his teenage years. But in spite of it, he was now a
happy adult with a fulfilling life that included a great career and a loving fam-
ily. He was frustrated that Billy Lucas would miss out on those things. “I wish
I could have talked to this kid for five minutes,” Savage wrote in his column. “I
wish I could have told Billy that it gets better. I wish I could have told him that,
however bad things were, however isolated and alone he was, it gets better”
(Savage, 2010).
It was too late to say those things to Billy Lucas. But Savage knew there
were thousands more young people like Billy Lucas, teenagers who were gay
or lesbian or simply unsure about their sexuality and who were being targeted
and tormented. He knew that those teens are four times more likely to at-
tempt suicide than others—and he believed that it wasn’t too late to talk to
them. So Savage and his partner sat down in front of their webcam and made
a video. They talked about their own experiences at the mercy of bullies and
about being isolated from their own parents when they first came out. But
they also talked about what comes later: about gaining acceptance, finding
places where they weren’t alone, and building families and careers. They
posted the video to YouTube and encouraged others to do the same. The It
Gets Better Project was born.
By November 2013, more than fifty thousand videos had been posted—
from straight and gay people, celebrities, and ordinary people from all over
the world—and the site had logged more than fifty million views (“It Gets
Better,” 2013). Suddenly, isolated teens had a place to go to be assured that
they were not alone, that they could survive the bullying, and that life would,
indeed, get better.THINK
ABOUT
THISCOMMUNICATIONACROSSCULTURES
Note: The project does not offer any solutions for dealing with bullies or advise students to engage in conflict with those
who abuse them. It simply offers them a peer experience, to show them that they’re not alone, and tries to show them that
life will go on after the bullying ends.
Our group identification and communication shift depending on which
group membership is made salient—or brought to mind—at a given moment.
For example, students often consider themselves ingroup members with fellow
students and outgroup members with nonstudents. However, a group of students