"Ram and I died because we had to hide our gay forbidden love from a misapproving world."
— Ram and Kurt's forged suicide note, Heathers
"[I]t is difficult for a young person to accept their difference, and to complain about it means to acknowledge it and admit it to authority figures. To ask for help for homophobic bullying is to out oneself, not only to others but, crucially, to ourselves - something many children are not ready to do. I wasn't, and though more are perhaps more are willing to do so today, I don't believe the majority are.
It's my view that suicide by LGBT kids is massively underreported for this very reason. Growing up, I would see reports in local papers about 'caring, artistic' boys in their early teens who had committed suicide; they were often described as 'passionate about theatre or pop music' and so on, but no one, of course, ever mentioned the word 'gay'. Even today there is very little significant mainstream media coverage of the issue...As a result, these children remain invisible."
— Matthew Todd, Straight Jacket: Overcoming Society's Legacy of Gay Shame
