The concept of diversity encompasses acceptance and respect. It means understanding that each individual is unique, and recognizing our individual differences.  These can be along the dimensions of race, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, socio-economic status, age, physical abilities, religious beliefs, political beliefs, or other ideologies.  It is the exploration of these differences in a safe, positive, and nurturing environment. It is about understanding each other and moving beyond simple tolerance to embracing and celebrating the rich dimensions of diversity contained within each individual. For my diversity paper I decided to interview someone that is gay, she did not want her name to be included, but was okay with me sharing her answers.

            On November 1, 2016 I interviewed a gay person at approximately 6:45 P.M. in the Tiger 2 dorms. I asked her a range of questions such as: When did you know you were gay? Do you think you were born gay? What type of discrimination have you faced because you are gay?  Her answers helped me get a better understanding of what it feels like to be gay in our society.

            For the first question I asked: When did you know you were gay? Her answer was this: “I knew I was gay when I was really little, I didn’t quite understand it at first though. When you are so young you don’t really think that you are gay just because you like this and that. The older I got I started to understand that maybe I really am gay. It took till about High School for me to fully come out about me being gay. I had known all my life though it seemed.” After hearing her response to that question I was really interested in her story. I had sadness for her that she had to keep something like that bottled up for as long as she did.

            For the second question I asked: Do you think you were born gay? Her response to this question was:  “I believe I was born gay. To most people it sounds dumb for you to say you are born gay but I honestly believe I was. Let’s be honest who would want to be gay in the society we live in today? There is such much hate towards homosexuals. It really heats me up when someone tries to say that gay’s choose this lifestyle because they want to be different or difficult. That is not the case at all. I find those people to be very ignorant to think that we choose this because we want to be different.” When I heard her answer I agreed with her completely. I feel that most people that are fully gay could possibly be born gay. I don’t think anyone would want to live in our society and be gay.

            For the third question I asked: What type of discrimination have you faced because you are gay? Her response to this question was: “I have had many things happen to me because I am gay. Many people won’t talk to me, they won’t let me near their kids, I get stared down everywhere I go, I have people shout out rude things to me when I’m in public, I have people not let me come into their stores because of the way I am, and I’ve even been kicked out of restaurants because the chef refused to cook my food. I get so many problems just because of the way I am, it really hurts my feelings sometimes. I wish people would treat me as an equal.”  It really is a disgrace that people do these things to gay people. I find it really crazy that people would actually treat someone like that just because they are gay.

            After doing this interview I had learned a lot about gays in our society. I feel that from doing this interview that it will help me with my future career as a teacher. I hope that when I’m a teacher that no child ever has to go through anything that makes them feel different or unloved. Every student should be treated the same regardless of their sexual orientation. It shouldn’t matter that someone is different; you treat them with fairness and respect. When I am a teacher I will make sure that none of my students are ever bullied or treated differently because of the way they are.

            I feel there was a lot of value doing this paper. I learned a lot about my subject and even changed my views towards certain things. This paper would be a great idea for everyone to do. It helps you learn to understand someone or something that is different from you. You have to do things you don’t usually do for you to learn. I had a great learning experience doing my interview. Over all it was a great project to do and I enjoyed it thoroughly.