It really does get better.

The closet seems like a vestige from a darker time. Many young LGBT people never experienced the repression, but there is an older generation of men who closed the door decades ago and now find themselves tentatively stepping out into a terrifying world. They often feel alone.

Your world will change completely in about a decade and, without really having planned it, you will end up on this tiny island on the other side of the world called Manhattan -- a place full of people who are weird, crazy and sometimes totally unsure of themselves -- just like you.

Freshman year of high school was a nightmare. I couldn't walk through a hallway without my books being tossed to the floor, my body being shoved out of the way, or my face being slammed against a locker. Every day I woke up in fear and returned home in tears.

It is shockingly easy to unintentionally glorify suicide. Williams was a great talent, no doubt, but are we inadvertently communicating to others that they, as well, could find more love, comfort, and appreciation if they copied his act?

If a Somali man is considered feminine he is deemed weak, helpless, pitiful: The underlying message being that femininity is inherently inferior to masculinity. Variants of this thinking extend across most cultures, belief systems, races and sexualities.