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  “To refer to him as a victim of ‘bullying’ in this case soft-pedals the aggressive homophobia that is the root issue.”

  Jonathan Katz

  Associate Professor of Visual Studies




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By PATRICIA DONOVAN

Published: September 29, 2011

Jamey Rodemeyer, the 14-year-old suburban Buffalo teen who committed suicide last week, was the victim of a hate crime, a UB faculty member and longtime gay rights activist and author says.

“To refer to him as a victim of ‘bullying’ in this case soft-pedals the aggressive homophobia that is the root issue,” says Jonathan Katz, an associate professor in the Department of Visual Studies. “This young boy was taunted and bullied because of his sexual orientation and that, by definition, is a hate crime.

“We don’t refer to racism or sexism as ‘bullying,’” Katz says. “We call them by their names to acknowledge the social pathology we are trying to eliminate.

“In this case, too, we must name this form of discrimination because with each incremental advance in GLBTQ rights, the most vulnerable people in our community—our children—are being targeted.”

Katz maintains that adults who perpetuate bigotry share in the blame.

“Our children are being told by some authority figures that same-sex desire is sinful and that queer people aren’t even worthy of life, much less respect,” he says.

Director of the doctoral program in visual studies at UB, Katz, is an art historian, educator and writer who works at the intersection of art history and queer history. The former executive coordinator of the Larry Kramer Initiative for Lesbian and Gay Studies at Yale University, he co-curated the celebrated 2010 Smithsonian Institution exhibition “Hide/Seek: Difference and Desire in American Portraiture.”