If I only had the words...

Harvey Milk has a famous quote. "If a bullet should enter my brain, let the bullet destroy every closet door." A bullet did enter his brain, but there are still closet doors. Numerous bullets and knives and hurtful words have entered a thousand brains and hearts and minds and yet, thousands of doors remain closed, locked, and bolted with no peephole. How long can we go on like this? How many young lives are we willing to sacrifice so that we can pretend that diversity doesn't exist? How many more times will a GLBT youth have to commit suicide before we get the message? Why isn't zero enough?

If I only had the words to answer these questions.

If I only had the words to tell the family of Tyler Clementi how incredibly sorry I am. How words can't make this better, but they're all I have right now. How even as I sit here writing this, I struggle to find the next sentence, the next phrase, knowing that no matter how eloquent I am, it won't make any difference. Tyler Clementi will still be gone because someone else was to afraid to face the differences and learn. Learn to not only accept diversity, but embrace it. Revel in it. Love it.

Learn to love not despite differences, but because of them.

If I only had the words to show people. Show them that the only thing they have to fear is fear itself. If I only had the words to make everything okay. To make every day a day of awareness. To make every day a day where people were ashamed when someone says, "That's so gay," rather than just during Ally Week. To make every day a day where people felt safe and secure and happy no matter who they are.

If only.

But Harvey Milk is famous for something else too, the Hope Speech. "You gotta give them hope." And I hope that's why he's remembered. I hope that's why Tyler Clementi will be remembered. Not for the way they died, not for why they died, not for their sexuality. But maybe for the people they were, the beliefs they had, the good things they did. Maybe because, as tragic as both deaths were, someone might have learned something from them. I don't know what that something is, but maybe it leads to a few less hurtful words and a few more open doors. In the words of a famous song, All you need is love.