Approximately 60 people watched and discussed videos from the It Gets Better Project Tuesday night in Kresge Hall. History professor Lane Fenrich and English professor Nick Davis facilitated the event planned by the Gender Studies Undergraduate Board.
The It Gets Better Project was launched in October of last year by columnist Dan Savage in response to the series of suicides among LGBT youths. It attracted extensive media coverage in the United States and drew national attention to the issue of teen bullying.
Several videos from the project were shown to the classroom full of people, who then openly talked about their opinions on the videos and the project as a whole.
Fenrich, whose teachings focus on discourses of memory and national identity, and Davis, who teaches and writes in the areas of film, queer, feminist and gender studies, directed the discussion on LGBT issues and reactions to videos from the campaign.
“It’s great to see academic conversation that was more structured and formal about the project,” said Weinberg senior Jodi Savitz, member of the Gender Studies Undergraduate Board. “I’m glad to see conversation about something so public, viral, and now,” Savitz said.
Although there are thousands of videos uploaded to YouTube as part of the It Gets Better Project, there was only time to watch a few. The audience watched videos produced by American Idol alum Todrick Hall, Autostraddle.com & Celesbians and President Barack Obama.
“The idea of this campaign has not only caught on, but it has caught fire,” said Fenrich. “There is also a political response to these videos. We should look at the different ways people are trying to navigate these politics.”
One of the more heated conversations centered on Obama’s video for the campaign. Members of the audience debated whether he could post his video without explicitly addressing civil rights, upon which someone shouted out, “He could at least say what these bullies are doing is not okay.”
The last topic discussed at the event was the LGBT community on Northwestern’s campus.
“It’s important that we recognize our situation here at Northwestern in relation to the broader story,” said Communication junior Cat Hammond. “Even though people had issues with some of the videos such as Obama’s, the fact that he made the video is a step in the right direction.”