A group of us from the Newry Rainbow Community this week went to see the Play Beautiful Thing staged locally by The Company Youth Theatre and The Rainbow Factory. The Play is the Stage presentation of the feel good film of the same name and was absolutely brilliantly done. It’s a gay story line where two young lads fall in love with each other and we experience first hand their difficulty ‘coming out’ and accepting who they are as well as all the other background issues happening their families.

While giving lots of food for thought, the thing that struck us like a bolt out of the blue wasn’t the play but the audience’s reaction to it! The audience was mainly composed of young men in their late teens from Armagh and Down Youth Groups and the organisers would have been thinking of the play helping them to promote a healthy debate around the area of sexuality and we can only hope that it will.

When the plays gay storyline became more obvious there were shouts of “queer” through most of the play, cries of “fagots”, “oh no” and “stop right there” and “Brokeback Mountain” while in all probability seen as a bit of a laugh by the hecklers did actually make us think of the more serious underlying issue.

I certainly wouldn’t have felt comfortable telling them to stop or engaging in a debate with them and that to me is the crux of the matter. If I as an out gay man who is comfortable with his sexuality didn’t feel I could “stand up for myself” how much infinitely more difficult would it be for a teenage member of their own group who is questioning their sexuality to talk to them? We all know the severe damage that bottling up something can do to your mental health and well being. It appears that talking about sexuality issues with your peers is still a taboo subject and a major major hurdle that needs to be overcome with our young people.

Sometimes when you have been through all that years ago and feel happy within yourself and with your family and friends it’s easy to think that things are so much easier for young people nowadays so here perhaps was the wake up call we needed!