Kind of a Funny Story Book Transsexual
There's nothing like reading a book about depression to bring you down. It's a shame, though, when that wasn't the author's point. Warning: this post contains vague spoilers about the book It's Kind of a Funny Story by Ned Vizzini, so if you're planning to read it, you can skip this for now. Just be warned that the book kind of spoils itself on the last page. If you're still reading, I'll explain…
It's Kind of a Funny Story is a very good book and a sensitive, illuminating portrayal of mental illness. The main character, a 15-year-old high school student under a ton of adolescent pressure, checks himself into a psychiatric ward after having suicidal thoughts. Over five days there, he meets some other troubled people, learns a lot about himself and finds the inspiration to go on with life. It's even more emotionally involving when you know that it was based on the author's own time spent in a similar institution and that he himself struggled with depression for many years. It's been a bestseller, was adapted into a movie and has become a favorite of YA readers everywhere.
So what's my problem? Well, on the very last page of the book, the main character, Craig, is running through a mental checklist of how to go on with his life after leaving the institution. It's a beautiful monologue, until near the end, when he says this:
"Travel. Fly. Swim. Meet. Love. Dance. Win. Smile. Laugh. Hold. Walk. Skip. Okay, it's gay, whatever, skip."
Wait… what? "It's gay"? Really? I've been emotionally involved in your struggle for 317 e-pages and you reward me with a crude sucker punch in the fourth-to-last paragraph? There's no homophobia in the book until then. Other than a few fleeting moments involving a transgender resident, there are no LGBTQ characters at all. Just a lot of sensitively-portrayed, troubled individuals who were probably loosely based on the real residents Vizzini encountered in his hospital stay.
I love a good cry when I'm reading a book, and I'll bet a lot of people cried at the ending to this one, but not me. I wanted to throw it across the room. I might've done it, too, if it wasn't an ebook. No way I'm wrecking my iPhone over something like that. What infuriated me was that, while reading this character's mental pep talk, I suddenly felt transported back to being a depressed 15-year-old myself, and this book that was written to inspire depressed 15-year-olds was actually mocking me.
Here's a passage from my memoir "Mommy Man" in which I talk about what it was like growing up in a world rife with casual homophobia:
"As a gay kid, all I could do was suck it up, play straight, and play along. I never knew when my homophobia might be tested. I would go to see a perfectly fun movie like Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure, only to find out one of the running jokes was the two loveable protagonists calling each other "fag." No one warned the public about it, no critics condemned it as hateful, no one even thought it was worth commenting on. It was just a joke, and judging by the reaction of the audience around me, a hilarious one. So I was forced to bust a gut, too — unless I wanted someone to think I was some kind of fag myself.
Everyone raved about the movie Lucas, in which Corey Haim played a sad, scrawny outcast who tried to win over the girl of his dreams by joining the high school football team. Sad, scrawny outcast? Sign me up! The reviews said it was sweet and heartwarming — and it was — but smack in the middle is a scene where Lucas accuses the bad guy of being a 'fag' in the locker room showers, supposedly a moment of stand-up-and-cheer comeuppance for a character we despise. Watching that scene with my friends, I died a little inside. (On the plus side, though, there were naked jocks.)"
Sure, the 80's were full of casual awfulness. Casual racism, casual sexism, casual date rape, all wrapped up in a quirky New Wave neon package. As a 43-year-old man in 2015, I'm happy that those kinds of things are no longer acceptable and can no longer go unquestioned. (Read Dave Holmes' excellent open letter to Kid Rock for more on this subject.) But It's Kind of a Funny Story came out in 2007. Long after the message was out about how using "gay" as a pejorative is bad for gay kids, a writer wrote it, an editor declined to edit it out, a publisher published it and tons of gay kids undoubtedly read it, just like I did.
That's what really upsets me. The book worked so hard to describe and sympathize with the suicidal impulses of its characters. We know that gay kids attempt suicide four times as much as straight kids. So why the gratuitous gay slur amid an otherwise uplifting monologue? As I read it, all I could picture was how it would feel to be a depressed gay teen who might be totally engrossed in the book and inspired by the ending… only to unexpectedly get the message, right in the final sentences, "Hold on, this isn't about you. You're weird."
Tragically, Ned Vizzini lost his own battle with depression when he committed suicide in 2013 at the age of 32. I'm not trying to tarnish his legacy or accuse him of homophobia. It's Kind of a Funny Story is a wonderful book that has undoubtedly brought comfort to a lot of unhappy adolescents (and grownups for that matter). Its author was probably a great guy who thought he was making a harmless joke and just capturing the way teenagers really talk. I wish he were still here to respond — and to write more books.
For any depressed LGBTQ kids who might be reading this one, though, I hope they know that the message still applies to them, that they can overcome their thoughts of suicide, and most of all, I hope they bought the book in paperback, so if the mood strikes them, when they're done, they can throw it across the room.
Source: https://jerry-mahoney.com/2015/03/13/what-i-didnt-find-funny-about-its-kind-of-a-funny-story/
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