GLAAD has joined 13 Members of Congress led by Congressman Mike Honda of California and over 20 organizations, in a letter to the Federal Communications Commission, asking them to ensure that online filtering software used at federally funded schools and libraries does not prevent access to sites with important resources for LGBT community.
Schools and libraries are required to block obscene or harmful information to minors, but occasionally appropriate LGBT resources have been blocked. Some of these sites include the national LGBT youth suicide prevention program, The Trevor Project, as well as GLAAD, or state or local LGBT resources.
The letter states, part:
The Internet has the potential to help LGBT people cope with discrimination, isolation and stigma they may face in their everyday lives. A 2013 Pew Research Center report and a national survey of LGBT adults found: 39% have been rejected by friends or family because of their sexual or gender identity; 30% have been physically attacked or threatened; 21% have been treated unfairly by an employer; and, only 56% have told their mother about their sexual or gender identity. A 2014 report by the LGBT Technology Partnership & Institute ‘Vision for Inclusion: An LGBT Broadband Future’ concluded that LGBT people are dependent on the Internet to meet a range of individual and social needs, which also makes them especially vulnerable to discriminatory Internet policies enacted by schools and libraries.
You can read the full text of the letter below:
Congressional Letter to the FCC regarding LGBT Content Filtering in Public Schools and Libraries