Brandon Hoffman is one of GLSEN’s 2010-2011 Student Ambassadors and he hails from Owings Mills, Maryland. He is a senior at Owings Mills High School and an active LGBT ally.

When Brandon isn’t running with the cross country team or wrestling at a match for his school, he writes passionate articles for his school’s newspaper, Eagle’s Eye, including many editorials on current political events.

This month Brandon is spearheading a new day of action, “No Homo Day,” being held Friday, January 14, but don’t let the controversial name mislead you, he’s using the phrase to educate his fellow students.

“No Homo Day” is a day where you take it upon yourself to refrain from hurtful anti-LGBT words such as “Fag” “Homo” and phrases such as “That’s so gay” “You’re a faggot” ect. While No Homo Day should be every day, this is a day specifically to refrain from using such slurs.

While you may think that this is an easy task and it won’t help anyone, just try stopping for a day. You’d be surprised at how many times you’ll want to say these hurtful words but then you stop yourself short. It’s sad when we live in a world where a word which describes a group of people can also be used to mean stupid, bad, and overall just has such a negative and hurtful connotation.

Why it’s called No Homo Day:

I picked “No Homo Day” because of it’s distinct irony of the phrase being used by people to distance themselves with the suspicion of them being gay. It’s ironic because how it’s being used in the context of the event is that people are not distancing themselves from being gay, but distancing themselves from using anti-gay slurs. No Homo Day is a day for people who would usually say “gay” or “faggot” etc. to abstain from saying these slurs or any anti-LGBT slurs. While this may be one day specifically to not use these slurs, it should be everyday.

Coming from the point of view of “the locker room” (I am a 3-sport athlete and 2-sport captain), I hear these slurs all the time as well as “no homo” and I believe that by calling the day “No Homo Day” it puts a completely different spin on “no homo” as well as spreading information about anti-gay bullying.

You can check out the event and/or sign up to attend by visiting the official No HOMO Day Facebook event page.