A queer youth group at a Detroit high school is providing LGBTQ students with the support they need

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Growing up in northeast Detroit, Patrick Burton had an androgynous appearance that often caused him to be mistaken for a girl.

One day, a group of boys knocked on the door of the house he and his family had just moved into. They asked his mother if the new girl living there was available. She was confused, but Burton knew they were talking about him.

When the boys met Burton, they were no longer interested in friendship. Burton was disappointed but not surprised—he was no stranger to such awkward situations. So he withdrew from the misconceptions, harassment, and abuse to create his own world, he said, “like a lot of queer people do, right?”

It was a world continents away from some of his classmates, filled with art collages from fashion magazines, the music of David Bowie and Martin Luther King Jr.’s musings on the indomitable human spirit.

Decades later, the educator, artist, and curator is still creating his own world—but it’s also for his students. Burton runs True Colors, an LGBTQ youth group at Denby High School in Detroit, where he teaches art.

He started the group about five years ago with Denby counselor Sarah O’Halla to provide support that leverages the school’s existing mental health infrastructure. Since then, dozens of students have joined the group, and the group has become a place to embrace one’s differences, learn more about queer culture, and heal.

A Detroit art educator who is still recovering is also helping his students recover

The decades-long LGBTQ rights movement has made significant progress, including the legalization of same-sex marriage in 2015. It has also faced a backlash in the form of a recent wave of anti-transgender legislation. The policies have not gained much traction in Michigan, but changing hearts and minds remains an ongoing struggle, especially for children of color growing up in Detroit.

That’s where True Colors comes in.

Young people participating in bimonthly group meetings have resolved a multitude of traumas – from peers who bully or harass them, to parents who use homophobic slurs or even kick them out of the house.

Some of what Burton hears suggests his students are “as broken as I am,” he said. He believes many of them will need years to recover. At True Colors, he’s trying to speed up that recovery by helping them “put the pieces back together.”

O’Halla, the counselor who works with Burton, said the group has the support of school administrators and is helping to address a huge need at the school. As many as 40 students have attended one session. Still, she said, “the number of students who feel comfortable going to class is a tiny fraction of the number of students who would benefit.”

Those who actually participate are showing “a huge step of courage,” O’Halla said.

This step usually leads to several important conclusions: Through conversation and contemplation, students learn that their situations are not unique and that they are not alone.

Burton also empowers students by teaching them about queer activists who risked everything in the name of human rights. Through films, books, articles, podcasts and field trips, they learn about figures like Harvey Milk, the first gay man to hold office in California; writers and thought leaders like James Baldwin and Audre Lorde; and key events like the 1969 Stonewall Uprising, a series of demonstrations that took place in New York City after a brutal police raid on a gay bar.

This is a testament to Burton’s breadth of knowledge and work outside the classroom as a programmer and fine arts curator. Burton earned a Bachelor of Fine Arts from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and a Master of Arts in Humanities from the University of Detroit Mercy.

For his master’s thesis, he specialized in queer studies, writing and directing a show with drag’s revolutionary roots that debuted at the famed Black Box Theater at 1515 Broadway in Detroit. It was later performed in New York to commemorate the 25th anniversary of the Stonewall Uprising.

Burton continues to serve as a “queer cultural official” through his organization Mighty Real/Queer Detroit and his biennial multimedia exhibition I’ll Be Your Mirror – Reflections of the Contemporary Queer, which is on view in multiple galleries and runs through the end of Pride month throughout Detroit.

The exhibition elevates queer art, expression and history through paintings, photography, textiles, films and more by dozens of artists from around the world. Each article has a story about queer life, and this approach – shining a light on the bold legacy of LGBTQ culture – reflects how Burton leads True Colors.

The group draws inspiration from Burton’s raw personal experiences. He came out in the late 1970s and found solace in literature that celebrated difference. In high school, discovering Langston Hughes and the Harlem Renaissance was a turning point. Burton, who is white, felt a strong parallel between notions of the “other,” being black in America, and what it means to be queer amid the constant tensions of a society governed by heteronormative standards.

Detroit youth learn to dismantle the concept of “other”

Arreanna Thompson, a senior at Denby High School, understands what it means to be the so-called “other” both as a young black woman and as a queer person. She acknowledges that finding acceptance can be difficult for black queer people, given the central role religion plays for many in the black community.

People outside the LGBT community were telling her, ‘Oh, you should be with a man, marry a man.’ I just didn’t feel that,” she said.

This complicated intersection of race and sexuality crystallized within her when she began having feelings for other girls in middle school.

Thompson is pansexual, meaning she is attracted to people of any gender identity. She came out as a woman quite by accident when she was 15.

She heard family members say that gays “should die.” She exclaimed, “Well, I like women too. So should I die?”

Thompson said her family told her she “didn’t deserve to share blood with them,” that her sexuality was a phase – and a choice. She was devastated.

In True Colors, a group Thompson has attended since her freshman year, she felt safe unpacking that painful moment, sharing who she was and asking for support from her peers. She also leaned on them when another student harassed and bullied her because of her sexual orientation.

Burton’s education has given her a broader understanding of the gay rights movement and its key figures, which has given her the courage to attend the annual Motor City Pride celebration for the first time this year.

“It made me feel safe when you’re home – like I belong there. It’s been a long time since I felt like I belonged somewhere and that these are my people, this is my community.”

For Rashawn Grayson, who graduated from Denby this year, True Colors will always be the place he can go to when he needs support.

Grayson is pansexual, a realization he realized when he was 10 years old.

“I had classes with a boy and a girl and I was in love with both of them,” he recalled. It hit him around the same time that people in his class were making fun of gays. He couldn’t understand it. “I thought to myself, ‘But what’s the problem?'”

But Grayson, like most kids, was also looking for acceptance, so he hid his feelings and joined in. “I felt a little bad when I did it. But I was kind of just in denial when I was so young,” he said.

During his freshman year, as the COVID-19 pandemic tightened its grip on the country, Grayson often found himself alone at home with his thoughts. He became depressed and suicidal. LGBTQ youth are four times more likely to attempt suicide than heterosexual youth.

(If you’re having trouble, you can find help and support here.)

“At that point, I really came to terms with who I was,” he said. “When I was doing that, I was thinking about all the things I had done before, like teasing people, bullying people and all that stuff.”

He decided he needed to talk to someone.

“I wasn’t going to tell them everything. I was still figuring myself out. But I knew one thing for sure: I’m pansexual,” he said.

Grayson mustered up the courage to come out to his mother. She later told him she “needed a drink” because he had just dropped a bomb on her. They both laughed – but his laugh was forced. Later, Grayson went to the bathroom and cried.

Joining True Colors helped him come to terms with the moment.

He discovered that he had a community and that other children also had troubled relationships with their parents after reaching out. “I stopped caring about what people thought about me and what they said about me. And now I can constantly tell people that I am a genderless person who has three different sexualities.”

Today, Grayson said his mom is still “trying to figure out who I am,” but it’s something he can talk about with some peace.

Just as Burton gathered an inspiring vocabulary to describe himself through literature and art decades ago, Grayson also learned a language to describe his identity through the group True Colors.

“In a way, it was a form of therapy, not just for me but for everyone there,” Grayson said.

Biennial exhibition I’ll Be Your Mirror – Reflections of a Contemporary Queer hangs in galleries throughout metro Detroit through June 30. One participating gallery, Anton Arts Center in Mount Clemenspresents exhibits from the exhibition lasting until mid-August. For additional information, updates and more, click here.

Robyn Vincent is a reporter for Chalkbeat Detroit, covering Detroit schools and Michigan education policy. She can be reached at [email protected]