Wednesday was the National Day of Silence. This is a nation-wide event supported by a number of LGBT organizations and their allies in the States. The purpose of this day is, interestingly, to break the silence. The state of silence is that since it is so hard for LGBT people to speak up/come out their gender identity or sexual orientation in this heterosexual society, their existence won't be known; we are not hearing any voices of them. One of the ways to end this silence is to break this silence.

I think it could be hard for some people to come out, but the heterosexual society should be responsible for the silence, so I think I should do something to end the silence. I definitely owe some of the responsibilities. (And you could say Japanese society is too silent to hear voices.)

The Coe Alliance also participated in the event. Some of the students who had signed up for the participation wore the card, and they were not allowed to speak anything until 4pm. Many students signed up regardless of their sexual orientation and gender identity. The card explains the idea of the Day of Silence, which is in order to understand the situation that LGBT people are placed or faced in our daily life; they are not allowed to tell the truth very often.

At 4pm, we gathered on the quad and rang the Victory Bell for 130 times. I did it too. It is said that 10 percent of the community will be GLBT people, and there are approximately 1300 students; therefore, the number of times that the bell sounded shows the estimated LGBT students number at Coe. Considering from my experience here so far, most of the LGBT people here still keep silence. Even though there is an organization that supports LGBT people here, that fact shows this community is not ready for those who haven窶冲 spoken up and come out. I hope the sound of the bell (it is not a victory though) breaks the silence and lets the heterosexuals know the existence and LGBT窶冱 voices.