By Rebecca Sandles Reporter, Five Live Reporter

Bullying: Gay insults second only to weight insults

Calling something, or someone, gay is one of the most popular put-downs in school.

A pair of trainers can be gay, so can a broken drinks machine and anyone who does not quite fit in can be deemed gay too.

Teachers, health workers and the police are increasingly concerned at the effect the pervasive use of the word gay as a negative term is having on children.

The experience of 16-year-old Jamie (not his real name) shows how anti-gay name-calling can have a disastrous impact if left unchallenged.

When he was 14, Jamie joined a new school in north-west England.

One girl began to pick on him, calling him a gay boy. Slowly, other pupils picked up on the abuse and Jamie told us how eventually the whole year seemed to be targeting him.

A lot of times when the word gay is used it's not used intentionally as a derogatory statement, although it of course has a lot of negative overtones Liz Rawsthorne

He said: "They told me I dropped my gay card, told me I was queer."

The continual name-calling coupled with family problems and Jamie's own struggle to come to terms with his sexuality eventually led him to attempt suicide.

"I just think I am basically rubbish. So although it has stopped physically, it has not stopped mentally," he said.

Jamie left school as soon as he could, with no qualifications.

People who work with young gay men and lesbians say his experience is not rare. One study found 72% of lesbian and gay adults had been regular truants.

Rising abuse reported

That is perhaps understandable when another set of research into school experiences of young lesbians and gays found a marked rise in problems since the early 1980s.

The percentage who had experienced verbal abuse rose from around 8% in 1984 to 36% in 2001.

These days they just think you come out and that is it everything is fine - but it's not Mark, teen homophobia victim

The number who reported being physically assaulted in school had tripled from just 5% to 15%.

Turton High School Media Arts College, near Bolton, is one of small number of schools targeting homophobic language.

They began addressing gay and lesbian stereotypes and the effects of name calling after a survey on bullying found anti-gay abuse second only to insults about weight.

Liz Rawsthorne, one of the teachers spearheading the school's work in this area, said colleagues find homophobia far trickier to address than racism.

She said: "If it's racist it's overtly aggressive.

"A lot of times when the word gay is used it's not used intentionally as a derogatory statement, although it of course has a lot of negative overtones.

"That makes it's much more of an insidious problem - and it's harder to tackle directly"

Section 28 legacy

Other teachers blame the legacy of Section 28, the controversial education regulation that banned the promotion of homosexuality, for schools' hesitancy.

Andrew Mullholland, a health worker in Bolton who has organised workshops on the impact of homophobia among young people, believes the current piecemeal approach to the problem needs addressing.

"With the repeal of Section 28, it is certainly a good opportunity nationally for the government to actually give a clear that they need to address this issue in the future."