When i was in grade school and high school there were a few boys who weren't out of the closet gay, but were nonetheless quite effeminate. I stuttered and stammered horribly well into my junior and senior year so I was basically their friend by default. There was also the token black kid who would have probably preferred to hang out with the more popular kids in school. It wasn't that people were mean or nasty, intentionally wanted to hurt them. They just didn't want to associate with them or me.
The thing i remember most was that they were always so cheerful. Laughter always came easy to them despite the fact that they didn't really have any male friends. I think part of the problem is that kids are being forced to like or associate with someone, and it puts everyone into an embarrassing position. The gay kid is in the spotlight, and woul probably prefer not to be, and the other kids are being forced to associate with someone they really don't have anything in common with.
Years later, I was employed by two gay men for a year or two, and I watched as one of them lost his mind to a brain tumor and the other one also had a seriously compromised immune system. It was ghastly seeing what they went through. They both had it made. They had a thriving business. They both had patents that were going to make them both millionaires, if not multi millionaires, but their lifestyle was literally killing them, not to mention tearing their families apart. It was one of the most tragic things I've seen in my life.
I had some rentals, and rented to a bi sexual man who eventually had to wear diapers. It was bizarre. He seemed like the most normal easy going person in the world. It turns out he was a sadomasochist, and as time went on, he just became completely deranged and demented. I'm not suggesting this couldn't happen to heterosexuals, but they don't seem to be targeted nearly as much.
I think children today are in a significantly different culture than that of 50 years ago. It's one where a dislike or an unfriend on facebook is catastrophic. I read where a kid in grade school was so embarrassed by his cell phone going off in class that he killed himself. Sex and violence are pervasive, and becoming more and more mainstream.