Unfinished Lives

Remembering LGBT Hate Crime Victims

Gays Most Often Targeted by Hate Crimes in America; SPLC Report Confirms Alarming News

Montgomery, Alabama – In a blockbuster announcement released today, the highly respected Southern Poverty Law Center’s annual Intelligence Report confirms that LGBTQ people are the most often targeted group for physical violence in American life.  As human rights groups scored advances for LGBTQ people in 2009, hard-core anti-gay groups have stepped up hate speech and are digging in to reverse the justice done to queer folk throughout the United States.  In its analysis of better than 14 years of data on hate crimes, the SPLC found that LGBTQ people were twice as likely to be the victims of violent attacks than Jews or African Americans, more than four times more likely than Muslims, and 14 times more likely than Latinos and Latinas.  As gay and lesbian people increase in acceptability among the populace at large, anti-gay groups are becoming far more extreme in opposition, and are employing alarming new tactics to undermine the queer community.  PR Newswire and US Newswire quote Mark Potok, editor of the Winter 2010 issue of the SPLC Intelligence Report: “As Americans become more accepting of homosexuals, the most extreme elements of the anti-gay movement are digging in their heels and continuing to defame gays and lesbians with falsehoods that grow more incendiary by the day.  The leaders of this movement may deny it, but it seems clear that their demonization of homosexuals plays a role in fomenting the violence, hatred and bullying we’re seeing.” Spurred on by a belief that homosexuality threatens “historic Christian faith,” hard-line religious groups and their secular right wing political allies are blaming the very people and organizations dedicated to protecting the LGBTQ community, especially LGBTQ teenagers who have been reported as committing “bullycide” from anti-gay harassment in recent weeks.  As Evelyn Schlatter writes in her Intelligence Report article on religiously-motivated anti-gay bias groups: “Even as some well-known anti-gay groups like Focus on the Family moderate their views, a hard core of smaller groups, most of them religiously motivated, have continued to pump out demonizing propaganda aimed at homosexuals and other sexual minorities. These groups’ influence reaches far beyond what their size would suggest, because the “facts” they disseminate about homosexuality are often amplified by certain politicians, other groups and even news organizations.” A particular target for the ire of the religious right has been GLSEN, the Gay, Lesbian, and Straight Education Network, which has been most outspoken against the bullying of LGBTQ youth in American schools through its “Safe Schools” campaign.  Eighteen anti-LGBTQ hate groups are profiled in the report, and ten popular myths about LGBTQ people are debunked, as well, including the irrational claim that homosexuals were somehow responsible for the Nazi Holocaust of the Jews during the Second World War.  The Report does contend that some religious leaders are speaking out against anti-gay violence, such as the Rev. Fritz Ritsch, Senior Minister of Fort Worth’s St. Stephen’s Presbyterian Church:  “The recent epidemic of bullying-related teen suicides is a wake-up call to us moderate Christians,” Rev. Ritsch, wrote in October in the Fort Worth, Texas, Star-Telegram. “To most unchurched Americans — meaning most Americans — the fruit of the church is bitter indeed. … [T]he bullying crisis has put a fine point on the need for moderates to challenge the theological bullies from our own bully pulpits. We cannot equivocate. Children are dying. We need to speak up. If not now, when?”  The summation of the SPLC report is grimly realistic.  For the near term, religiously-spawned anti-LGBTQ violence will continue, and perhaps increase.  The report concludes, in part: “Although leaders of the hard core of the religious right deny it, it seems clear that their demonizing propaganda plays a role in fomenting that violence.” It is up to all people of good conscience–especially people who identify with organized religion–to find the courage and spiritual resources to combat religiously and politically motivated violence against LGBTQ folk everywhere.

November 23, 2010 Posted by | African Americans, Anglo Americans, Anti-LGBT hate crime, anti-LGBT hate crime murder, Anti-Semitism, bi-phobia, Bisexual persons, Bullying in schools, gay men, gay teens, Gender Variant Youth, GLSEN, harassment, Hate Crime Statistics, Hate Crimes, hate crimes prevention, hate speech, Heterosexism and homophobia, Latino and Latina Americans, Lesbian women, LGBT teen suicide prevention, LGBTQ suicide, Perpetrators of Hate Crime, Politics, Public Theology, religious hate speech, religious intolerance, Social Justice Advocacy, transgender persons, transphobia | , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Comments Off on Gays Most Often Targeted by Hate Crimes in America; SPLC Report Confirms Alarming News

Transgender California Teen Dies in Fear of Bullying

 

Chloe Lacy before transitioning

 

Clovis, California – When Chloe Lacy decided earlier this year to transition from male to female in order to become who she really was inside, she feared what her peers would do.  Chloe, née Justin Lacy, told her family that she had nightmares about what people at Buchanan High School would do to her when they learned about her transgender identity, according to KMJN Radio News.  Her mother, Allison Murphy, told reporters for KFSN News, “Who wants to see a young man walking down the street with a dress on? In his eyes, that was the worst fear of all time, for someone to throw rocks at him, beat him up. It’s just the overall society judgment is what did this.”  Reflecting on the recent suicides of Tyler Clementi in New Jersey and Seth Walsh in California, Chloe’s stepfather said, “That’s what we’re creating as a society. We’re creating this incredible cloud of fear for these individuals and they feel they have nowhere to go.”  Chloe’s mother said that as far back as kindergarten, her child was expressing a different gender presentation than her biological gender.  During high school, Mrs. Murphy says that she forbade Chloe from coming out as transgender, for fear of harm.  Chloe struggled with what the steps of transition would mean to her, seeking therapy and support, but mostly living a lonely existence at home except for a group of girls at Buchanan High in Clovis where she found a sense of peace and acceptance.  After graduating from high school this past year, Mrs. Murphy says that Chloe moved away north to Eureka to begin a post-secondary education.  There, she started to wear women’s clothing more often, and shyly becoming the person she always knew she was.  Fear killed Chloe, fear of misunderstanding and bullying, according to her family.  Just a few days before her 19th birthday, on September 24 Chloe shot and killed herself inside her Eureka home where she was living for school. Her mother and stepfather say Chloe’s death reflects the deaths of other teens who have recently committed suicide due to bullying, according to KFSN News.  The Equality Forum, an LGBTQ history and news site, seven youths have committed suicide in recent months due to anti-gay and anti-trans bullying.  Chloe makes the seventh.  Both in Eureka and in Clovis, moves are afoot to remember Chloe in vigils and school assemblies.  The Murphys intend to be at all of these commemorative events they can, speaking out against intolerance and bullying against youth like their Chloe.

October 12, 2010 Posted by | Anglo Americans, Anti-LGBT hate crime, Bullying in schools, California, gay teens, Gender Variant Youth, gun violence, harassment, Hate Crime Statistics, Hate Crimes, hate speech, Heterosexism and homophobia, LGBT teen suicide prevention, LGBTQ suicide, New Jersey, Remembrances, Slurs and epithets, transgender persons, transphobia, Vigils | , , , , , , , , , , , , | 3 Comments

Remembering Matthew Shepard on the 12th Anniversary of His Murder

Laramie, Wyoming – Matthew Shepard was brutally assaulted on a lonely ridge overlooking Laramie, Wyoming on this day twelve years ago. He died in a coma in Fort Collins, Colorado, with his family by his side.  Much has changed.  Much has not.  His hate crime murder has set the pattern by which all LGBTQ hate crimes murder victims are remembered, both for good and ill.  Good, in that many American’s are more keenly aware of the problem of anti-LGBTQ hate crimes and the issues surrounding the struggle for human rights equality because of his death.  Millions of people around the world came to know about other hate crimes murder victims through the lens of Matthew’s story.  His family foundation, The Matthew Shepard Foundation, has done untold good advocating for justice, equality and the embrace of diversity in American life.  His mother, Judy Shepard, has become one of the most visible and effective spokespeople for human rights in our time–a true conscience for the nation.  It is no mistake that the long-awaited federal hate crimes law, the Matthew Shepard and James Byrd, Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act, is named in honor of Matthew, largely through the dogged persistence of this estimable woman who will not take “no” for an answer.  It was a proud day for all of us when President Obama signed the bill protecting LGBTQ Americans from bias-motivated crimes last October, inclusive of transgender people and disabled persons, as well.  But there is a downside to the way Matthew Shepard’s story is remembered in this country too, one neither he nor his family are guilty of–and one we must all act to redress.  The story of Matthew Shepard has tended to overshadow the remembrance of any other LGBTQ hate crimes victim, especially if that person was non-white, older and therefore less attractive, disabled somehow, or feminine in gender presentation.  This has been true of the many gender variant youth of color who have died in staggering numbers as the 21st century has dawned.  In the case of 15-year-old Sakia LaTona Gunn, an African American lesbian Aggressive, murdered at a bus stop in Newark, New Jersey, relatively few media stories on her outrageous murder broke into the national press compared to the thousands that flooded the channels when Matt died.  Much ink has been spilled over why this was so, but in order to honor Matthew, we must demand that ALL LGBTQ stories are told with the passion and respect his has been.  Finally, following Judy Shepard’s example, we must use this anniversary to cry out for Safe Schools for all children.  As she wrote on the Matthew Shepard Foundation blog in early October, “Our young people deserve better than to go to schools where they are treated this way. We have to make schools a safe place for our youth to prepare for their futures, not be confronted with threats, intimidation or routine disrespect. Quite simply, we are calling one more time for all Americans to stand up and speak out against taunting, invasion of privacy, violence and discrimination against these youth by their peers, and asking everyone in a position of authority in their schools and communities to step forward and provide safe spaces and support services for LGBT youth or those who are simply targeted for discrimination because others assume they are gay. There can never be enough love and acceptance for these young people as they seek to live openly as their true selves and find their role in society.”  In October 2008, I spoke at “Hope Not Hate,” an anniversary service for the city of Austin, Texas, commemorating the deaths of Matthew Shepard and James Byrd, Jr., both unwitting martyrs to the cause of true equality in American life.  I said at that time, in part, “We who believe in justice cannot rest! We who believe in justice cannot rest until it comes! When a mother like Judy Shepard challenges us to send a different message to America than the one delivered by the men who killed her son, we must embrace that memory with all its pain, and break out of defeat into action.”  I believe more fervently in the work of erasing hatred today than ever.  Rest in Peace, Matthew, Sakia, and all our sisters and brothers.

~ Stephen V. Sprinkle, Director of the Unfinished Lives Project

October 12, 2010 Posted by | anti-LGBT hate crime murder, Bisexual persons, Bullying in schools, Colorado, gay men, gay teens, Gender Variant Youth, harassment, Hate Crimes, hate crimes prevention, Heterosexism and homophobia, Law and Order, Legislation, Lesbian women, LGBT teen suicide prevention, LGBTQ suicide, Matthew Shepard, Matthew Shepard Act, Matthew Shepard Foundation, Media Issues, Remembrances, Sakia Gunn Film Project, Social Justice Advocacy, Special Comments, transgender persons, transphobia, Wyoming | , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

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