Unfinished Lives

Remembering LGBT Hate Crime Victims

Five D.C. Lesbians Attacked, But Police Refuse to File Report

Washington, D.C. – When five D.C. lesbians were attacked outside the Columbia Heights Metro Station, they thought they could count on the police to protect them.  They were wrong.  On July 30, according to the Washington Blade, five lesbians were brutally assaulted at 3 a.m. outside the metro stop by two men who attacked them while shouting expletives because of their perceived sexual orientation. A third man accompanying the attackers used a cell phone to record the assault.  Yazzmen Morse, 21, who was pummeled in the face by the attackers, told the Blade that her assailants were yelling “dykes,” “bitches,” and other slurs at her and her companions.  A bystander placed a 911 emergency call to report the attack, and four police cruisers from the Third District Police Department station with “six or seven” officers responded.  The women were hurt, scared, and frantic to have the Metro police protect them and arrest their attackers.  Instead, the officers refused even to take a report, chiding the lesbians for “not knowing how to act,” and released the one assailant they had apprehended and restrained at the scene of the crime.  365 Gay reports Morse saying of the police,  “They let him go. And then they said they didn’t want to hear our stories.” Morse said she was horrified and angered that the police simply released her attacker, who smiled and taunted his lesbian victims as he walked away.  “He walked across the street laughing,” Morse told the Blade. “And I will never forget his face – he was just smiling. And we are five people who are in tears and he is just laughing at us.”  The second suspect had already fled the scene when the police arrived.  Their companion who took video of the assault continued to record even after the police arrived.  The video confiscated showed the attackers enjoying the mayhem they inflicted on the lesbians.

Responding to the charge that the lesbians “didn’t know how to act,” one of the victims who wishes to remain anonymous said to the Blade, “[The police] were telling us if you guys don’t calm down we’re going to lock you guys up. One officer said I’m not talking to you because you guys don’t know how to act,” she said. “And yes, we were panicking. Yes, we were crying. Yes, we were going off. But the fact is these men had just hit us.”  The anonymous victim also said the police offered no reason why they were not going to make a report of the assault.

D.C. LGBTQ activists and organizations unleashed a storm of protest over the actions of the Metropolitan Police.  In response, officials of the Department have assured the community that arrests will be forthcoming, and that as many as seven police officers may be disciplined (even terminated) because of their behavior.  The attack is now being classified as an anti-LGBT hate crime. The District has suffered a rash of attacks against lesbians and transgender women of color in recent months.  The last reported homicide of a transwoman of color took place just two week prior to the attack outside the Columbia Heights Metro Station.

August 8, 2011 Posted by | African Americans, Anti-LGBT hate crime, Beatings and battery, gay bashing, GLBTQ, Hate Crimes, hate speech, Heterosexism and homophobia, Law and Order, Lesbian women, LGBTQ, Perpetrators of Hate Crime, Slurs and epithets, Social Justice Advocacy, transgender persons, Washington, D.C., women | , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

Families/Friends at Each Other’s Throats During Trial of Larry King’s Alleged Murderer

Brandon McInerney (left), and Lawrence Fobes "Larry" King (right)

Chatsworth, Los Angeles, California – The Advocate and the Los Angeles Times report that the trial of Brandon McInerney erupted in tears and rage as the courtroom proceedings entered their fourth week. Dawn Boldrin, former teacher of both boys, showed pictures she took of the lime green strapless chiffon dress she presented to 15-year-old Larry King.  Ms. Boldrin, members of McInerney’s family,  and many in the courtroom sobbed and shed tears as they saw the broad smile on King’s face as he held up the dress.  Shortly after Larry King received the dress, just a matter of days, in fact, his classmate Brandon McInerney allegedly shot King to death execution-style in full view of dozens of other students and Ms. Boldrin, their first period teacher. The display of emotion proved too much for King’s parents.  As the L.A. Times reports: “An infuriated Greg King, father of Larry King, stomped out of the courtroom. He returned a short while later and rounded up the entire King family to leave the courthouse for the day. As the group walked past Boldrin’s daughter and another relative, Larry’s mother, Dawn King, whispered an expletive to them.”  On Friday morning, the presiding judge, Ventura County Superior Court Judge Charles Campbell, ruled that King’s mother would not be permitted to attend the trial any further because of her profane outburst the previous day.  Later, outside the courtroom, King’s father told reporters that he became enraged at the emotional display on Boldrin’s part because he believed her to be a hypocrite, shedding what he termed “crocodile tears.”  The Advocate quotes King as saying, “My son is dead and they’re crying?  That’s the woman (referring to Boldrin) who gave him a dress after complaining that he shouldn’t be coming to school in makeup and boots!”  By accentuating Larry King’s overt gender-outlaw behavior, and hyping the image of the dress, McInerney’s defense team is seeking to shift blame from their client to the dead gay student, suggesting that his alleged aggressive, sexualized overtures toward McInerney drove him to violence.  In order to counter this subtle form of the outworn “gay panic defense,” the prosecution has portrayed the defendant as a violence-prone neophyte white supremacist who harbored deep anti-gay and anti-transgender biases.  McInerney is being tried in the Chatsworth courthouse as an adult, even though he was 14 at the time of the murder.  If he is convicted of the slaying, McInerney, now 17, could face 53 years to life in prison.

August 1, 2011 Posted by | African Americans, Anglo Americans, Anti-Gay Hate Groups, anti-LGBT hate crime murder, Bullying in schools, California, Character assassination, Execution, gay bashing, gay panic defense, gay teens, Gender Variant Youth, GLBTQ, gun violence, harassment, Hate Crimes, Heterosexism and homophobia, Law and Order, LGBTQ, Neo-Nazis and White Supremacy, Perpetrators of Hate Crime, School and church shootings, Slurs and epithets, transgender persons, transphobia | , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Comments Off on Families/Friends at Each Other’s Throats During Trial of Larry King’s Alleged Murderer

Lesbian Youth Activist Attacked in Downtown Portland

Kayla Stone, bashed on the streets of Portland (Just Out image)

Portland, Oregon – A 21-year-old musician and LGBTQ youth activist was brutally assaulted July 3 in what Portland Police are calling a bias-motivated crime.  Most concerning to the local LGBTQ community is that Kayla Stone appealed for help, and initially got none.  Stone, who plays guitar and sings for a local art gallery and for a home offering services to queer and transitional youth, is well-known in the LGBTQ scene in Portland.  She reported to Just Out that the night before the violence, she had performed at a local club when a group of Latinos menaced her as she left the venue, followed her for three blocks down the street, and called her an epithet.  Stone denounced the group, verbally defending herself, and they went away. The next night, on Sunday, sometime between 1 and 2:30 am, as she came back to the area to meet her date, the same group attacked her without provocation as soon as they recognized who she was. The assault was swift and brutal, and the shaken lesbian remembers little about the violence except the description of the first man to punch her in the face.  He had a teardrop tattoo underneath one of his eyes, Stone recalls.  But though the whole group struck out at her, leaving her face a bloody wreck, she fought back and refused to fall to the ground.  As she related to Just Out, “It was really intense for me, because it was like, wow, even though Rosa Parks is dead, these people that stood up against prejudice and racism are dead, I’m not. And I feel very thankful to not be. Because with how many people there were that night, I can’t believe I didn’t go down on my knees.”

When her assailants backed off and left her standing, Stone limped to The Escape, an all-ages gay bar, for help. Though there were witnesses to the assault who saw the whole attack, none of them offered to help or call police.  Stone says that in the aftermath of the attack, while she was struggling to get to The Escape, two police cruisers passed her by, and though she was obviously bloody and unsteady from being bashed, the officers did not help her.  Only when someone at the bar called 911, did police respond to her situation. Stone was taken to a hospital, but refused to be stitched up for fear that her injuries would be minimized by the authorities if she let Emergency Room personnel finish their treatment.  Instead, she asked a friend to take photos of the cuts, bruises, and lacerations she received from her bashers. Stone is a committed activist who is no stranger to discrimination. Reflecting on her assault, she says that being targeted for anti-LGBTQ hate crimes is part of the cost of being different. “I’m not trying to justify anything that occurs, but the point is that the revolution is not glamorous,” Stone said. “It means continuing to do what you say you’re going to do no matter what.”

Portland’s LGBTQ community has suffered a rash of gay and queer bashings in recent weeks. Two gay men were assaulted near the Hawthorne Bridge, and a Newport man was beaten as he tried to stop a an anti-gay attack.  The Stone case is now being treated as an anti-gay crime by Portland police, though the lack of evidence and witnesses agreeing to testify hamper the investigation. Courage and commitment to change homophobic and heterosexist patterns in society, like that exhibited by brave Kayla Stone, may yet break the cycle of violence against sexual minorities in the Portland area.

July 13, 2011 Posted by | Anglo Americans, Anti-LGBT hate crime, Beatings and battery, gay bashing, Gender Variant Youth, GLBTQ, harassment, Hate Crimes, Heterosexism and homophobia, Latino and Latina Americans, Latinos, Law and Order, Lesbian women, LGBTQ, Oregon, Perpetrators of Hate Crime, Queer, Slurs and epithets, Social Justice Advocacy, transgender persons, transphobia, Unsolved LGBT Crimes | , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Why is Larry King Put On Trial for His Own Murder? Get the Full Story

Larry King (Newsweek graphic from "Young, Gay and Murdered")

Chatsworth, California – Larry King was murdered in cold blood in his first period computer classroom.  As he unsuspectingly worked on a paper on World War II, his middle school classmate, Brandon McInerney, allegedly moved up behind him and shot him in the back of the head before the unbelieving eyes of dozens of students and Ms. Joy Boldrin, his teacher. Then McInerney, who had been a party to harassing Larry for months about his gender non-conformity, pointed the .22 pistol again and delivered a coup de grace to Larry’s ravaged head.  In his landmark book,Unfinished Lives: Reviving the Memories of LGBTQ Hate Crimes Victims (Resource Publications 2011) , Dr. Stephen Sprinkle treats the King/McInerney story at length, exploring the backgrounds and struggles of both teenagers. In the chapter, “Baby Boys, You Stay On My Mind,” Sprinkle sets Larry’s murder in the context of other assassinations of femininely presenting boys of color throughout the United States in early 2008.  Larry King fought back with the only power he had: his camp persona.  Half African-American, he was small, gracile, and not nearly as strong as the gang of boys, the “Young Marines,” surrounding Brandon McInerney. Larry learned to flirt in order to push back against his harassers. By the time of his murder, Larry was a five-year veteran of bullying in schools. McInerney, though slightly younger than Larry, was cultivating a “cool” image with middle school girls–an image aided by his overt harassment of Larry, “the little fag.” Underneath the surface of McInerney’s “cool,” though, was a budding white supremacist, whose confused masculinity chose violence as a way to silence the boy who turned the tables on him. Almost from the moment Larry’s murder hit the newswire, journalists started digging for dirt on the young gender outlaw.  Newsweek’s infamous article by Ramin Satoodeh labeled Larry a sexual aggressor in a blaze of controversial hot type. The Gun Lobby sprang into action to defend handguns. Larry’s partisans struck out at McInerney’s character, too. As Sprinkle details the journalistic feeding frenzy in the days following the murder, “these two boys were both abused by a media establishment determined to give a voracious public the news it was hungry to have: digestible pictures of a victim and his alleged killer to feed the insatiable American fascination with teen-on-teen violence.” 

Opening arguments in the McInerney trial, now taking place after three years of legal wrangling over Brandon’s status as a juvenile or an adult, and a critical change of trial venue, are busy following the lead of the media. Larry is being portrayed as a maladjusted predator (at 15? How is this possible?), and McInerney is being painted as a first-degree murderer who planned homicide in large part because of his homophobia and transphobia. The defense is indulging in a what amounts to the gay panic defense that has been discredited in courtrooms throughout the nation. Behind the defense strategy is the amazing idea that any expression of sexuality on the part of a gender non-conforming person makes violence legitimate in response. Just as Sprinkle surmised, the trial is going to turn on whether Larry King can be put on the stand as the chief malefactor instead of the defendant. As Sprinkle says, “There is a stark difference between the boys that no media wizard can resolve.  While Brandon remains alive and able to defend himself against the negative portrayals of his identity, Larry King cannot. He lost his voice in death” (Unfinished Lives, p. 284).

Unfinished Lives recounts in a chapter-length format the backstory of this, the most-publicized anti-LGBTQ hate crime murder since the slaying of Matthew Shepard in 1998. The book also tells the stories of thirteen other gay, lesbian, and transgender lives in these United States cut brutally short by unreasoning violence.  Unfinished Lives will be an indispensable resource for anyone wanting to understand the McInerney murder trial for what it really is.  To explore or purchase the book, go to http://www.amazon.com/Unfinished-Lives-Reviving-Memories-Victims/dp/1608998118/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1310064063&sr=1-1 or to https://wipfandstock.com/store/Unfinished_Lives_Reviving_the_Memories_of_LGBTQ_Hate_Crimes_Victims

July 7, 2011 Posted by | African Americans, Anglo Americans, anti-LGBT hate crime murder, Blame the victim, Bullying in schools, California, Character assassination, Execution, gay bashing, gay panic defense, gay teens, gender identity/expression, Gender Variant Youth, GLBTQ, gun violence, harassment, Hate Crimes, Heterosexism and homophobia, Law and Order, Lesbian women, LGBTQ, Media Issues, Perpetrators of Hate Crime, Remembrances, Slurs and epithets, Social Justice Advocacy, trans-panic defense, transgender persons, transphobia | , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

6 New York Teens Charged with Murder as Hate Crime

Anthony Collao, 18, fatally mistaken as gay, (l), pictured with his girlfriend, Wendy Vargas

New York City – Six teenagers have been charged with second-degree murder as a hate crime in the fatal March attack on an 18-year-old male perceived to be gay.  365 Gay reports that the youths attacked and stomped Anthony Collao of Bethpage on Long Island to death as he was leaving a birthday party on March 15 in Woodhaven, Queens. The suspects, none of whom are older than 18, crashed the party, breaking windows, shouting “homophobic remarks,” and scrawling anti-gay slurs and epithets on the wall with a red marker. Collao and his cousin, sensing trouble, tried to leave the home, but were chased outside where the assailants threw Collao against a car, and savagely beating and stomping him until he no longer moved.  His cousin screamed for them to stop, saying that Collao was not gay and had a girlfriend, but the attackers continued pressing their assault with their fists, shod feet, and a metal pipe. Collao fell into an irreversible coma and died two days later at a Jamaica hospital when life support was removed from him. Four suspects — Alex Velez, 16, of the Bronx, Christopher Lozada and Luis Tabales, both 17 and from Queens,  and Nolis Ogando, 18, also from Queens – were arrested soon after the attack. A fifth suspect, Calvin Pietri, 17, of Woodhaven, who allegedly bragged about the killing on Facebook, was arrested within a day of the attack. Jonathan Echevarria, 16, of Brooklyn was also arrested and charged.  Queens District Attorney Richard A. Brown told news reporters that each suspect has been charged with a 21-count indictment of murder as a hate crime.  The charges were upgraded after new evidence in the case came to light.  The suspicion that someone might be gay, or even an unsubstantiated accusation of it, as in this case, carries the potential of death. Homophobia and heterosexism are deadly to straights as well as gays.  The defendants in this case could each face as much as 25 years for the crime if found guilty.

June 24, 2011 Posted by | anti-LGBT hate crime murder, Beatings and battery, Bludgeoning, Gang violence, gay bashing, GLBTQ, Hate Crimes, hate speech, Heterosexism and homophobia, Latino and Latina Americans, Law and Order, LGBTQ, Mistaken as LGBT, New York, Slurs and epithets, Stomping and Kicking Violence | , , , , , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Asher Brown’s Legacy: Anti-Gay Bullying Ban in Houston Public Schools

Asher Brown, bullied to death in September 2010

Houston, Texas – By a vote of 7 to 0, with two board members absent, the Houston Independent School District made LGBT discrimination and anti-gay bullying against policy for all students and employees in Houston public schools.  The action came in response to outrage over the “bullycide” suicide of 13-year-old Asher Brown, who took his own life after two years of intolerable harassment for his sexual orientation in Cypress-Fairbanks School District schools.  His parents have testified that they repeatedly contacted school officials about the violence focused on their gay son, but to no avail.  No school official or teacher intervened to stop the bullying and save Asher’s life. The gay teenager’s death in September 2010 sparked a state-wide effort to revise school policies to ban harm to LGBTQ students while on school property. The Dallas Voice picked up the story of the policy change from the Facebook page of HRC board member Meghan Stabler, and is covering developments in Houston and Harris County.

The policy revision reads, in part: “A substantiated charge of harassment against a student or employee shall result in disciplinary action. The term “harassment” includes repeated, unwelcome, and offensive slurs, jokes, or other oral, written, graphic, or physical conduct relating to an individual’s race, color, religion, ancestry, national origin, disability or handicap, or age, sex, marital status, veteran status, political affiliation, sexual orientation, gender identity, and/or gender expression that creates an intimidating, hostile, or offensive educational or work environment.”

Houston School Board Member Larry Marshall said that the revision will make district schools safer for all children, especially LGBT students: “I think this recommendation clearly signals to principals that when you enter a school building you are on our turf, and on our turf we are going to treat everyone with dignity and respect. I think that administrators need to thoroughly understand that anything else will not be tolerated.”

Because the Houston ISD is the seventh-largest school district in the nation, the action of the district school board to ban discrimination and bullying against LGBT students will exert substantial pressure on other school systems to revise and enforce fair treatment of all children.  Cypress-Fairbanks ISD, for example, the district where Asher Brown attended school, has not yet changed its policy towards LGBT student bullying and harassment.  Nothing will bring Asher back to his family and his friends.  The horror of his death will remain.  But actions like this policy revision, and vigorous education and enforcement of the ban will help ensure that no other family or school need go through the agony that surrounded the fragile life and death of a gentle teenager who just wanted to live an authentic life and be able to get a good education at the same time.

June 24, 2011 Posted by | Anglo Americans, Anti-LGBT hate crime, Bisexual persons, Bullying in schools, gay bashing, gay teens, Gender Variant Youth, GLBTQ, harassment, Hate Crimes, hate crimes prevention, Heterosexism and homophobia, Houston Independent School District, Human Rights Campaign, Lesbian women, LGBT teen suicide prevention, LGBTQ, LGBTQ suicide, Slurs and epithets, Social Justice Advocacy, Texas, transgender persons, transphobia | , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Comments Off on Asher Brown’s Legacy: Anti-Gay Bullying Ban in Houston Public Schools

Gandalf Comes Out Against School Bullying; Works Magic Among Students

Sir Ian McKellan is Gandalf and Magneto...and he's gay!

Kent, United Kingdom – Sir Ian McKellan, international stage and screen star, best known for his portrayals of Gandalf the Wizard in The Lord of the Rings, and Magneto the Mutant in X-Men, is working the secondary school circuit to put an end to bullying against LGBTQ youth.  The Guardian reported in April 2011 that Sir Ian, who broke new ground by coming out as a gay man in 1988, is touring schools in a program to make education safer for gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender youth.  Stonewall, the human rights and equality charity established by Sir Ian and a few others in 1989 is sponsoring the effort throughout Great Britain and Asia.  Here is an excerpt from the Guardian article by a Stonewall staffer who accompanies Sir Ian on anti-gay bullying school tours:

“Do you know any gay people?” Sir Ian McKellen asks. Silence. Heads shake. “Well, you do now. I’m gay.” It’s my turn to speak up. “You know two now. I used to go to this school – and I’m gay,” I offer. “You know three now,” a sixth-former chips in. The other pupils don’t look too surprised, and he seems admirably comfortable in his sexuality. Silence. Then: “Erm. Well. You know four now.” Heads shoot around to see a uniformed boy, leaning close to McKellen. Mouths fall slightly open – including mine – but nobody speaks. Then McKellen says, in that mellifluous voice of his, “Well. How about that? It turns out we all know quite a few more gay people than we thought we did.”

This is the third month of McKellen’s nationwide “role model” tour of secondary schools on behalf of Stonewall, the gay equality charity that he co-founded, and which I work for, and the two of us have come to Hundred of Hoo comprehensive in Kent, which I left over a decade ago. It has become a familiar scene for him. “My school visits are often rewarded by people coming out,” he says. “And I don’t just mean pupils – I’ve heard staff coming out to their heads on my visits, too.”

McKellen obviously has a powerful effect on the schools he visits; how does this make him feel? “A bit overwhelmed – and privileged,” he says. Gandalf has worked his magic in 54 secondary schools over the last two years. His dream? An education system free of the homophobia that has plagued it for years – and a curriculum that fully includes lesbian, gay and bisexual people . . .This has a profound effect on two year 10 friends, who tell me: “We didn’t realise calling things ‘gay’ could offend someone. It was touching when he talked about never being able to tell his mum he was gay. One of our best friends is gay and he gets abused for it. We hope it will stop now.”

McKellan reprieves Gandalf in upcoming film, "The Hobbit"

Magic, indeed!  Sir Ian’s example challenges others to follow in his footsteps among celebrities and everyday folk alike, to expose homophobic and transphobic language for what it is: a chief contributing factor in violence enacted against youth who present in gender variant ways, or who dare to live authentic lives as lesbians and gays. At the final school assembly, Sir Ian tackles the issue of anti-gay hate speech, homophobia, and hate crimes:

“I’m not useless,” McKellen asserts . . . , “but when you use that word [gay] as an insulting adjective, that’s what you’re saying about me. So please, watch your language. Because if you don’t, you mightn’t watch your actions…” He goes on to tell how Ian Baynham was recently killed in a homophobic hate attack by teenagers. “The girl who stamped on his head might have used ‘gay’ to mean anything rubbish and useless. And that probably convinced her that gay people were rubbish and useless – and don’t deserve to live.”

So, Gandalf has exchanged his ring quest for a new campaign: to convince LGBTQ students they are of great worth, and to encourage their peers and their teachers and school administrators to support their gender variant students by bringing anti-gay violence to an end.  We at Unfinished Lives Blog cannot think of a more necessary or noble adventure for everyone involved.  Bravo, Gandalf!

June 24, 2011 Posted by | Anti-LGBT hate crime, anti-LGBT hate crime murder, Bisexual persons, Bullying in schools, Gandalf, gay bashing, gay men, gay teens, gender identity/expression, Gender Variant Youth, GLBTQ, Great Britain, Hate Crimes, hate crimes prevention, hate speech, Heterosexism and homophobia, Ian McKellan, Lesbian women, LGBT teen suicide prevention, LGBTQ, Perpetrators of Hate Crime, religious hate speech, religious intolerance, Slurs and epithets, Social Justice Advocacy, Stonewall, transgender persons, transphobia | , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Comments Off on Gandalf Comes Out Against School Bullying; Works Magic Among Students

Southwest Air Pilot Smears Gays on Radio, Suspended, Then Reinstated

Southwest Air Flight Attendant Ken Cummings Jr. (r), and his murderer, Terry Mark Mangum (l)

Houston, Texas – Most passengers are acquainted with a friendly pilot’s voice on the inboard com link, welcoming them aboard a flight.  A Southwest Air pilot, however, launched into a homophobic tirade on a stuck-open mic about gay employees and others in a rant that cost him a suspension, according to EDGE reports. In a March incident only now coming to light thanks to news reports by KRPC-TV, the pilot indulged himself in a series of epithets and slurs against gay people, older employees, and obese employees for two-and-a-half minutes, calling them (in the publishable portion of his rant), “gays, grannies, and grandes.”  Thinking he was only speaking to his co-worker, the pilot did not realize his microphone was on until informed that it was open and broadcasting by air traffic controllers in the tower.  A spokesperson for the airline informed media that the offending pilot was reprimanded and suspended without pay for an unspecified time period.  After a period of LGBTQ sensitivity training, he has been reinstated and is flying the skies again. Corporate and professional amnesia about the effects of homophobic speech and behavior on Southwest Air employees contributed to this regrettable incident.  Kenneth L. Cummings Jr., a longtime Southwest Air Flight Attendant, was brutally murdered by a religious zealot in June 2007.  The grisly slaughter culminated in Cummings’s tortured body being set afire in a shallow stock tank near Poteat, Texas in what his murderer called a “burnt offering to God.”  Southwest Air employees by the score aided in the search for Cummings in an effort co-ordinated by EquuSearch, and uniformed flight attendants, pilots, and company officers attended his funeral to honor him.  But how soon people forget.  Now a pilot in the same organization can rave on about gay people with little or no regard for their humanity, get a slap on the hand, some retraining, and then be put right back on the line, flying LGBTQ people among others to destinations around the world.  Unfinished Lives Team hopes he has learned something from this experience, beyond the old bromide that anything is okay so long as you don’t get caught.  Reports suggest that this pilot had to apologize to air traffic controllers and Southwest employees for his indiscretion as a part of his punishment.  A representative of the Southwest Airlines Employees Union is filing a discrimination complaint with the federal government concerning this matter.  Until then, fly carefully.  You never know who might be at the controls.

June 23, 2011 Posted by | Anglo Americans, anti-LGBT hate crime murder, funerals, gay bashing, gay men, GLBTQ, Hate Crimes, hate speech, Heterosexism and homophobia, immolation, LGBTQ, Perpetrators of Hate Crime, religious hate speech, religious intolerance, Slurs and epithets, Social Justice Advocacy, Southwest Airlines, stabbings, Texas, Torture and Mutilation | , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Palm Springs Parents Bash Gay Couple In Front of Their Child

Russell Bates and Abigail Sheehy, alleged gay bashers

Palm Springs, California – A dispute over a parking space resulted in young parents beating the teeth out of the mouth of a gay couple–all done in front of the parents’ small child.  Russell Bates, 24, and Abigail Sheehy, 19, both white, took their rage out on an older gay male couple in what police are calling “a brutal attack that should be prosecuted as a hate crime,” according to the Desert Sun. The gay men, 45 and 63 respectively, business owners at a popular strip of flower and yogurt shops, asked the straight couple with a young child to move their parked car from a space clearly reserved for business patrons at about 4:20 p.m. on Saturday, May 21. Bates and Sheehy refused.  The gay couple took their pictures, which sparked the dispute into an all-out attack, taking place in full view of the four-year-old boy.  Shouting anti-gay slurs at the gay men, the straight couple thrashed the couple so violently with closed fists that the teeth of one of the victims were knocked out of his head, and his jaw was broken.  Both victims were taken to a local hospital to be treated for their injuries.  They have since been released to recuperate at home. The assailants fled the scene, only to be apprehended the next day at a public park. Bates and Sheehy have been charged with three felony counts each, including hate crimes charges. They lost custody of their son, who has been remanded to Child Protective Services.  Sheehy was released on bail later in the week. Bates, who has a previous criminal record, is being held on $50,000 bond for violating his parole agreement.  The offending couple are due to appear in court on June 6.  According to local residents, Riverside County has a gay-friendly reputation, making this attack unusual.  Darron Dahle, long-time citizen of Palm Springs, told the Desert Sun, “I’m just outraged that something like this is still happening. This is something that happened 35 years ago. It still happens in this town in daylight? That’s really the most outrageous part.” It is customary for the victims of a hate crime to remain unidentified for their own protection until the trial date, which has yet to be set.

June 4, 2011 Posted by | Anglo Americans, Anti-LGBT hate crime, Beatings and battery, California, gay bashing, gay men, GLBTQ, Hate Crimes, hate speech, Heterosexism and homophobia, Law and Order, LGBTQ, Perpetrators of Hate Crime, Slurs and epithets | , , , , , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

KKK and “GodHatesFags” Zealots Turn On Each Other

Arlington, Virginia – Klansmen joined in a counter-protest attempting to screen military funerals from a Westboro Baptist Church picket at Arlington National Cemetery on Memorial Day weekend.  The Fred Phelps-founded protestors, made infamous by their “God Hates Fags” campaign and their more recent demonstrations at the funerals of fallen United States military servicemembers, found themselves confronted by a number of members of the Knights of the Southern Cross Soldiers of the Ku Klux Klan, a racist KKK cell based in Powhatan, Virginia, according to the Hatewatch post of the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC).  Including the KKK, 70 counter-protestors waved American flags and held up pro-USA signs, blocking the funerals in progress from the demonstrators holding signs brandishing such slogans as “Fag Nation,” “Thank God for Dead Soldiers,” “Pray for More Dead Soldiers,” and “Thank God for IED’s,” typical of the anti-American message propounded by the Topeka, Kansas Baptist church in its continuing opposition to “homosexual lifestyles.”

Dennis LaBonte, spokesperson for the Knights of the Southern Cross Soldiers, said that their counter-protest was in defense of freedom of speech and in support of the U.S. military. LaBonte told reporters that it was the military in this country that fought to defend the rights of groups like Phelps’s Topeka, Kansas church which recently successfully defended itself before the U.S. Supreme Court against a suit brought by the parent of a Marine killed in combat–a soldier whose funeral had been picketed by the Westboro zealots to condemn the “fag-enabling ways” of the nation.  “It’s the soldier that fought and died and gave them that right,” LaBonte said.  Responding to the Klan counter-protestors, Abigail Phelps, an attorney as are many of her siblings, complained to CNN that people should not “idolize” soldiers who died in national service, or anyone else who died in an “unrighteous cause.”  When directly asked about her reaction to the presence of KKK members in opposition to the Westboro Baptist demonstration, she told the reporter, “They have no moral authority on anything.” According to yourblackworld.com, Phelps went on to say, “People like them say it’s white power … white supremacy.  The Bible doesn’t say anywhere that it’s an abomination to be born of a certain gender or race.”

Nationalism makes strange bedfellows, indeed–enlisting bigots in competing demonstrations against other bigots.  No one in the LGBTQ community is under any illusion about the feelings of the KKK toward them, however.  As the SPLC points out, the Klan hates gay people only slightly less than they hate Jews, African Americans, and “mongrel races.”  As one blog commentator wrote, “On the one hand, this could be laughable, but it is not. One could also [take this news] with a grain of salt. Neither side are LGBT friendly. Let them fight among themselves.”

June 4, 2011 Posted by | African Americans, Anglo Americans, Arlington National Cemetery, Bisexual persons, CNN, funerals, gay bashing, gay men, GLBTQ, harassment, hate speech, Heterosexism and homophobia, Homosexuality and the Bible, Kansas, Klu Klux Klan, Lesbian women, LGBTQ, Protests and Demonstrations, Racism, religious hate speech, religious intolerance, Slurs and epithets, transgender persons, transphobia, U.S. Marines, U.S. Supreme Court, Virginia | , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

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