Gay Utah Teen Bullied To Death: Emergency Community Summit Called
Jack Reese, 18, latest victim of school bullying against LGBT students.
Ogden, Utah – Last Monday, another gay teenager from Utah took his life in response to intolerable bullying because of his sexual orientation. Q Salt Lake reports that Jack Reese, 18, of Mountain Green is the latest casualty in the war on gay teenagers taking place in the nation’s schools. With heartbreaking coincidence, Reese’s boyfriend, Alex Smith, spoke on Reese’s experiences with school bullying to a community event focused on the problem of bullying–without the knowledge that the love of his life had already taken his own life earlier that day. Details of Reese’s death have not been released to the public at this time.
According to Ogden OUTreach, a local LGBT youth service organization, the rate of gay teen suicide in Utah is fully 8 times the national average. A North Utah mother of a gay son appeals to parents in the community the community in the wake of Reese’s bullycide to wake up and take action against the epidemic of suicide sweeping so many queer youth away. Allison Black writes to her fellow parents, in part: “Our local community and churches do not always make it easy to openly accept our LGBT (lesbian, gay, transgender, and bi-sexual) friends, family members, and loved ones. The bullying and suicides need to stop. Parents please do not let outside influences tell you that your gay child is evil or broken. Follow your heart.”
The Rev. Marian Edmonds, director of Ogden OUTreach, says that in an “off-the-record” comment by a local official, a gay teen takes his or her life at the rate of once a week, though it does not get reported that way to the press. In a statement to the media, Edmonds said: “The youth I work with all know either a victim of bullying, the loss of a friend to suicide, and most often, both. These youth are bright, creative and loving, yet too often face daily abuse from rejecting families, bullies at school and the loss of their church family. It is time for local schools to incorporate proven techniques for eliminating bullying and homophobia, for churches to preach love and acceptance, and for parents and families to love and accept their children. Each loss of life is a loss for all of us, and it must stop now.”
An emergency community summit aimed at stopping the spread of gay teen suicides due to bullying has been called in Ogden for May 1. Speakers will include parents from Ogden PFLAG, local opinion leaders, faith leaders, and active members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, the predominant religious influence throughout the area. At Alex Smith’s request, a candlelight vigil will be held at the end of the summit in memory of Reese. Rev. Edmonds decries the situation that is robbing Ogden and North Utah of its young people. “Each loss of life is a loss for all of us, and it must stop now,” she said. Liz Owen, director of PFLAG national, summed up the challenge facing us all: “Sadly, the death of Jack Reese is a reminder that there is still much work to be done.”
Gay Hate Crimes Victim Ryan Keith Skipper Lives On: A Special Comment
Ryan Keith Skipper (April 28, 1981 - March 14, 2007)
Wahneta, Florida – Today would have been Ryan Keith Skipper’s 31st birthday, had he not died at the hands of two reckless, homophobic men in Central Florida five years ago. But Ryan lives on in the hearts and minds of his family, his friends, and countless supporters of human rights who commemorate his life and the lives of other hate crimes murder victims around the nation.
Ryan’s murderers are both sentenced to life in prison for their crimes. William David “Bill-Bill” Brown Jr. and Joseph “Smiley” Bearden killed Ryan on the night of March 14, 2007 in cold blood, stole his car, and vainly attempted to fence it before desperately trying to burn it up in order to destroy evidence of the murder. The Sheriff of Polk County, Grady Judd, capitalized on Ryan’s murder politically, and crassly blamed Ryan for his own death. Sheriff Judd, as of this writing, still holds office, though every one of his innuendoes and allegations concerning Ryan have been categorically disproved.
In the five years since Ryan’s untimely death, his parents, Pat and Lynn Mulder, his brother Damien, and his host of friends have gotten on with their lives, dealing with their grief the best they can. His family has become one of the foremost voices for justice for hate crimes victims in the nation. A major documentary film, “Accessory to Murder: Our Culture’s Complicity in the Death of Ryan Skipper,” directed by Vicki Nantz, a former news director for Orlando’s WESH-TV, continues to open hearts and minds to the cause of human equality throughout Florida and beyond. Damien, Ryan’s older brother, has married and moved away from Florida. He and his wife welcomed a beautiful baby girl, Ryan, into the world this past year, so in an act of life in defiance of death, another Ryan Skipper lives and thrives in her uncle’s memory.
The Unfinished Lives Project was inspired by the life story of Ryan Skipper: his extraordinary capacity for love and friendship, his ability to make people feel appreciated and important, and his unconquerable spirit of life. His story occupies a chapter in the recent book, Unfinished Lives: Reviving the Memories of LGBTQ Hate Crimes Victims (Resource Publications, 2011), entitled “Keeper of Hearts.”
Every time Ryan is remembered and his story is retold, the intentions of his killers and their accomplices in today’s culture and politics are thwarted. Ryan is precious in our memory on his birthday. Our fight for equality and justice continues because Ryan lives on in our hearts.
Lesbians Thrown Out of Texas Bar, Then Beaten in Possible Hate Crime
Julie Ward says she and her friends were held and beaten for being lesbians (KVUE News image)
Weir, Texas – A group of lesbians say that they were thrown out of a local bar and then held and beaten because of their sexual orientation. Weir, Texas is a town of 500+ souls in Northeast Williamson County, east of Georgetown and north of Austin. Julie Ward, her sister, sister-in-law, and another friend stopped in the Bunkhouse Bar, the only place to get an adult drink in the town, late on Sunday, according to the Dallas Voice. Ward, one of the victims in the crime, said to KVUE News that she and her party got beers and started playing pool. A female employee of the Bunkhouse approached them to tell them the bar “didn’t serve [their] type,” that they were not welcome there, and to see them out the door. When the group of women moved outside, patrons of the bar followed them into the parking lot, seized them, and commenced to beat them while hurling anti-lesbian slurs at them.
Ward says that women held them while the men from the bar beat them. She told KVUE: “As we came outside into the parking lot, we were followed by the patrons of the bar and our arms were held back by women and we were beaten by men. A man told me if I was going to look like a man, I better be able to take a hit like a man, and I was punched in the face at that moment and hit the ground.” Ward continued: “We’re just people too. We’re normal people that wanted to be in a bar. We wanted to spend our money there. We wanted to play pool there and because of our sexuality we weren’t welcome.” Ward, her friend, and her sister suffered multiple scrapes, bruises, and cuts on their arms and legs from the beating.
A bar spokeswoman says that “sexual preference” didn’t cause the attack. In her version of the incident, the lesbians were “rough housing,” and were asked to leave. No explanation was given of why patrons of the bar followed the victims outside, held and beat them. Weir residents are making the customary defense of their hometown, saying that things like a lesbian beat-down don’t occur in their close knit community.
The Williamson County Sheriff’s Department says that the investigation is ongoing, and if a hate crime was perpetrated, then the case will be treated as a bias crime at that time. No arrests in the beating have yet been announced.
Marine Murdered in Possible Anti-Gay Hate Crime
Philip Bushong, 23, called homophobic slur and stabbed to death by a fellow U.S. Marine
Washington, D.C. – A U.S. Marine was attacked and stabbed through the heart by a fellow Marine who allegedly ignited the fight by calling him an anti-gay slur. Philip Bushong, 23, was fatally stabbed with a pocket knife on Saturday in the Barracks Row section of D.C. by 20-year-old Michael Poth, according to reports in WTNH News. Gravely wounded, Bushong was rushed to a nearby hospital where he died about an hour later. The stabbing took place near the Marine Barracks and the home of the U.S. Marines Commandant–a bustling section of the U.S. Capitol with shops, restaurants, and residences that is normally thought to be safe because of its proximity to the military barracks.
Witnesses told DC police that Poth called Bushong the homophobic slur as the two Marines passed each other on the sidewalk at about 2:40 a.m., according to the Washington Post. Bushong, who apparently had never met Poth, took exception to the slur, and the fight erupted in front of a sporting goods store. The DC Metro Police are taking the lead on the investigation of Bushong’s murder, assisted by the Naval Crime Investigative Service. Poth was charged Monday with second degree murder, according to WJLA News 7. Bail was denied at the request of representatives of the Marine Corps, and Poth will go to court the next time on May 15. Defense attorneys allege self-defense on their client’s part. When Poth was arrested by Marine guards and told that Bushong was on his way to the hospital, he allegedly told them, “Good! I hope he dies!” Carolyn Eaves, a worker a block away from the scene of the crime, told News 7, “Sad. Two families… now destroyed “We have to learn not to call people names, you know. Got to be on our Ps and Qs all the time. Sad.”
Because of the report of the homophobic slur, hate crimes protocols are being observed in the investigation, and the Gay and Lesbian Task Force of the Metro Police have been brought in. The Advocate reports that OutServe, the first openly gay and lesbian active duty military advocacy organization in the nation, issued a statement on the killing over the weekend. In part, the statement reads: “We are troubled by the specter that this might have been a hate crime; if so, we anticipate the authorities will pursue it to the fullest extent of the law. This is particularly upsetting since, overall, gay and lesbian Marines have been accepted and treated equally in the force since repeal of ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.’ We look forward to the results of a swift and thorough investigation of this tragic incident.”
Bushong, a Marine since 2007, was stationed at Camp Lejeune in North Carolina. A native of Enfield, Connecticut, he was described by friends and fellow Marines as a fun-loving person who enjoyed his life. Funeral arrangements in Connecticut have not been released to the public at the time of this report.
Hate speech has the capacity to inflame young men, in particular. What prompted one Marine to sling an anti-gay epithet at the other is not known, but neither young man is believed to be gay. The language of violence attached to homophobia is still strong enough to infuriate people like no other speech in our time, and turn otherwise sensible people into combatants, as in this awful case in the nation’s capitol. The Marines have traditionally been felt to have a higher degree of homophobia than the other armed forces, but recent accounts seemed to indicate that the repeal of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell was going well in the Corps. It seems there is much work left to do, however, until young men like these no longer feel that accusations of homosexuality are intolerable to their manhood.
East Texas Gay Basher Gets 10 Years for Savage Attack
Mickey Jo Smith, convicted of anti-gay hate crime in East Texas.
Paris, Texas – The second of three defendants in the Reno, Texas homophobic hate crime attack on a gay man received a 10 year sentence after pleading no contest to the charges against him. Mickey Jo Smith, 25, took his medicine for participating in the savage beating and burning of 28-year-old Burke Burnett that took place after an October 30, 2011 Halloween gathering gone seriously wrong. Smith offered no defense Tuesday against charges of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon, plus a hate crime enhancement, as reported in the Dallas Voice.
Burnett, who suffered multiple bruises, stab wounds, and cuts from a broken beer bottle, plus second degree burns from being bodily dumped in a blazing trash barrel, offered this statement on Wednesday to the Voice: “I am grateful and comforted to hear of the sentencing of Micky Joe Smith. So many people who have endured similar experiences of hate crimes have not been afforded the opportunity to see justice served. The gay community in North Texas is a safer place today.”
In February, James Mitchell Laster, 32, pled no contest, and was sentenced to eight years in prison for his part in the hate crime. The third suspect in the attack, Daniel Shawn Martin, 33, who like the other defendants yelled homophobic slurs at his gay victim while prosecuting his assault, was scheduled to face trial on Wednesday, but according to court officials, his day in court has been postponed.
Texas prosecutors have been reluctant to invoke the state’s hate crimes law in cases involving gay or lesbian victims. The fact that both men convicted in this brutal example of homophobia have been sentenced with a hate crimes enhancement is significant–perhaps indicating that the LGBTQ community’s protests have been heard by state and local officials.
Gay Iowa Teen Driven to Suicide by Bullying
Kenneth Weishuhn, 14, bullied to death by his schoolmates for being gay.
Primghar/Paullina, Iowa – An out gay teen took his life in Northwest Iowa on Saturday night because bullying in his high school had become intolerable for him. Kenneth Weishuhn was just 14 years old. After coming out as gay barely a month ago, the torrent of anti-gay harassment overwhelmed his gentle spirit. KTIV News reports that he had not anticipated how hated he would become after revealing his sexual orientation to his friends. His sister Kayla told reporters that her brother was constantly harassed and bullied by boys in her class at South O’Brien High School where Kenneth was a freshman. “People that were originally his friends, they kind of turned on him,” she said. Bullies set up an anti-gay Facebook page targeting Kenneth. Then, Kenneth started receiving death threats on his phone. “A lot of people, they either joined in or they were too scared to say anything,” Kayla concluded.
His mother Jeannie Chambers asked him about the menacing phone calls, but believed Kenneth was handling them well enough. Still, there were warning signs that the pressure was getting to much for the 14-year-old. EDGE On the Net reports that Kenneth told his mother “Mom, you don’t know how it feels to be hated.” Though the school was aware of the bullying and issued a warning to his tormentors, it seemed to do no good. Nothing stopped. Kenneth’s mother says the school never contacted her about the problem. Now she is contemplating bringing legal action against the students she feels drove her son to suicide.
The towns of Paullina and Primghar, approximately 50 miles from Sioux City, are having to come to grips with the ugliness of homophobia and hate crime, issues these communities of largely German Lutheran ancestry never thought they would have to face. Counselors have been working with Kenneth’s schoolmates who are devastated by the suicide of their friend. Many saw him as a loving, loyal friend, and cannot understand how hateful other students have been. His friends have created a tribute video to express their love and grief at his passing. According to Channel 4 News, authorities are investigating both the in-school and online bullying that targeted Kenneth for being gay.
Kayla says that she has lost her best friend, the only person she could completely trust. Hatred built to a point of no return, she believes. “Things get started, and then they get out of hand,” she told interviewers for Channel 4. “Then they go too far, and you can’t stop it. He is gone now, and he is not coming back.” Kenneth’s funeral was conducted on Thursday at Grace Lutheran Church in Primghar.
Soulforce Founders Leaving Virginia; Say It’s No Longer Safe for Gays — A Special Comment
Lynchburg, Virginia – In a wakeup call to gays and their allies, Mel White and Gary Nixon, co-founders of LGBTQ advocacy group Soulforce, are leaving their home in Virginia for California–because they believe the Old Dominion is not safe for LGBTQ people any longer. Rev. Dr. White writes today in the News and Advance: “With a great deal of sadness and a real sense of failure, Gary and I are leaving this beautiful city and the wonderful new friends we’ve made here. We thought that in 10 years our witness would have helped in some small way to change Virginia for the better.” In fact, Dr. White goes on to say, it has gotten dangerously worse. “During our 10 years in Virginia,” he writes, “we’ve watched this great state turn against its gay and lesbian residents. Not only are we denied the rights and protections of marriage, our relationships are no longer safe here even when “protected” by wills or powers of attorney.”
Dr. White and his partner of 30 years, Gary Nixon, embody the heart and soul of advocacy for LGBTQ people in America. After ghostwriting Jerry Falwell’s life story, Dr. White had to acknowledge the extremist homophobia generated by the so-called Moral Majority and the rest of the Religious Right Wing–coming out to the world as a gay man and ordained minister. He and Gary established and led Soulforce to provide a voice countering religion-based bigotry throughout America’s faith communities–one based on the non-violent principles of Gandhi and King. Their advocacy against hate crimes of violence against the LGBTQ community has been legendary, inspiring many gays and lesbians to resist the damnation cynical religious leaders wished on them.
But now this courageous, generous couple have seen things in Virginia cross the line for queer folk. As Dr. White goes on to say in the News and Advance, the long slide toward bigotry took off in 2006 when the citizens of Virginia gave in to hate and wrote anti-gay discrimination into the Virginia state constitution. “Of all the states with constitutional amendments prohibiting marriage equality,” he writes, “Virginia became the most strident and mean-spirited.” Most recently, legislation banning adoption of children by gay and lesbian couples in the Old Dominion passed into law: “When the General Assembly denies lesbians and gays the right to adopt or provide foster care, they are implying that we aren’t capable of being loving and trustworthy parents and even worse that we are a threat to children.”
Hundreds of friends and well-wishers have visited White and Nixon’s home to show their love, appreciation, and support of the work for justice they have done, as WSET-TV Channel 13 reported. Ever gracious, Dr. White said to the gathering, “We’re starting a new chapter of our lives, we don’t know what’s gonna happen next, but we’re gonna be close to the family, we’re gonna be in our favorite church, All Saint’s Episcopal, we’re gonna be by my favorite beach, so we’re gonna let God do the rest.” He and Gary look forward to a new day in Virginia and the nation, when freedom and equality for LGBTQ people can flourish in safety.
Many LGBTQ people leave advocacy to people like Mel White and Gary Nixon. Many live in a bubble of false security. They persist to believe that if some must die or suffer violence and discrimination, it will always befall “the other guy,” and not them. Straight allies of the queer community commit the same error, living in a fantasy that President Obama will surely be re-elected, and radical extremists who are besieging women, racial/ethnic minorities and immigrants will leave the LGBTQ population alone. Nothing could be further from the truth, as White and Nixon’s decision to move back to California fairly shouts out to anyone who will listen.
We at the Unfinished Lives Project wish Mel and Gary well as they go on to the next chapter in their lives. No couple deserves more appreciation for standing tall against anti-gay violence. We can only hope they will find a safer, better place in the Golden State. But to the hundreds of thousands of LGBTQ people who continue to live in Virginia, and to any queer person in a so-called “Red” state (like us in Texas), or in any “Purple” swing state, we say that the job of advocating for non-violence, justice and equality is now yours to do. No more fantasies of safety. No more passing the buck. As White and Nixon warn us, we could lose everything in this political and spiritual climate if we do not step up and join the struggle for ourselves. ~ Rev. Dr. Stephen V. Sprinkle, founder of the Unfinished Lives Project
Two Women Plead Guilty to Gay Bashing and Kidnapping in Kentucky
Alexis Jenkins and (Mable) Ashley Jenkins, both 19, convicted of anti-gay hate crime in Eastern Kentucky
Lexington, Kentucky – Two teenaged women pled guilty on Wednesday as accomplices in the kidnapping and assault of a gay man in Harlan, Kentucky. The women are the first persons convicted under the provisions of the Matthew Shepard and James Byrd Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act, signed into law by President Barack Obama in October 2009. The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Kentucky announced that Alexis LeAnn Jenkins and Mable Ashley Jenkins, both 19 years old, entered guilty pleas to assisting a pair of cousins, Anthony Ray Jenkins and David Jason Jenkins, in a brutal assault and attempted murder against Kevin Pennington, an openly gay man whom the quartet abducted to Kingdom Come State Park on April 4, 2011. The women’s pleas were sealed for another two days, according to LGBTQ Nation. If they are found guilty of the charges, and no plea bargain agreement is in play, the women could face life sentences. It may be that they agreed to cooperate with federal authorities in order to receive lesser sentences, which will be handed down against them in August as the court schedule now stands. Alexis Jenkins is the spouse of Anthony Jenkins, and (Mable) Ashley Jenkins is his sister and a cousin of (David) Jason Jenkins.
The announcement of the guilty pleas come a day after a federal grand jury indicted Anthony and Jason Jenkins of kidnapping, conspiracy, and carrying out a deadly attack on Pennington because of his sexual orientation. The cousins have entered not guilty pleas to all charges, and will have their day in court on June 18.
In a statement issued Friday by the U.S. Attorney’s Office, the roles played by Alexis and Ashley Jenkins in the near-deadly attack on Pennington became clearer: “The women admitted they lured [Kevin] Pennington into a truck with two other defendants, Anthony Ray Jenkins and David Jason Jenkins. The truck was driven to an Eastern Kentucky state park where Pennington was allegedly assaulted by the male defendants,” the statement says. “Both women waived their right to be indicted and pleaded guilty to the charges brought by U.S. Attorney [Kerry B.] Harvey and the Department of Justice’s Civil Rights Division.”
Though the Jenkins cousins recruited the women to entice Pennington into their Silverado pickup, Alexis and Mable were equally as intent on the gay man’s murder as were the men, according to the details of the federal indictment filed against Anthony and Jason. Kentucky.com reports that the women allegedly cheered on the Jenkins men as they beat Pennington senseless, yelling “Kill the faggot!” Pennington, who is 28, suffered injuries to his chest, head, face, and neck. Had he not escaped his attackers, he has no doubt he would have been killed. Prosecutors indicate that the savagery of the gay bashing is not what qualified it as a federal hate crimes case. Instead, the fact that the defendants transported the victim in their vehicle on a federal roadway allowed the FBI and the U.S. Attorney’s Office to become involved in the investigation and prosecution of the crime. The Kentucky Equality Federation appealed to the U.S. Justice Department to intervene in the case, since local judges and other law enforcement officers were reluctant to carry the investigation forward in an effective way.
Two Kentucky Men Charged By Feds With Anti-Gay Hate Crime: First Use of U.S. Hate Crimes Law
Cousins Anthony Ray Jenkins (l) and David Jason Jenkins (r), indicted under the Shepard/Byrd Hate Crimes Act for anti-gay attack.
Lexington, Kentucky – Two cousins face the first charges filed by the Federal Government under the Matthew Shepard/James Byrd Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act for attacking a gay man, as announced by the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Lexington. According to the Associated Press, David Jason Jenkins, 37, of Cumberland, Kentucky, and Anthony Ray Jenkins, 20, of Partridge, Kentucky were indicted early this week by a federal grand jury for a savage April 2011 attack upon Kevin Pennington, a gay man who refused to perform sexual acts upon the cousins. The Jenkins cousins were also indicted on federal kidnapping, assault, and conspiracy charges. Both men pleaded not guilty to the charges. If convicted, each defendant could face a life sentence in prison.
CNN quotes the indictment as saying that the cousins enlisted two women to entice Pennington to get into their pickup truck on April 4, 2011 for a trip into the pristine wilderness of the Kingdom Come State Park in Harlan. “David Jason Jenkins and Anthony Ray Jenkins made a plan to assault Pennington because of his sexual orientation,” the indictment reads. The men wore clothing that made it difficult to see who they were, and disabled the dome light inside the pickup to further obscure their identities. The FBI affadavit says that when David Jason Jenkins demanded Pennington service him sexually, Pennington refused. Jenkins threatened to rape him. The cousins stopped the truck, dragged Pennington out of the cab, and brutally assaulted him while shouting, “How do you like this, Faggot?” Pennington reported to human rights advocates, “The whole time I screamed and begged them to stop, I was screaming I’m sorry for whatever I had done to make them want to do this to me. I can remember seeing bright flashes of light every time one of them would stomp or punch me in the head with them telling me he was going to rape me asking me if I was going to suck his [edited] how they would hold me down if they had to and how he was going to [edited] me in the [edited] dry until I bled.” Knocked unconscious, he lay on the forest floor. He awoke and managed to escape while his assailants were debating how best to dispose of his body. Pennington ran to a ranger station, broke a window to gain access to phone, and called police. He suffered multiple injuries, including wounds to his neck, head, back, and face. After treatment, Pennington was released from hospital care, but says he still struggles emotionally with the effects of the attack. Though the two women, Alexis Leann Combs Jenkins and Mable Ashley Jenkins, have been charged with kidnapping and aiding a kidnapping according to the authorities, Edgeonthenet says they have not been indicted by the federal grand jury.
This case is a landmark use of the Shepard/Byrd Act to prosecute an anti-gay hate crime in the nation, and interest around the nation is running high. Since the cousins used a truck and drove their victim on a federal roadway, the case fell under federal jurisdiction. A U.S. Department of Justice statement read, in part, “The indictment marks the first federal case in the nation charging a violation of the sexual orientation section of the Federal Hate Crimes Law.” Human Rights Campaign’s Michael Cole-Schwartz, who worked for the passage of the Shepard/Byrd Act, said, “It’s vindicating to see that the years of hard work that went into making sure this law was on the books is now being put into place.” Kentucky Equality Federation president, Jordan Palmer, commented on the larger context of the case. “The bigger picture here is that the U.S. attorney’s office is sending a message that you don’t try to hurt someone and you don’t injure them because of their sexual orientation or gender identity,” he said. The Kentucky Equality Federation vigorously lobbied the U.S. Department of Justice to become involved in the case.
As a defense, the cousins claim that Pennington had approached them for illicit drugs, and the deal went bad, a common attempt on the part of perpetrators of hate crimes to deflect attention away from the heinous nature of their acts, and to defame the victim. The Jenkins cousins will face their day in court on June 18.
About
If you are a first-time visitor to the Unfinished Lives Project website, we invite you to read A Welcome Message introducing you to our project. We are truly grateful for your visit.
The Unfinished Lives Project website is a place of public discourse which remembers and honors LGBTQ hate crime victims, while also revealing the reality of unseen violence perpetrated against people whose only “offense” is their sexual orientation, gender identity, or gender presentation. LGBTQ people in the United States are suffering a slow-rolling decimation of terror and murder all across the country. Every locale and demographic of society are affected: First Nations, Anglo, Black, Latino and Latina, South and Southeast Asian, Transgender, Bisexuals, Gay men, Lesbians, disabled, young, and mature. Homophobia has a long, crooked arm, and it is reaching out to snatch the life away from women and men whose tragic stories are under-reported to begin with, and whose memories are swiftly forgotten.
The horror of these killings transcends the shock and bereavement of loved ones and friends. These are not typical homicides; they are not killings for money or drugs, incidents of domestic strife, or crimes of passion. The vicious nature of hate crimes against LGBTQ persons is extremely brutal, grotesquely violent, and egregiously hateful.
Each murder serves the LGBTQ population as a sobering warning about the actual level of danger in our communities. The message these killings send is that freedom and open life for LGBTQ people is a cruel dream. Every time we remember one of these victims, however, the intentions of their killers are frustrated. To remember these women and men is to begin the process of changing the culture that killed them.
Our Project Director
Dr. Stephen V. Sprinkle (Keith Tew photo).
Stephen V. Sprinkle is Director of Field Education and Supervised Ministry, and Professor of Practical Theology at Brite Divinity School, Fort Worth, Texas, a post he has held since 1994. An ordained Baptist minister, he is the first open and out Gay scholar in the history of the Divinity School, and the first open and out LGBTQ person to be tenured there. Read More…
Recent Social Justice Advocacy Activity By Dr. Sprinkle
Summer 2009 – Dr. Sprinkle responded to the Fort Worth Police Department and Texas Alcoholic Beverage Commission Raid on the Rainbow Lounge, Fort Worth’s newest gay bar, on June 28, 2009, the exact 40th Anniversary of the Stonewall Rebellion. Dr. Sprinkle was invited to speak at three protest events sponsored by Queer LiberAction of Dallas. Here, he is keynoting the Rainbow Lounge Protest at the Tarrant County Courthouse on July 12, 2009. Read More…
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Dr. Sprinkle has given his Unfinished Lives presentation to these and other community groups and organizations. Read More…
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Unfinished Lives: Remembering LGBT Hate Crime VictimsBrite Divinity School/Texas Christian UniversityFort Worth TXprofessor, minister, author, blogger, LGBTQ advocate
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Unfinished Lives 
The Outrage of Pulpit Homophobia: A Special Comment By a Baptist
Sean Harris (l), caught in the act of pulpit bullying.
Fayetteville, North Carolina – Pastor Sean Harris did not make news around the blogosphere because he preaches against gay people. He should have, of course, and been opposed for it. But homophobic messages from American pulpits are given passes every Sunday of the world. Because he got caught fanning the flames of homophobic bullying against children, however, he has become an infamous example of what can no longer be tolerated in any pulpit anywhere. In a sermon at Berean Baptist Church in Fayetteville, home to Fort Bragg, Pastor Harris shouted that any “limp-wristed” boy acting like a girl should be punished with physical violence. His wrist should be “cracked” and he should receive the blows of his father’s fists, the preacher said with great enthusiasm. Girls were not left out of his sights, either. Pastor Harris went on the say that girls could “play sports,” but they were supposed to conform to his notions of what a girl looked like, dressed like, acted like, and “smelled like.”
“Smelled like”? Pastor Harris’s sermon does not pass the “smell test.” Love of God and neighbor are apparently foreign to him, and the shouts of affirmation he received as he preached his homophobic message had nothing to do with the Good News. His message of harsh punishment smells like something dying, not something being born again. Sadly, there are too many like him in the pulpits of this nation, so-called men of God who give God, Christ, and the Holy Spirit a bad name.
It doesn’t take a theologian to know what Pastor Harris is up to. He is trying to say that God hates gay people, even those in the larval stage. He is a strong supporter of North Carolina’s proposed anti-difference amendment to the state constitution, Amendment One, which will be voted on shortly in the Old North State. Same-sex marriage is already illegal in North Carolina, but pulpit politicians like Harris want to inscribe discrimination in the constitution of the only southern state in the country that has had the good sense not to do so yet. So, Pastor Harris feels free to advocate violence against children who are stereotypically suspected of being gay.
Pastor Harris is abusing his pulpit in the name of a homophobia embedded within him, and which he reads back into scripture and Christian faith–a practice that is controversial at the very least, and has been repeatedly shown to be false by ministers, scripture scholars, and church leaders for decades. It is the oldest ministerial slight-of-hand in the Christian faith: find an outcast group it seems safe to demean, then proof text a Bible verse to support your bias (but be sure to wash your hands of the violence your words inspire and the attacks people you instigate carry out!). Jews, Blacks, women, and now gay people and their supporters in North Carolina know all about it. And it is no longer tolerable or acceptable for other Christians to put up with silently any longer. Where is the outcry from clergy? From church members who know better? Where is the demand that religion based bigotry must stop? Where are the voices of school administrators, teachers, and school board members who know full well that attitudes and advocacy like Harris’s lead to children being bullied to death in classrooms and school playgrounds?
Pastor Harris now says he wants to “retract” his advice about parental violence against their children. But he defiantly affirms that he still hates sinners like gay people, calling them “abominations,” homophobic biblicism’s shorthand for the worst curse imaginable. I would hope he changes his mind and heart about his fellow human beings, the ones God loves just as much as God loves his Berean Baptist flock. But I am not holding my breath until he does. I have worked educating ministerial students, speaking on panels in schools and universities, and writing on the role religion based homophobia plays in hate crimes for decades, and these two things I have learned about “true believers” like this pulpit abuser: You cannot take out of a person by rationality what rationality did not put into him. Neither can appeals to humanity change a heart of stone.
Though I suspect he would argue with me until Judgement Day, I know that every child is precious in the sight of God–even those who will one day identify as gay, lesbian, transgender, or something else. God doesn’t make junk. And, contrary to the homophobia he was taught somewhere and seems to have swallowed whole, being gay, just like being straight, is a gift from God, too.
One other thing is sure: what Pastor Harris is preaching about the gender identity and expression of children did not come from God.
Here is a scripture that came to me while I was listening to Pastor Harris’s diatribe in the guise of a sermon: John 11:35 – “Jesus wept.” ~ Rev. Dr. Stephen V. Sprinkle, Baptist minister and professor of Practical Theology in Fort Worth, Texas
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May 2, 2012 Posted by unfinishedlives | Amendment One, Bullycide, Bullying in schools, gay bashing, gender identity/expression, Gender Variant Youth, Hate Crimes, hate speech, Heterosexism and homophobia, Homosexuality and the Bible, Internalized homophobia, LGBT teen suicide prevention, North Carolina, religious hate speech, religious intolerance, Special Comments, transgender persons, transphobia | Amendment One, Bullying in schools, gay bashing, Hate Crimes, Heterosexism and homophobia, Homosexuality and the Bible, LGBTQ teen suicide, North Carolina, Special Comment, transgender persons, transphobia | 1 Comment