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While the rhetoric against the LGBT community has been ratcheted up in the last months due to the Boy Scouts and marriage equality, violence has also escalated. Calls for imprisonment and even death have surfaced at home and abroad.
Last week in homophobia (click on links to see full stories):
Florida Teen Expelled, Charged With Felony For Lesbian Relationship
BRITAIN: Gay Magazine Editor And
Partner Gay-Bashed In London Park
GEORGIA (Country): PM Denounces Anti-Gay Violence At Pride Rally
New Europe reports that members of the mob were shouting, "Kill them! Tear them to pieces!"
The Mark Carson Vigil
The victim of a hate crime
murder in New York's Greenwich Village on Friday night was revealed as a
'courageous' gay man who never hid his sexuality - despite being subjected to
anti-gay slurs for years.
Mark Carson, 32, was killed after a gay-bashing assailant asked whether the man
he was with was his boyfriend. Carson didn't hesitate and told the man yes,
according to reports.
Elliot Morales, 33, called Carson a 'f*****' and a 'queer' when he confronted
him and his 31-year-old partner on a busy street on Friday night.
Mark Carson was then shot in the head, and
rushed to a hospital where he died. His alleged assailant confessed to the hate
crime and to the homophobic slurs.
It was the fourth such crime in New York in two weeks, but it prompted a vigil
which will live in New York memory for some time: a vigil that was fraught with
love and determination.* It was a vigil for which elements of anti-gay animus
(e.g. the Christian Right) could have little criticism.
Emotions ranging from fear and disillusionment to love and determination were
all there:
"Enough!" "Your love is a dangerous thing - use it
everywhere you go."
"Don't let it be a cowardly moment."
"Enough!"
"Your love is a dangerous thing - use it everywhere you go."
"We are all the same. We can all bleed."
"We deserve to feel safe in our home town."
"Feels like a home invasion."
The only (slightly) seditious statement, "The powers imprisoning people
are the powers that shot Mark Carson" alluded to the treatment of the
people in the Greenwich Village community by the NYPD.
The vigil was impassioned, but not as inspirational as one would would hope
for, simply because so many people have heard the same voices throughout the
years since the death of Matthew Shepherd. It is also difficult to inspire
people who have become indifferent. What sets aside this vigil from the
"Laramie Project" reaction during Shepherd's funeral, perhaps, is the
sense of community - a community within an enormous city. It is a community
trying to tell everyone that it has tried to be a microcosm of love and
acceptance, a community with a sense of purpose - and that sense of purpose was
violated, but not beaten. "Feels like a home invasion" was probably
the most poignant of the vigil statements.
Rage
"Our grief and our anger brought us
together."
The murder happened just a few blocks away from
the Stonewall Inn, where, in 1969, the gay rights movement was born, bringing a
sense of continuance to the vigil. In fact, from the statements during the
vigil, rage was heaped upon a society at large rather than focused on any
particular group. In many ways, the vigil seemed to make a valiant attempt to
transcend hate by overcoming it with determination coupled with pride in the
courage of Mark Carson, imploring everyone to be like him.
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