Today in Christian Love: God Hates Fags ... So Shoot Them

Another day, another Hate Crime.

This time it’s Wayne Steven Odegard, of Minnesota, who harassed patrons outside a gay club in Minneapolis and then, just for fun apparently, because they were gays after all, he decided to shoot a gay couple with a BB gun.

The attack occurred last September, when Wayne Steven Odegard stood outside the Saloon bar and began hurling anti-gay epithets at the people waiting to get into the club, Shortly after his little homophobic tirade, he pulled out the BB gun and began shooting into the crowd of patrons and then ran. Tyler Erickson, the club’s security guard, who witnessed the entire altercation and pursued Odegard as he fled the scene.

"I ran after him and then it ended up he shot a different gay couple in the leg, with that gun and it went through his jeans and drew blood. He told me multiple times that I’m going to go to hell and he’s going to bring me with him. He recited a biblical passage — I think it’s a Deuteronomy passage." — Tyler Erickson

Erickson caught Odegard and held him until police arrived, charged and arrested the man for making terroristic threats; last month Odegard plead guilty to the charges in October and was sentenced to six months in jail, and ordered to undergo chemical dependency and psychological evaluations and attend anger management classes. In addition, given that his crime was based on the sexual orientation of his victims, the court raised his probation period from three years to five years.

Okay. So what?

Here’s so what: I blame every single one of those so-called religious anti-gay bigots, like Pat Robertson, Tony Perkins, Bryan Fischer, Peter LaBarbera, Mike Huckabee, Brian Brown and Linda Harvey; I blame NOM and the FRC and the AFA.

For every single time they take to the airwaves to rail against gay folks, and quote the Bible, and pretend that they speak for God, they incite people like Wayne Steven Odegard to physically attack gay people just for being gay.

And yet, these same wingnuts, in the same breath, will rant and rave about how The Gays are out to destroy religion and harm the Christians, and rid the word of God-fearing individuals. And still I wait for that Hate Crime, the one perpetrated by a Gay Man or Woman, waiting outside a church, shooting a BB gun at a Christian couple and shouting anti-Christian epithets.

But that hasn’t happened. I have yet to see one incident of a gay person bashing, shooting, hurling hate speech, at Christians. And yet we have these losers and morons and haters telling their minions that we are an abomination, a sin against nature, and that God hates us; and because they do that, because they couch it in Freedom of Religion, they encourage people like Wayne Steven Odegard to attack gay people in the streets while shouting Bible verses.

I blame Wayne Steven Odegard for what he did in Minneapolis, but I also blame Fischer, LaBarbera, Brown, Perkins, Harvey, Huckabee and the rest.

They all played a part in that attack.

via LGBTQNation

It Was A Hate Crime

I’m sure by now you’ve all seen, or at least heard about, that airport incident, where an apparently drunken white man attacked a black man, while calling him a n****r over and over again. The whole episode was caught on a cellphone camera—as is everything these days—and was posted to YouTube where it went viral.

The attacker was tackled by bystanders in the airport, and taken down while screaming about “f*****g n****r” and was subsequently arrested and charged with a Hate Crime.

Except it didn’t happen that way, though maybe if it did …

At the Dallas airport that day McCleish Christmas Benham was drunk, very drunk; when a gate agent asked him if he’d had any alcohol, Benham cursed at her, saying, “Yes, 100 drinks.” A man standing nearby heard the exchange and told Benham to calm down, that the police were on their way, and that’s when Benham turned his rage on that young man.

He was asked again to relax, and when another passenger asked why he was so angry, Benham pointed to the first young man and said, "This faggot right here."

Then Benham kicked the man in the groin, punched him in the eye, and hit him on the head before he was tackled by five onlookers and an airport police officer. While he was being taken to the ground, he continued to yell, "Queers! That's what I'm upset about."

Now, while this sickens me, and while I wonder why it took so long for airport security to respond, because the minute you take too long taking your shoes off at TSA you’re surrounded by security, I am stunned to learn that Benham will only face charges of simple assault and public intoxication; each carries a maximum fine of $500 and no jail time. 

But there doesn’t seem to be any move to charge him with a Hate Crime, though, to be fair, local police have not yet indicated whether they will file hate-crime charges against Benham; if they did, Benham could be charged with a Class-B misdemeanor, punishable by a maximum $2,000 fine and up to 180 days in jail.

In addition he might also face separate charges under the federal Matthew Shepard and James Byrd, Jr., Hate Crimes Prevention Act, though it seems that hate crime charges can be difficult to prove when an assailant is under the influence of drugs or alcohol. 

Okay, I’ve said this before and I’ll say it again: if that drunk man had punched and kicked the other man because he was a belligerent drunk, that’s hateful; but when he punches, kicks, and hits, while calling the man a “queer” and a “faggot” that’s Hate.

I mean, if that first part of the story were true if he’d called a black passenger a “n****r” and attacked him, we’d know right away it’s a Hate Crime; there’d be no discussion. But since this was, perhaps, because we don’t even know, a gay victim, well, we can’t be sure it was Hate.

I’m here to say it was Hate; it is Hate; and it will be Hate. And when a lawyer, when asked about hate crimes laws says that would be difficult to prove because Benham was drunk, well, then you’ve just given people their out: get drunk, attack a queer, and it won’t be considered hate because you’re intoxicated.

Now that’s hateful.

The Star-Telegram

The Advocate

Eric Martin: Bullied and Beaten By Gang Of Students ... And Charged With Assault

A couple of things about yours truly: I know what it’s like to be bullied. I was bullied for being gay — or at least perceived as being gay — all through junior high and high school. I cannot remember a day going by that I wasn’t called “faggot” or “queer.” But luckily for me, if you could consider it luck, the bullying was mostly name-calling and, maybe, the occasional shove in the hallway’ I didn’t have to live with the threat of physical harm, just the still painful verbal taunts which make me shudder even today, decades later.

Another thing about me? I am not a violent person. I have never been in a physical fight in my life; the closest I ever came was one day when my sister was so irate—that girl had a temper—that she tried to slug me; I grabbed both her wrists and basically set her down on the kitchen floor. I don’t fight.

So, I cannot begin to imagine what Eric Martin went through, after years of being called “faggot” and “queer;” years of shoves and taunts and harassment, until, one day, he’d had enough and decided to fight back against those who bullied him.

He fought back against several, several, of his classmates called him names and then beat him into unconsciousness; Eric spent nearly two weeks in the hospital with a traumatic brain injury, multiple contusions and a broken arm.

And finally the school has decided to press charges … against Eric.

Yes, the kid who has been bullied and taunted and name-called since he was a child is being charged as a criminal because he finally stood up for himself.

When are we going to stop letting this happen? When are we, as a community of parents, of bullied students, of allies, going to demand that the schools do something? How many students have to die, have to be beaten, have to be arrested before it’s enough?

We go to school to learn, not berate and abuse those students who seem different; we go to school to study, not to gang up on someone who acts in a way we don’t understand, we don’t like.

The bullies are winning; LGBTQ youth are being harassed to death, unless they fight back, and then they are being charged as criminals.

There is a GoFundMe page set up to help Eric pay his legal bills; bills he’ll have to pay because he was the victim of gang violence and fought back — keep in mind not one of his attackers was hospitalized or hurt during the fight, but Eric himself was in the hospital for six weeks.

There is also a place to send Eric letters of support, to let him know that while his own school, his own teachers, principal and administrators stood by and did nothing for him, that we can stand by him, and support him, and let him know that he is not alone.

We are all Eric Martin.

sources:

NCRM

GoFundMe: Justice for Eric

ISBL: Two Cases of Bullying ... Two Ridiculous Outcomes

Letters for Eric
P.O.Box 993
Sandston, Va. 23150

Random Musings

First off ... big shout-out to Anne Marie for her donation to The Will of the People Fund —click that lick up there on the right — a group Carlos and I helped create to fight for marriage equality in South Carolina.

Thanks Anne Marie, for the donation-slash-wedding-gift in our name.

You don't know how much we appreciate it!

So, I mentioned last week that Carlos and I ordered our wedding bands. I mentioned that Carlos had been into the “Smallville Jewelers” a couple of weeks back and how receptive they were to selling bands to a same-sex couple. I mentioned that when I looked at the rings — in silver, platinum and tungsten because I am not a golden kind of gay — I picked one that I really liked and Carlos told me he had also picked that very same ring.

Great minds, right?

Cut to the weekend and Carlos and I are in the car and he says to me, “Do you really like the rings?”

Yes.”

“We could get something else if you want …”

“Wait! You want a different ring?”

“No, I really like the ones we chose but if you want a different ring …”

“UM, why would I walk into a jewelry store, pick a ring, found out it’s the same exact mother%^$ing ring you’d pick, get our fingers sized, place the order and then decide I wanted something different?”

“I just want to make sure you like them.”

Oy.

Ann Romney, that insufferable Republican bitch, and wife to serial loser Mittsy Romney, is back in the spotlight saying her husband would have prevented the current ISIS mess … or made a fortune off of it … and then, when asked if Mittsy would run in 2016, she said, oh so sickeningly sweet, "We will see."

Let him run, and when he becomes a three-time loser maybe then this self-involved, out of touch, wannabe queen of America will shut her stinking piehole for good.

God, I loathe her.

UPDATE:

After an airman was unable to complete his reenlistment because he omitted the part of a required oath that states “so help me God,” the Air Force changed its instructions for the oath and, following a review of the policy by the Department of Defense General Counsel, the Air Force will now permit airmen to omit the phrase, should they so choose.

The change is effective immediately.

Good, since we are going back to war and will need as many military men and women as possible, eh?

Still, it was a stupid policy and it’s nice to see it ended so soon.

After arrest warrants were issued, three of the suspects involved in that mob gay bashing of a gay couple in Philadelphia turned themselves into police. They are: 

Kevin Harrigan, Kathryn Knott, and Philip Williams.

Most galling of all is that these three, and hopefully any and all others involved in the attack, will not be charged with committing a hate crime as Pennsylvania hate crimes laws don’t cover sexual orientation because, well, gay people are less than.

I’ve said it before, but it bears repeating: if you bash a couple because they are gay, that’s hate; if you bash a couple because you want their wallet, that’s hateful.

There is a difference.

Now, while I abhor violence of any kind, the more I read about what these f&kmonkeys did, and especially read Kathryn Knott’s homophobic Tweets, I wish the punishment would be that they endure the exact same public beating they gave that couple.

And then lock them up for a good long while.

New TV season Hottie Alert:

Ioan Griffudd, of ABCs Forever about an immortal man who works in a morgue and dies every episode only to be brought back to life. It’s like Sherlock Holmes, who never dies. But Ioan is adorable with a delicious accent, so we’ll stick around for a while with this one.

And Las Alonzo, from The Mysteries of Laura AKA Grace Adler is a Cop Now. The show is cute, kinda funny, kinda serious, but I fell it could be wearing thin after a few views. But Las is definite eye candy while we watch.

Color me surprised, but a group of Texas county sheriffs and law enforcement officers have filed a brief with the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals this week in support of marriage equality.

Yes, in support of marriage equality.

The letter, filed by Harris County Sheriff Adrian Garcia, Dallas County Sheriff Lupe Valdez, and more than 50 other Texans working in law enforcement, said, in part:

 “Gay and lesbian law enforcement officers and other first responders put on their uniforms, place themselves in harm’s way to protect and defend our communities, and swear to uphold our laws without prejudice or bias. … They serve our communities with equal distinction, skill, and bravery. But Texas denies these men and women the equal dignity and respect they deserve. Texas does not treat them equally in their day-to-day work, nor, tragically, even when they make the ultimate sacrifice.”

Good on Texas and good on law enforcement.

Fun Fact: President Obama and Tea Party Senator Ted Cruz are cousins—14^th cousins to be exact.

Picture that Thanksgiving dinner!

Oy.

Just in time for our wedding, new census data released last week makes a simple, but oh so substantial change in the ways that same-sex couples will be categorized now.

We are now considered families.

In prior years, the U.S. Census Bureau counted same-sex couples as “unmarried partners” — even if they were legally married — but starting with the new annual American Community Survey, same-sex couples will be counted in the family totals.

It sounds so minor, really, but it’s a huge deal; we are no longer co-habitators or partners or buddies or friends of the same-sex with benefits … we are family.

I might break out into a little Sister Sledge!

Overheard at work:

Racist, homophobic, idiotic Republican client: “What was all that protesting about climate change in New York? That’s just stupid. I say let Mother Nature take care of it.”

Me [to myself, way under my breath because I’ve learned not to poke the racist, homophobic, idiotic Republican client]: “That’s the problem you moron, Mother Nature is doing what she does because of what we’ve done.”

Asshat.