Love is a powerful force worth fighting for. The price for it should never be our lives.
—
“What must it be like to be an openly gay person in America right now?”
That is the first question I asked my wife when I first started seeing the reports from Orlando. The thought of knowing that people were targeted just for who they love. It’s happened before but never to such a scale. This attack was so much different, so much more personal. We have seen random acts of terrorism on our soil before, but this was different, this was specific. The location, the victims, the timing, were picked for distinct reasons. The victims weren’t random targets; they weren’t casualties of just another terrorist attack who were in the wrong place at the wrong time. They had been specifically chosen for who they were.
The social media frenzy was immediate, as it always is in a situation like this. What I quickly realized, however, was that my LGBT friends were noticeably silent. Other than a couple of posts about how to help victims, they weren’t talking about what happened. They weren’t speculating, they weren’t vocalizing their anger, they were just quiet. While many in the LGBT community were out holding vigils, and volunteering in any way that they could. I still wondered how they were handling this event personally.
Even in their silence, I could sense the sadness.
“They turn to friends, gay neighbors, and venues. Yet, in the United States of America, we still can’t seem to protect them.”
|
So I made a point to message as many as I could just to see how they were. They were angry of course, but they were more concerned with the victims. One friend said this “I just think about some of those poor souls. We’ve come leaps and bounds in LGBT rights but still today; individuals are isolated, left out to dry, and abandoned. They turn to friends, gay neighbors, and venues. Yet, in the United States of America, we still can’t seem to protect them.” He described what he was feeling as “A weird pain,” that left a “void space in my heart, it’s a weird pain. A reminder that we have a long journey ahead of us.”
He said most of what he was feeling was not just because that it was a hate crime, but because of the dynamics of the gay men and women involved. He wondered “How many of the 50 people were disowned when they came out?” to their families. “How many lost friends and never spoke to them again?” and “How many felt safe and communal in a gay club because they don’t anywhere else?”
◊♦◊
Saying that he was left to shudder after reading of the fact that “Now that the club is empty of all living individuals and occupants, the lifeless bodies of the victims remain. And the only sound in there is that of ringing cell phones of loved ones seeking assurance that their friends or family members are okay.”
The anger wasn’t only directed at the shooter, but to the atmosphere in our country right now.
|
I think the overwhelming theme I heard from those I spoke to was, anger mixed with hope. There was no sense of quitting or giving up, no desire to go into hiding. The anger wasn’t only directed at the shooter, but to the atmosphere in our country right now. Another friend said that while he didn’t specifically blame the Presidential contender for what happened, he did believe that Donald Trump “has made it ok to hate.” He continued by saying he didn’t want to make this about him and “We’ve been run off the road for holding hands, yelled at, etc. People are assholes, but I’m alive.”
While not a view that is held by the majority in the LGBT community, he also said he didn’t want this to turn into a debate about restricting gun rights. That an American with no criminal history should be able to buy weapons, “You can’t take away people’s constitutional rights for no reason!”
He went on to make the point that most likely not all the victims were gay. “Gay clubs are frequented by straight girls. Because they can dance without getting hit on. Straight guys have learned this, and nowadays gay clubs are very mixed.” While they don’t necessarily represent the entire LGBT movement, I found the opinions of these two friends to be very honest and thought provoking. Especially in the rawness of an event so horrific.
So where does all this leave us?
As I have said to friends numerous times over the last few months. I believe that simply because of the rhetoric that is being spewed in this election cycle. We have been pushed back forty years when it comes to civil rights. People again feel like they can say or even do anything they want. They have been empowered to express their bigotry and hatred. I think that played a role in this tragedy. Certainly there were a lot of pieces in the life of a man that could or would do something like this, but in this season of hate, it only took a little push to light his fuse.
◊♦◊
Over the coming days and weeks, we will be faced with many questions. What were the real motivators? What could have been done to prevent it? Who shoulders the most blame? What we won’t ask enough is “How do we move forward and build a better society?”
There are at least 50 dead American citizens who will no longer get to participate in that debate. Many of whom may have had to live a life in hiding. It is far past the time for us as a civilized nation to continue to allow productive, intelligent, ambitious, and brave members of our society to be marginalized, simply for being LGBT. The victims deserve that; they deserved far more than that, but it’s all we can give them now.
If you support legislation that forbids people from expressing love for their mate in the same way you are allowed, you are guilty.
|
Many will read this and say “I love everybody, I have never done anything bad to any gay person.” Unfortunately if you support policies and politicians that force LGBT to hide who they are, then you are guilty. If you support legislation that forbids people from expressing love for their mate in the same way you are allowed, you are guilty. If you have ever boycotted a company that supports gay rights, you are guilty. If you have ever distanced yourself from a friend or family member, even in the slightest, because they are LGBT, then you are guilty. I know this because I have done all of those things, and had to take a long hard look at myself in the mirror and realize what I was doing. It made me sick; it still makes me sick.
Blaming this simply on Islamic terrorism is easy. It is easy to say it is just a random act of violence. It is easy to say it’s just another random gun related tragedy. It is hard to dig deeper to the core, to the heart of this nation and examine what lay there. It is far more difficult to do so with our own hearts. Still we must. The fact that so many in this country don’t see this for what it is is disheartening. We have a problem with gay people in this nation, it isn’t hard to discover. We can talk a good talk but at the end of the day prejudice still takes over. This cannot be allowed to simmer and fester any longer. People have to be called out for who they are. Ideas have to be challenged and our thought process needs to be redirected. Hate is the real problem in our world, and like it or not it starts at home.
◊♦◊
Thankfully a lot of good has been done in the aftermath of this tragedy. The outpouring of support from all over the world. Lines that reach for blocks to donate blood. It has also galvanized those who were already in the fight to make this world a better place, to be more vocal and more proactive. So I recommit myself, to raising my sons to fight the good fight, and to do so through example as long as I have breath in my body.
For today, I have been slapped in the face by a cold reminder indeed of how far we have left on this journey.
—
Photo:Flickr/Heather