Anti-gay violence feared rising

[ccharles000]

http://www.365gay.com/news/anti-gay-violence-feared-rising/

(New York City) A rash of attacks against lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people across the country - including the severe beating of a New York man whose attackers believed he was gay - suggests the number of reported assaults could rise in 2008, an advocacy group said.

The number of reported attacks against LGBT people increased 24 percent in 2007 over 2006, and they were expected to jump in 2008, said Sharon Stapel, executive director of the New York City Anti-Violence Project.

Officials were still crunching the 2008 figures, which will be released next spring, Stapel said.

The baseball bat murder of Ecuadorean immigrant Jose Sucuzhanay in New York on Sunday was the latest in a number of reported assaults, said the project, which coordinates organizations that document violence against LGBT and HIV-positive people. The attack left Sucuzhanay, 31, brain dead.

Since the February fatal shooting of Lawrence King, a 15-year-old Los Angeles boy who endured harassment after telling classmates he was gay, “we are witnessing what appears to be an increase in both the occurrence and severity of violence motivated by racism, homophobia, and transphobia,” said Stapel.

Stapel attributed the increase in part to more people reporting incidents, but she believed there actually could have been more assaults because 2008 was an election year.

“Election years are always violent years for us because of wedge issues,” Stapel said, referring to ballot measures this year banning gay marriage in California and Florida. “With increased visibility comes increased vulnerability to LGBT stereotypes and violence. We’ve seen some of the most violent hate crimes that we’ve seen in a while.”

In the case of Lawrence King, one of his classmates was charged as an adult in the slaying, which prosecutors classified as a hate crime.

Other incidents include the discovery of Angie Zapata’s body in July in her apartment in Greeley, Colo. Zapata, 18, was a transgender woman. Police have charged a man with murder as a hate crime in her death.

[BlueIris]

1. Yikers. K&R. nt

[nichomachus]

2. Blood on the hands of the Christian churches and the Mormon cult n/t

[ColbertWatcher]

3. Yes, perfectly said. n/t

[Raster]

5. let's not forget the roman catholic church's attitude toward gays...

There will be those that swoop in like carrion birds on this thread to chide and deride for the "blood on the hands" comment. And I wonder how many, if any, of the carrion birds are gay--and know what it means to live in fear that someone will do you harm because of your sexuality? I wonder...not many--perhaps none, I wager.

I am fucking sick and tired of my GLBT brothers and sisters having to bear the brunt of someone's hateful upbringing and their religious-encouraged homophobia. And to all those "good people" in Arizona, California and Florida that stood by and allowed--and in many cases aided and supported--religious-fueled homophobic hate rule the day: you are no better than Germans that allowed the nazis to enslave a nation to their hate. No better. And to those Holocaust purists that would bemoan that I compared the plight of GLBT persons to that of the Jews during the Shoah: never forget the nazis murdered Gays, Lesbians, Bisexuals and Trans-persons by the thousands, even hundreds of thousands. You weren't the only victims of the nazi insanity.

Never forget, because I sure the hell won't.

[ColbertWatcher]

6. Minor correction ...

I wonder how many, if any, (...) know what it means to live in fear that someone will do you harm because of your sexuality?

The Christers do not cause harm because of someone else's sexuality, they cause harm because they make someone else's sexuality their business.

It isn't so much that another person is gay, it's important to make the distinction that the people so filled with the Hate of Christ™ that they go out of their way to make someone else's business their own.

And that they're violent as all get out.

[Libertyfirst]

11. nor will I. n/t

[sarcasmo]

8. Don't forget the Catholic churches.

[nichomachus]

12. I think Catholics consider themselves "Christian"

I realize the evangelicals don't, but then they're very picky about who they allow into their own twisted club.

[sarcasmo]

14. The Christians I know don't consider Catholics, Christians.

[nichomachus]

15. And, in turn, Catholics consider them heretics or at least schismatics

Don't you love it when they hate each other in the name of the Prince of Peace.

But, who knows, their mutual hatred of gays may unite them after all these centuries.

[sarcasmo]

18. It's funny when Hypocrites argue with each other.

[DonEBrook]

9. Blood on the hands is exactly what they WANT.

What's the point of being a Sadist if you can't cause a lot of misery?

[terrya]

13. I agree with that.

Churches who propagate hate in the name of God are complicit in hate crimes.

[ZombieHorde]

4. God damnit!

Humans are stupid.

[1776Forever]

7. This is terrible news - Mormon's & Catholic's have a role in this - King James would be sad...

AND they don't even know he was as gay as you can get! What hypocrites! Most Mormons do believe in both the Mormon bible and the King James version.

But what about King James - the REAL King James.........

........

http://jmm.aaa.net.au/articles/12465.htm

King James & Letters of Homoerotic Desire

The first edition of the English Bible commonly known as the "King James Version" was printed in 1611. King James VI & I of Great Britain had sponsored the project, and the translators appropriately dedicated
the new Bible to him. At this point in his own personal life, King James had already been involved in a love affair with one man, the Duke of Lennox, which provoked a rebellion in Scotland; his current lover in England was a young man whose special relationship with the king would earn him the Earldom of Somerset. By 1615, however, Somerset's fortunes declined and James succeeded in luring his most famous lover, George Villiers, later Duke of Buckingham, into bed. What are we to make of these relationships between King James and his so-called "favorites?" Many earlier historians treated the subject with shock, disdain, and denial. Only recently has the subject been treated more seriously and fairly by scholars such as Caroline Bingham, Jonathan Goldberg Roger Lockyer, and David Bergeron.

[DonEBrook]

10. I'd prefer "as gay as you can be" not "...as you can get"

that seems to imply it requires practice. I know, I know, nitpicking again. Sorry. :shrug:

[nichomachus]

16. The King James translation

has about 30,000 known mistranslations -- as literature, it's beautiful. As a faithful rendering of the early Christian texts, it's junk.

[Parche]

17. hey

:cry: :hug: