Thursday, October 12. 2006Queer Bashing in New York: We've got a long way to go. I just read a post on Fastlad about a horrifc gay bashing in New York City. On Sunday night Michael J. Sandy was lured to a car park frequented by gay men in Brooklyn. There, four men jumped him. In the scuffle that followed he was forced onto the Belt Parkway where he was struck by a car that didn’t stop.My head is swirling with anger, frustration, sadness and pain. I'm trying to reconcile all of this this with the fact that yesterday was National Coming Out Day, that this is one of many recent highly publicized bashings, that we continue to think and act as if we are much safer and freer than we are, and wonder what it will take for things to change. Meanwhile, for some reason there seems to be this collective misbelief around the world that the U.S. is much more open and safe than it actually is. Yes, all things being relative we could argue that folks in the U.S. are much better off than in many places; after all, being queer isn't illegal. But then again homosexuality is outlawed in Singapore but they're not tying people to fences and setting them aflame 100 miles from nowhere. I can't count how many times I've heard things like "well at least in the US.. you can be open," from readers or friends outside around the world. Then when we start talking about the realities, when I bring up specific incidences of gay hate crimes and queer bashings, they're shocked and don't believe me until I send them some gay bashing news reports.
You would think after the tragic murder of Matthew Shepard or the recent high-profile bashing of the international performer Kevin Aviance and the countles others, the world would know that we still have a long way to go to feel open and safe in New York and the U.S.A. Trackbacks
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True. I hadn't even heard this story. I listened to a show of Fresh Air last week where the show's host-Terry Gross-interviewed three people, one of whom was the head of Exodus, that fucking ridiculous Christian organization to help gays become straight. The whole show had me so mad I wanted to reach through the radio and pull his conservative Christian trachea through his nose. But one thing he said was that when he was gay he didn't know a lot of gays who really wanted "marriage" or "civil rights" like that.
Yeah, God bless the fucking USA, right?
It's funny because I know plenty of heterosexual people today that aren't interested in marriage and believe it's an outdated institution with roots in a patriarchy that was more about property rights (i.e. owning a woman) than about sharing love and life with another person.
Dude, I'm kinda confused. Homosexuality is outlawed in Singapore? I don't think so. There's a fair number of homo people here. It's just that Singapore doesn't conduct or recognise gay marriages ... yeah.
Well, I'm a Singaporean so I was just wondering about what you said.
While gays have been allowed to work for the government for a few years the Prime Minister stated in 2003 that homosexuality will remain illegal.
He was most likely referring to the laws in Singapore that make it illegal to engage in homosexual acts. Find out more here: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/3044688.stm http://www.gaytimes.co.uk/gt/listings.asp?action=ShowCountry&CID=852
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2006-10-29 16:05
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