It’s not the outcome I would have liked, but I suppose it’ll have to do. At least this way we won’t have to watch the judge wink at another jury and tell them to go easy on the boy. At least we won’t have to watch another jury decide that shooting a gay (possibly trans) kid twice in the back of the head at point blank range because he’s gay not only isn’t a hate crime, but also isn’t murder. At least it’s over.

Except, not quite.

Those of us who care about LGBT kids are left to clean up the mess, as Republican and religious right figures (as if there’s a difference) blame Larry’s school and the LGBT civil rights movement for his murder.

But the worst, most galling accusation comes from Larry’s own mother. She blames not the school (look deeper than her words), and not the murderer, at least not completely. Here’s a snippet from the LA Times article about McInerney’s plea deal.

The victim’s mother, Dawn King, revealed for the first time Monday that she had contacted school officials four days before the shooting in an effort to solicit their cooperation in toning down her son’s behavior. The boy had been taken from the Kings’ home two months earlier by authorities because of problems at home.

She said she was told that her son had a civil right to explore his sexual identity.

“I knew, gut instinct, that something serious was going to happen,” she said. “They should have contained him, contained his behavior.”

Over and over we hear about kids going to their teachers and principals and getting no help. Over and over we hear about their principals telling them that it would stop if they would just stop being so damn faggy or girly or butch or different.

That is, in essence, what Larry’s mother is saying. She couldn’t stop him. The school wouldn’t stop him. So instead of blaming the person who pulled the trigger and put two bullets through the back of her son’s head, she blames her dead son because his identity didn’t match what she wanted.

Over and over our kids tell us that they just want to be themselves and be safe, and we tell them, well, you should be able to have that. Over and over they test the waters and go into hiding, or worse, kill themselves because the adults they look to for guidance say just what Larry’s mother is saying here: If somebody makes fun of you or beats you up or scares you or murders you, it’s your own fault because you won’t stop being queer. It’s a shocking abdication of a parent’s job, but I’d wager it’s something we’ve all heard before, even if it’s only been implied.

What happens next? We keep on telling our stories, letting those around us know that we are their family members, their coworkers, their classmates, and their friends. We keep on telling straight people until everybody knows, until it becomes impossible for straight people to accept the silly notion that we’re monsters to be feared and mistreated. We keep on telling the next generation of trans, bi, lesbian, and gay kids that things will get better because we’re making things get better.

As this year comes to a close, my hope is that someday very soon, Larry’s death and his mother’s accusation will be relics of a past as unimaginable to our descendants as that future is to me today.

(cc) Matt Algren for Asterisk, 2011. | Permalink

Very few things make me feel this way. Oh, I have a temper, and I can be a bit of a dick, but it’s rare for me to feel like this.

Earlier tonight, hours after New York City Mayor and multi-billionaire Michael Bloomberg ordered Zuccotti Park raided, journalists arrested, and the Constitution pissed all over, a security guard for Brookfield Properties, which owns the park, …wow this is the longest run on sentence ever. This is what happens when I’m mad.

Anyway, the security guard called comedian (?) Joey Boots a “faggot.” On camera. While trying to look tough before running away when Joey didn’t just stand there and take it.

Here are a couple shots of the bigot rent-a-cop who couldn’t control his bigotry with a camera in his face. (Uppity faggot doesn’t know his place, so he’s going to tell him.) He wouldn’t give his name, you know, because bigot tough guys hate it when people know their names.

Anybody know who he is? Send me an email or comment on the post. I want his name plastered all over the internet so future prospective employers know who they’re getting.

P.S. Who wears sunglasses like that? Bigots, apparently.

(h/t Scott Wooledge, via towleroad)

(cc) Matt Algren for Asterisk, 2011. | Permalink

By now, you’ve probably seen the news report from Chillicothe, Ohio (about 75 miles from me) that rocketed across the internet yesterday (hat tip to Equality Ohio) about a 15-year-old student who was brutally attacked in school this week because he’s gay. (Trigger warning, just to be safe.)

See Dan Savage’s column for my reaction to this story. Cosigned, 100%.

Coincidentally, the school had a big assembly (screencap) about online and offline peer abuse just last Wednesday. Speaker Josh Gunderson addressed the students, ending his presentation by directly addressing suicides caused by peer abuse. Here is Gunderson’s It Gets Better video:

See Gunderson’s Youtube channel to get an idea what he does. It looks like a good program, and we need more of that kind of thing to reach students, but the abuse won’t stop until the adults in charge recognize that this is a real and urgent problem, not one you can just talk about for an hour and then forget for another year.

It’s important that adults treat peer abuse and the accompanying physical attacks without kid gloves. These are serious life-and-death issues. Zach has a concussion and is in a danger zone for self-harm and suicidal ideation right now because of this attack by a peer.

In fact, his attacker is probably back in school today, potentially sitting in the same classroom as his victim. Obviously, this will only exacerbate the attack’s long-term effects.

Union-Scioto School officials must act swiftly, both to make Zach whole and to make it known throughout the community that peer abuse, specifically peer abuse against LGBT people, are not accepted in their schools. Local officials in the sheriff’s and prosecutor’s office must treat this attack seriously and seek real penalties in order to rehabilitate the attacker.

Failing to do that will send the opposite message that attacking and abusing LGBTs is okay, and that’s a message we can’t afford for them to send.

(cc) Matt Algren for Asterisk, 2011. | Permalink

Family Research Council and American Family Association have both been considered hate groups by the Southern Poverty Law Center for some time now, and with good reason; both groups push their shared agenda with dangerous propaganda and outright lies about LGBT people.

To repeat: Rick Perry, Michele Bachmann, Ron Paul, Mitt Romney, Herman Cain, Newt Gingrich, and Rick Santorum all accepted the invitation of these hate groups (as they have for years), hoping to get their endorsements and the votes of like-minded individuals.

Do you really need more information before you cast your vote in the 2012 presidential election? What stance on which issue could possibly make it okay to vote for a candidate who has actively courted bigotry?

(cc) Matt Algren for Asterisk, 2011. | Permalink

One thing I didn’t mention over at Techcitement: Am I the only one a little put off by how much Barbara Walters was concerned about the feelings of gay kids’ parents in the clip from The View? She doesn’t seem to be worried about what they’ll do to their kid because of those feelings, just that they’ll have them. I found it a bit bizarre.

You can also check out my other articles, including one about using light bulbs for high speed data transmission. The technology is for real, it’s on its way, and you will lose your shit over the demonstration video.

Give the rest of Techcitement a look-see, too. We’ve got a darn good writing staff going, and you should really get on board now before we sell out and go all corporate.

(cc) Matt Algren for Asterisk, 2011. | Permalink

I see in this video the same cognitive dissonance as in his earlier It Gets Better video. In both, he said the words he was supposed to say, but he didn’t even convince himself. “It gets better, hold your head up high, you were born this way” was his mantra; the lines he repeated to get through the long days and the longer nights until the reality of his life became too strong.

As Harvey Milk famously said, “I know that you cannot live on hope alone, but without it life is not worth living.”

Jamey had run out of hope. I could fill the page with words (about 1,000 before I started over) trying to explain what happened, but it all comes down to that.

This is what the It Gets Better Project is all about. That’s why I’m From Driftwood, GLSEN, and all the LGBT rights groups exist. Ultimately, they’re here to nudge the rest of us into the hope and reality of a better tomorrow, so that one day there won’t be a 14-year-old kid who cuts and cries and finally completes suicide.

Jamey Rodemeyer
March 21, 1997 - Sepember 18, 2011

I hope to see that day soon. Until then, as Jamey said, paws up.

Forever.

(cc) Matt Algren for Asterisk, 2011. | Permalink

Bringing a gun to school and shooting someone in the back of the head — TWICE — doesn’t count as premeditated murder. At least that’s the case in the minds of some of the jurors in the trial of Brandon McInerney, the boy who murdered 15-year-old Lawrence (Latisha) King in broad daylight in front of a room of witnesses in February 2008.

A judge has declared a mistrial in the case of a California teen accused of murdering a gay classmate at a junior high school three years ago.

Jurors on Thursday told Judge Charles Campbell they were unable to reach a unanimous decision whether Brandon McInerney was guilty of killing 15-year-old Larry King.

The brazen shooting in front of stunned classmates in a computer classroom gained wide attention when authorities dubbed it a hate crime because King was gay and evidence suggested McInerney had white supremacy leanings. Extensive news coverage persuaded Campbell to move the case from Ventura County to neighboring Los Angeles County.

The prosecution contend McInerney, who was being tried as an adult, made a conscious decision to kill King during a computer lab class. They said McInerney told others he wanted to hurt King in the days leading up to the slaying and he hid a .22-caliber handgun in his backpack before pulling the weapon out and shooting his classmate twice in the back of the head.

Defense attorneys do not deny McInerney killed King, but they said their client snapped when he heard moments before the shooting that King wanted to change his first name to Latisha.

Prosecutors now have to decide whether to re-file murder and hate crime charges against McInerney.

Latisha (née Lawrence) deserves better.

EVERY.

TIME.

You want to know why trans and gay people kill themselves? This is why. We are seen as less than human. We are seen as less than real.

You want to know why straight people kill trans and gay people? This is why. We are seen as a nuisance to be snuffed out, and if someone actually pulls the trigger (FUCKING TWICE), it’s because the fag scared him by being faggy or something.

This is why, and honestly, I don’t even know what to do about it anymore.

To call this an appalling failure of justice and human decency would be the height of understatement.

I wish long and miserable lives for the jurors in this trial who aren’t convinced that planning and methodically carrying out the death of a gay kid is murder. Very long, and very miserable. May the memory of Latisha King’s murder haunt them the rest of their lives and into the next.

(cc) Matt Algren for Asterisk, 2011. | Permalink