Hate Crimes Against LGBTs Are Up

Less than a month after President Obama signed the Matthew Shepard and James Byrd Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act, the FBI has released its latest statistics on hate crimes. The report contains valuable information on the types of hate crimes (33 percent are property damage, 30 percent are physical attacks, and 30 percent involve intimidation), as well as which groups are targeted.

It comes as no surprise that crimes based on sexual orientation rose by 11 percent in 2008.

In the last month alone, antigay violence has been a constant news item. Last week, I wrote about Jason Mattison. On November 14, the body of 19 year old Jorge Steven Lopez Mercado was found dismembered, decapitated, partially burned, and discarded like roadkill in Puerto Rico. Due to Puerto Rico’s status as a U.S. territory, there is mounting pressure to prosecute his murder under the Hate Crimes Prevention Act.

In Georgia, high school teacher Randolph Forde has been charged with threatening a male student in a bizarre case that includes Forde pulling him out of class to ask if he was gay and then asking someone to kill the student.

Down in Houston, high school freshman Jayron Martin suffered a concussion after being beaten with a metal pipe after getting off the school bus . I do not know which is more distressing, the fact that the attack would have been worse had a neighbor not chased off the assailants with a shotgun, or Martin’s statement that he expressed concerns about his safety to school staff and was ignored.

Some people think that lesbians and gays are too sensitive and overstate the level of prejudice and violence that we face.

A September 2009 poll by the Pew Forum found that gays and lesbians were considered to face the most discrimination in America. Sixty-four percent of respondents believed gays and lesbians were discriminated against, more than Muslims (58 percent), Hispanics (52 percent), and African-Americans (49 percent).

“Winning” this poll proves not only are LGBTs not being overly dramatic when talking about homophobia, but also that the general public knows there is a high level of antigay sentiment. The difference with homophobia, compared to other forms of prejudice, is that people are often proud to express their hate publicly.

Conservative advocates such as Free Republic, Focus on the Family, and the National Organization for Marriage all traffic in demonizing the gay community, utilizing lies and fear-mongering to advance their agenda.

The Manhattan Declaration exemplifies just how low homophobes are willing to go in furtherance of their hatred. Referencing Martin Luther King as an inspiration, this group of 145 conservatives and right-wingers have promised to defy any law that treats gays and lesbians as equal to heterosexuals. That is, they would rather risk jail time and financial hardship rather than admit that heterosexuals are not superior. Think about that.

It sounds extreme, but that logic is at the root of why LGBTs are treated poorly — homophobes do not consider gay people as having any inherent value or rights they are bound to respect.

As long as this kind of thinking is pervasive and acceptable to the majority of people, don’t be surprised if the number of antigay hate crimes increases again next year.