..in response to an article in the Washington Examiner, where Burns is quoted as saying: “ “Those who want to ride on our coattails are historically incorrect," and then asking to see the marks, scars, or bruises endured during the struggle gay Americans. “How many of you have had crosses burned on their lawns or been thrown in a police wagon?”
Dear Mr. Burns,
I had the misfortune to come across your recent comments while thumbing through some local newspapers, and I was deeply, deeply ashamed that words like that could come from an elected politician from my home state of Maryland. And then, I was furious.
Lets begin by addressing some of your points. First I’ll give you Matthew Shepard. He’s the poster boy for being beaten just for being gay. They left him on a fence in the freezing cold to die, and he suffered, and then he died.
Then I’ll give you Lawrence King. He was fifteen when he was killed for being gay. He was shot to death inside his junior high school.
And what about Steven Parrish? He was no boy scout, but he was killed for being gay. Jason Mattison, Junior. Fifteen. Raped, gagged, and stabbed to death. Both of these gentlemen were from Baltimore, Mr. Burns, your home district.
They’re all dead, so you can’t see the bruises.
But if you insist, Todd Metrokin’s pictures were published on the website of the Washington, DC City Paper after he was beaten in 2008. They called him a faggot repeatedly while they beat him. They’re still up, if you want to see them. His face is so swollen that he can barely open his eyes.
What about Jack Price? He suffered a broken jaw, fractured ribs, a lacerated spleen, and a collapse of both lungs. Helpfully, the Huffington post has a VIDEO of him being beaten if you want to watch it. If you run a Google search on his name, you find pictures of him in a coma, bruises clearly visible.
When Mr. Price woke up from his coma, he said “I thought I died.”
You want burning crosses? I’ll give you Brandon Waters, from Tennessee. Someone burned a giant cross on his front lawn. How about Roy Kirkland and his partner Doug Sebastian, from Georgia? A 7-foot cross was burned on their front lawn. They received death threats. In the end, their house was burned to the ground and they were forced to move.
These are by no means the only stories like this.
But it does answer your question - that marks, scars, bruising, death, and struggle in the name of equality are not limited to one minority group. And in my personal viewpoint, even ONE incident like any of these, for any minority, is too many, and it tells me that we need to better address tolerance in this country. And I hope that you, as a legislator, will use your time in office to do better for tolerance. I ask that you stop focusing on the ways that we are different, and remember the ways that we are exactly the same.
At least now you can no longer claim ignorance on the facts of the matter. As I think that we can all agree, ignorance is no excuse for hatred, discrimination or inequality under the law.
Sincerely,
TCoMO
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