Posted on 02/15/2008 10:29:06 AM PST by paltz
(CNSNews.com) - A 14-year-old California boy is charged with a hate crime as well as attempted murder for shooting a 15-year-old boy who "sometimes wore makeup, high heels and other feminine attire," as the Associated Press reported.
The victim, Lawrence King, is brain dead, and prosecutors expect this to become a murder case very soon. They want to try the young suspect as an adult.
King was shot in the head Tuesday morning while sitting in class at a junior high school in Oxnard, Calif.
California has some of the nation's most liberal anti-discrimination, anti-bullying and "diversity" laws, including several that apply to schools and took effect on Jan. 1.
Homosexual activists have seized on Lawrence King case.
"Ten years after Wyoming college student Matthew Shepard was brutally murdered because of his sexual orientation, a 15-year-old gay California student is brain dead after a student allegedly shot him because of his sexual orientation and gender expression," the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network said in a news release. (The group says it's main focus is ensuring safe schools for all students.)
According to GLSEN, the 14-year-old suspect was among a group of students known to bully and harass King, who reportedly told classmates he was homosexual.
"As a nation, we've had our heads in the sand for far too long," said Kevin Jennings, executive director of GLSEN. "We need to do everything we can to prevent something like this from happening again."
GLSEN says the problem of "anti-LGBT bullying" must be addressed in the nation's schools. "We must confront the fact that LGBT [lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender] students are much more likely to be threatened with a weapon and much more likely to feel unsafe at school than other students," Jennings said.
Judy Shepard, executive director of the Matthew Shepard Foundation, said the attack on King "underscores the fact that we cannot let hate go unchecked in our schools and communities." She urged "all parents and teachers to educate their children and students about acceptance, understanding and compassion."
California leads on LGBT issues
As GLSEN itself noted, California is one of only 10 states that protect students from bullying and harassment based on sexual orientation. It is one of only five states that protect students from bullying and harassment based on gender identity/expression.
"Safe schools laws and policies are vitally important, but simply having a law is not enough," Jennings said on Thursday. "Schools need to implement staff development and training to address anti-LGBT bullying and harassment. Schools also need programs that teach young people respect and tolerance."
Too much emphasis on sex, some say
But some conservative groups say California has gone overboard when it comes to "sexual indoctrination" in the schools.
The California-based Campaign for Children and Families has just launched an appeal urging parents to removed their children from public schools.
The group argues that home schools and church schools "are the only way to rescue children from sexual indoctrination."
CCF points to two news laws, SB 777 (The Student Civil Rights Act) and AB 394 (The Safe Place to Learn Act), which took effect on January 1.
SB 777 bars any classroom instruction or school-sponsored activity that "promotes a discriminatory bias" against sexual orientation and gender. (According to CCF, the bill "functionally requires public school instructional materials and school-sponsored activities to positively portray cross-dressing, sex-change operations, homosexual 'marriages,' and all aspects of homosexuality and bisexuality, including so-called 'gay history.'")
AB 394 requires that school districts be monitored to ensure they are complying with laws regarding student safety and harraasment. (CCF said AB 394 "requires public schools to distribute controversial material to teachers, students, and parents which promotes transsexuality, bisexuality, and homosexuality, all under the guise of 'anti-harassment' training.")
"This is the type of gender-bending education which students may have to endure unless their parents rescue them from the increasingly negative public school environment," said Randy Thomasson, president of Campaign for Children and Families, at a news conference earlier this week.
CCF has set up a RescueYourChild Web site to help parents who are concerned about the new laws.
I agree completely. To repeat an old FR post of mine, "the typical negative reaction to gays and particularly to gay male sex is one of disgust, not fear. A more honest society would have a word that described that reaction." Being disgusted by "Brokeback Mountain" is not a sign of any mental pathology.
I have been trying to get people to use the term homoaverse instead of homophobic, and homoaversion instead of homophobia. Right now there are just six Google hits for homoaverse, and eight for homoaversion, so my attempt at language reform is not as successful as I would like. Still, if enough people use the words then they will enter the language, so please feel free to use them. People understand homoaverse and homoaversion immediately, without looking them up in a dictionary.
Homoaversion is perfectly normal in heterosexuals.
BTW I do not mean to imply here that homophobia does not exist. I think that pathological, irrational homophobic bigotry can be found in both liberals and conservatives, especially among males who are uncertain of their own sexuality. Homophobia is not hard to find here on FR. Some FR posters seem to believe that gays are an invading alien race, conspiring to take over the planet. I have lived around enough gays to know that they are all too human.
I hope we find out the full story of what happened to this gay kid. I just know that if he provoked the shooter, which seems likely to me, that it will not be reported by the MSM. It would not fit their "gays can only be victims" template.
Yes, good point. Were the shooter in this case female, and her victim a male who she claimed had harrassed her, she would be presumed to be the true victim, while he would be the oppressor who got what was coming to him.
I’m still trying to find the article. IIRC it was a op-ed piece so of course it contained bias.
You are blaming the victim for not being able to keep himself from being shot in the back of the head? What a piece of work!
some of you don't think you should be blamed for helping mislead young children into dangerous situations.
I sure don't condone homosexuality around my children, but I wouldn't condone murder around my children either! The kid who took it on himself to shoot the other should FRY!
http://journalism.nyu.edu/pubzone/recount/article/95/
From the linked piece:
“The Matthew Shepard Story: Secrets of a Murder,” which aired Nov. 26, promised shocking new information about the case. But it contained mostly speculation, scandalous details, unreliable new witnesses and revised confessions. The premise of the report by Elizabeth Vargas was that McKinney attacked Shepard during a robbery under the influence of crystal meth and that the murder had nothing to do with the victim’s sexuality. The report used sensational language to describe “the high plains of Wyoming, a lonely place to die,” where “the life drained out of” Shepard who had been “beaten so badly that the only part of his face that was not drenched in blood was where his tears had washed it away.”Vargas went out of her way to show that McKinney and Henderson did not hate gay people. She questioned previous reports that characterized them as “rednecks” (her word), and tells viewers that in fact they had steady jobs and girlfriends. Vargas reported that Shepard’s friends promoted the hate crime theory in the days following the attack. The report suggested that McKinney himself was bisexual, even though in an interview with Vargas, McKinney denies ever having sexual contact with another man. She also suggested that Shepard and McKinney were not strangers, but that they knew each other from Laramie’s underground drug scene.
BTW it sounds like the crotch-grab may never have happened:
http://dir.salon.com/story/news/feature/1999/11/06/witness/index.html
However, one of the killers was forced to perform oral sex on a neighbor when he was seven years old. From the Salon piece:
But one aspect of the defense's portrayal of McKinney did hold up under investigation. Independent of Henderson's testimony, the detectives concluded that McKinney's stunning allegations that a neighborhood bully forced the 7-year-old McKinney to perform oral sex on him were completely true. O'Malley lived next door to McKinney for several years, and he said his son was prepared to testify to witnessing those events during the penalty phase of the trial. Both detectives said the bully had left Laramie years ago.
Now that makes some sense as a motive. Gee I wonder why the "killed because he was gay" set chose to ignore the gay pedophile bully forcing the seven year old to have oral sex?
You might ask Scott Peterson.
Oops, he seems to have loved only himself.
Run a search on Jesse Dirkhising. But first, prepare to be enraged.
I know about Dirkhising. The perps were gay, so Dirkhising’s murder was just a local police matter, not a hate crime, and not worthy of national press coverage.
And in Saudi Arabia, Iran and the old Soviet Union, they put gays in mental institutions.
I would venture to say that you are not in very good company with your views.
While in prison, I am sure he will become well acquainted with the homosexual lifestyle.
Then you, Kevin, need to stop ramming it down people's throats. Oh but wait... that a fourteen-year-old snaps after having his weirdsh*t-o-meter maxed out day after day is really no surprise. Like Rachel Corrie's "friends" and family, you have more use for the mixed-up kid being dead, don't you Kevin.
Wow...however effed up the kid was there is no excuse for blowing his brains out at school. Are you even a conservative?
Egads. What excuse, saying the kid snapped? You’re are reading waaay too much into my post if you think I equate “snapping” with a get-out-of-jail-free card. It’s the homo lobby that salivates over just this kind of scenario so they can justify their sick agenda, all the while pretending to mourn for the dead. Same game the gun grabbers play. Here’s a tip: spend less time in the sun.
I fail to understand how you can misunderstand that statement, but you did.
You probably missed that part didn't you.
Not that I'm all that suspicious but it seems to me that this take on the event makes it exceedingly difficult to find out anything regarding the relationships of the killers with homosexuality and homosexuals before their trip to prison.
The other element popping up regularly in those articles concerns crystal meth.
The latter influence could be checked out with a reference to their dental records (if we could get them). Stuff makes your teeth fall out!
Not a single person discussing this case has argued that a shooting was justified. So, just exactly where do you come up with the idea that anyone did so?
All the stories I've seen outside the MSM say that he was murdered because he was a convenient victim, not because he was gay. He was a convenient cause celebre' for the lib / gay / socialist activists in our country.
Weirdly enough, teachers ENCOURAGE bullying of students who are “different,” and back up the “popular” kids who do it.
“Ten years after Wyoming college student Matthew Shepard ....”
notice how the drive-by media brings up something that has no bearing on the story that they are writing about.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.