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Pen Points
Letters to Gay Today |
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Those Silly Baptists—Is it Satire?
The Landover Baptist site. Are people this stupid or that clever?
Has anyone been to: www.landoverbaptist.org/home/mainx.html ?? I can't believe these people. Talk about absurd! At first, I was upset, but then it became so ridiculous you have to laugh. I'm asking that you e-mail the webmaster, and tell him your views. webmaster@landoverbaptist.org Blueeyes National Coalition of Anti-Violence Programs Outraged
NCAVP decries the brutal murder of two gay men, Gary Matson and Winfield
Mowder, in their Redding, California, home on July 1, 1999. The two
brothers charged in the killings have also been linked to three synagogue
arsons, the fire bombing of an abortion clinic and other white supremacist
and far right-wing activity. Extremist literature and propaganda from the
National Alliance and World Church of the Creator was found in their home.
Their fraternal crime spree has left death, destruction and abject fear in its wake. "It is a blatant and terrifying example of the links between racism, anti-Semitic bigotry and anti-gay hatred and malevolence. Racism and homophobia are simply two sides of the same coin of "hatred". Whether it will be racism or homophobia that will provoke the hater to violence is as unpredictable as the toss of that coin. Only, there is no winner in this coin toss," said Jeffrey Montgomery, executive director of the Triangle Foundation in Detroit, and member of the NCAVP Steering Committee. Only several weeks before the double murder of Matson and Mowder, the world reacted with outrage at the related triple attacks and killings of Bangladeshis, Africans and gays in London, England. That killer was also a white supremacist for whom there were no limits to his acting-out against those he regarded as expendable. And just two weeks ago in Chicago, another young white supremacist from the World Church of the Creator went on a killing rampage of different minority people before taking his own life. "The hatred and violence that are ingrained and embedded in the heart and mind of supremacists is, in it's own perverse way, non-discriminatory. Bigotry breeds equal opportunity haters. The slide from racist behaviors to homophobic activity and anti-gay crime is a steep and very slippery slope. The connection between these two forms of hatred should not, and must not be ignored," stated Richard Haymes, executive director of the New York City Gay & Lesbian Anti-Violence Project, and also a member of NCAVP's Steering Committee. "NCAVP's 26 affiliate anti-violence projects extend our thoughts and hopes to the people in Redding and Shasta County, California, as they continue to grapple with the aftermath of the tragedies that have befallen them. The discovery of such bald-faced inhumanity in one's own backyard is always traumatic for the entire community-- but particularly so for those members of the community who belong to the same group that was attacked," concluded Montgomery. National Coalition of Anti-Violence Programs More Forgotten History?
The New York group, which I was a part of, had many weaknesses as well as strengths. It was an exciting, chaotic and tumultuous time. We were beginning to discover and define ourselves rather than accept the labels of hostile institutions, taking the initial steps in building a network of radical activists, and creating a loving community.
Nikos Diaman, author
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