By The Way: If prejudice is ignored, hate becomes the norm

Paul F. Augusta | Sun, 03/16/2008 11:27 AM | Headlines

Imagine a world in which children attack their classmates, smacking them to the ground or putting a bullet through their brains. Unimaginable, you say; impossible!

Just scan back through recent headlines and you’ll find horrifying reports of attacks on a religious sect considered “a pack of infidels”, a political analyst saying America doesn’t dare vote a black man into office because someone is bound to shoot him, genocide in Europe and Africa, and the most recent tragedy, that of the murder of 15-year-old Lawrence Fobes King by 14-year-old Brandon McInerney in a computer lab class at E.O. Green Middle School in Oxnard, California.

Brandon shot Lawrence in the head because he was openly gay and refused to capitulate to the prejudiced bullying and harassment of his classmates. The fact that Lawrence defended his right to be himself by occasionally wearing makeup and jewelry to class incensed Brandon, who shot him in the head and now stands charged with the commission of a hate crime, meaning he will be tried as an adult and could face life in prison. Two youths have lost their lives because of the prejudice and culture of violence that rear their ugly heads far too often; not only in America but worldwide.

Perhaps the saddest thing about this incident was that Lawrence’s murder generated just a fraction of the media coverage that follows most incidents of violence in schools. Most of the initial reports were local. The national media didn’t pick it up until several days later, and perhaps most ironically, the most prominent international coverage was on the Internet, most specifically entertainment sites such as the Internet Movie Database and MTV.com, which started paying attention only when celebrities like Ellen DeGeneres and other public figures and activists like Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama and Judy Shepard spoke out in concern about the tragedy.

DeGeneres spoke emotionally on her television talk show: “A boy has been killed and a number of lives have been ruined and somewhere along the line, the killer Brandon got the message that ... to be gay you can get killed for it; we need to change the message. When the message out there is so horrible. I know there are entire groups of people who face discrimination every single day and we’re a long way from treating each other equally — all of it is unacceptable, all of it! But I would like you to start paying attention to how often being gay is a punch-line of a monologue or how often gay jokes are in a movie. And that kind of message, laughing at someone ‘cause they’re gay is just the beginning. It starts with laughing at someone, then its verbal abuse, then its physical abuse, and then it’s this kid Brandon killing a kid like Larry. We must change ... we can do it with our behavior, we can do it with our messages that we send our children.”

Clinton said: “I was deeply saddened. No one should face intimidation or violence ... We must finally enact a federal hate crimes law. We must
send a unified message that hate-based crime will not be tolerated.”

Obama spoke even more pointedly about the danger of bias of any kind: “It was heartbreaking to learn about Lawrence King’s death ... King’s senseless death is a tragic example of the corrosive effect that bigotry and fear can have. It’s also an urgent reminder that we need to do more ... to foster tolerance and an acceptance of diversity; that we must enact a federal hate crimes law ... and that we must recommit ourselves to becoming active and engaged parents, citizens and neighbors, so that bias and bigotry cannot take hold in the first place.”

Judy Shepard spoke even more vehemently of the societal implications of Lawrence King’s death: “This terrible incident underscores the fact that we cannot let hate go unchecked in our schools and communities. Our young people need our direction and guidance to prevent this type of crime from happening.”

All of these people know whereof they speak. Clinton is the first woman to vie for candidacy in a American presidential contest; Obama is the offspring of a white
mother and a black father who is touted as having the possibility of becoming the first “black” American president; Ellen DeGeneres is popular comedian and respected American television talk show host who a few years ago put her career on the line by publicly acknowledging that she is a lesbian, while Judy Shepard is the mother of the young man who was beaten and left to die in Wyoming 10 years ago simply because he was gay, and whose name graces the Matthew Shepard Hate Crimes Prevention Act that has yet to be passed into law despite widespread public support throughout the world.

Why is it that — even though rights issues are now at the top of the human agenda for change — not enough has been done in America or anywhere else to reduce prejudice of all kinds, including in Indonesia where women are routinely arrested under restrictive bylaws simply for being out after 8 p.m., and a transvestite drowned in a river while the public order officers who were chasing him for loitering in a park stood by and watched him die. Perhaps the American band R.E.M put it most succinctly in their song “Hope”:

And they did the same to Matthew
And he bled ‘til Sunday night
They’re saying don’t be frightened
But you’re weakened by the sight of it
You lock into a pattern
And you know that it’s the last ditch
You’re trying to see through it
And it doesn’t make sense.

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