Why We Fight…
A man beaten in a suspected homophobic attack in Londonderry has been told he may lose the sight of one eye.
The 20-year-old, from County Donegal, was attacked by two men as he walked along Clarendon Street on Sunday.
He was punched on the face and knocked to the ground. He is now recovering in hospital. There have been a series of attacks on gay men in the city.
David McCartney from the Rainbow Project, a support group for the gay community, knows the victim well.
“He is a student in his early 20s,” he said.
“He is a very quiet fella and is a decent bloke – he is well-liked.
“The fact is that this isn’t the first time this has happened to him.
“This is the second major homophobic incident that he has experienced in the last couple of years.
“It is absolutely traumatising for him – I’m not even entirely sure that the shock has set in yet, that he has in fact lost the sight in one of his eyes.”
SDLP leader Mark Durkan, the MP for the area, said it “was a savage assault on a completely innocent young man”.
Two men attacked a twenty year old student, a quiet and decent guy, and beat him so badly he’s lost the sight in one eye. And you can bet the thugs who did this are having themselves a good old laugh over it. And why not? Politicians tell them that homosexuals represent a threat to their families and their country. Clergymen, mullahs and popes thunder from the pulpits that homosexuals represent an intrinsic evil, a satanic force against Christianity. The two men who did this may be just a couple of gutter crawling thugs, but they were given permission to do this by their ersatz betters. The problem isn’t that there are violent gay bashers out there, but that more and more these days our communities, our churches, and our countries, are led by people with utterly no conscience, who inflame violent passions toward homosexual people because it brings them votes, and fills the collection plates. And so the blood of gay people transubstantiates into money and power.
[Update…] In comments Willie Hewes reminds me that England isn’t the United States and homophobia isn’t the major part of the political message over there that it is here.
