Ft. Worth police have issued a press release (Word Doc: 34KB/2 pages) blaming club patrons for police officers’ excessive show of force during Sunday morning’s raid on the Rainbow Lounge on the 40th anniversary of the Stonewall Rebellion. The cops are raising their own version of the “gay panic” defense, claiming that two patrons made “sexually explicit movements” and another “grabbed the [Texas Alcoholic Beverages Commission] agent’s groin.”First thought: why do insecure straight men convince themselves that a gay man will hit on them because somehow, they're irresistible? Hello! Just a quick note...gay men have better taste than you can ever imagine, so get over yourselves. We ain't into straight asshats.
People on the scene find those charges incredible. Todd Camp, a former Ft. Worth Star-Telegram reporter who was at the bar, said, “No one was acting aggressive to officers.” Another eyewitness, Chuch Potter, told a local CBS affiliate, “I can guarantee there wasn’t a man in this bar that would’ve touched one of those officers, knowing they were arresting people.”
Even straight people at the Fort Worth Weekly find the police department’s shrieking sex-crazed-zombie-homos excuse unbelievable. Straight guy Jeff Prince was working on a story that took him to another gay bar a few years ago, and steeled himself against the guaranteed out of control lecherous onslaught that awaited him:
As I sat there, I kept figuring one of these guys would hit on me. I was going to politely explain to them that I wasn’t that way. Except nobody paid any attention to me. For 10 or 15 minutes not a single person spoke to me or approached me. I was relieved and offended at the same time. What am I chopped liver?
Another straight dude Weeklyteer Dan McGraw did a cover story called “Waking Up the Rainbow” in 2005 about gay politics in Fort Worth and spent several nights incognito at a gay bar called Best Friends. He had a similar experience of being ignored. “It was like hanging out at any other bar,” he said. “Most of the guys had been married before and had kids.”
For some reason, however, Fort Worth police and Texas Alcoholic Beverage Commission officers went into a gay bar on Saturday night and the patrons allegedly became fraught with horn and damn near raped our boys in blue.
City councilwoman Kathleen Hicks says she’s disturbed by the raid. She joins openly gay councilman Joel Burns in calling for an investigation into the raid that resulted in seven arrests and sent one man to the hospital with a critical brain injury.
Good ol' Texas where big hair and bigger homophobes flourish. This is the kind of stuff that led to the Stonewall riots in the first place. But since we're talking Tex-ass here, all bets are off as to how this will work out.
Meanwhile, prayers for the man with the blunt trauma blood clot in his brain would be deeply appreciated.
Oh, and welcome once again to 1968!
Texas (one "s", thank you) isn't any worse or better than any other place. Homophobia is alive & well, even in your little Rehoboth enclave. Let's not bash Texas, the state, based on the stupidity of a few.
ReplyDeleteI find the reporter's comments very much on target. I have no desire to hit on a straight guy. If he is handsome, I may admire him from afar, but no way will I do so up close and personal. I wonder how many straights who fear gays will hit on them have actually be hit on. And when we don't, it makes them angry because it is a blow to their own narcissism.
ReplyDeleteAnon: I am from NOLA and don't need a lecture about Texass, especially from someone not using their own blogger ID. If you knew anything about Rehoboth, you would know that the police go through LGBT sensitivity training before every season. FW cops are good ol' boy thugs.
ReplyDeleteThanks for visiting.
Lem: My experiences with straights in gay bars is that they are initially apprehensive, then relax when they are either ignored or brought into conversation with others. I've never heard them getting angry, just oddly disappointed with a crushed ego. A true learning experience and a positive one.
Thanks for stopping by.
It really could happen anywhere, homophobia is alive and well all over, just like racism. There are perfectly nice people in Texas who don't behave that way at all. I'm from NOLA too and love it here in Texas (although at the moment it feels more like hell than Texas, it's so damned hot).
ReplyDeleteAnd, on the blog "night is half gone", there's a great story about the Upstairs Lounge fire bombing that killed 35 in New Orleans in 1973. I remember watching that on the news when I was 12. Can't wait for your Stonewall stories, were you in NOLA in 73?
ReplyDeleteDavid, good to know you're still alive ;). The Upstairs lounge was not raided by the police. Totally different situation.
ReplyDeleteTexas police have a wretched history of brutality to gays. I was in a raid on Splash Day in Galveston where we were forced to lie face down in the gravel parking lot for over an hour as they laughed, made jokes, and poked us in a degrading way.
I could tell you more stories about experiences in Texas, but I don't want to dwell on the pain.
I was in NYC by '73, but lost two friends in that horror.
I am far older than you.
Thanks for the visit and glad to hear from you.
i am glad to see this circulating in the blogs. the more who know the better.
ReplyDelete