A quick comment about that video of gay people screaming at Christians in the Castro as the police escort them away. It sounds like many people are disturbed by it, saying that gay people are now incredibly intolerant and dangerous.
- They come weekly. They stand at the center of the Castro and sing and hold Jesus signs and we tolerate them doing that like we tolerate all the wonderful nuttiness in San Francisco, even though their only purpose there is to be in other people’s faces. I’ve stepped around them many times to get to the pharmacy they stand in front of. We are generally tolerant, and that applies to the nutty Jesus people too. They are just part of the local color.
- They came just after our loss on Prop 8. They provoked. They got the reaction they were looking for. They got driven out. They didn’t get hit or bloodied. They got teased by a man dressed as a nun and yelled at and escorted safely away.
- I believe the unnerving sound you hear on the video are whistles. Do you know why gay people carry whistles? Because we are regularly the subject of attacks. We have volunteer patrols of gay neighborhoods to try to keep ourselves safe. It hurts my heart to hear commentators appalled that gay people are shown defending themselves and their neighborhoods, when gay people are regularly bashed by “Christians”.
- Gay neighborhoods are a sanctuary. Look at a map of the US. In how much of that territory are gay people assured we can just be who we are? Give us our few blocks of San Francisco, LA, New York, Boston, Chicago, Provincetown, and Key West in peace. Oh, and we want peace everywhere by the way… not to minimize that.
- Finally, a group of yelling drunks at 2am when the bars close is not a movement or a cultural zeitgeist. I belonged to a fraternity, I know.
Special thanks to the SFPD. They clearly acted in a calming and professional manner. I can’t imagine being a cop in our eclectic city. Thank you!
