What Effect Did Brandon Teena's Death Have On The Trans Community?

I constantly find myself re-evaluation my feelings concerning all that surrounds the Brandon Teena incident.  I say feelings as my mind sees this incident for what it was, violence against a member of the LGBTQI community.  My feelings on the other hand do not always match what my mind tells me and that is not always a good thing.

As Mara Keisling notes, what is important, the Brandon Teena incident "pushed advocacy forward."

"It's not, I think, lost on most of us today that this was a white, trans, masculine-identified person, and that's still not the most common story about violence in our community. But it did become a focus of activism," Keisling said. "There were a lot of folks from places like Transexual Menace and GenderPAC and others who went to Nebraska and then took that message and took that organizing to other places. And it was really a seminal moment in a lot of ways in our organized trans movement that still exists today."

A lot of the recent momentum around protecting the trans community has been in support of trans women of color who experience disproportionate rates of violence, according to Lourdes Hunter, the national director at Trans Women of Color Collective. She gave HuffPost Live a chilling first-hand account of her own experience.

 What Effect Did Brandon Teena's Death Have On The Trans Community?

ISIS throws 9 homosexuals from tall building in Mosul - Iraqi News

According to a local source in Nineveh province, ISIS organization threw nine civilians from a tall building on charges of homosexuality in the city of Mosul.

The source said in an interview for IraqiNews.com, “gunmen belonging to ISIS threw on Sunday nine civilians from the top of a high building in the city of Mosul after being accused of homosexuality.”

The source, who asked anonymity, added: “ISIS militants rounded up a number of citizens in the city to see the implementation of the judgment of the so-called Shariah judge.”

ISIS throws 9 homosexuals from tall building in Mosul - Iraqi News

Sadness Follows Murder of Man Motivated by Hate | Advocate.com

The National Coalition of Anti-Violence Programs issued a strong statement Thursday denouncing what it called “the hate violence motivated homicide of Ricky Griffin,” a murder that led to an arrest Monday in Dallas.

Police say Kieron Alexander, 25, beat Griffin to death and tried to set him on fire in an apartment in northeast Dallas Monday.

According to the advocacy group, Griffin was not gay, although officers said Alexander told them Griffin made “unwanted sexual gestures toward him.”

“We are deeply saddened by the death of Ricky Griffin,” said Osman Ahmed, research and education coordinator for the NCAVP at the New York City Anti-Violence Project.

“While Ricky Griffin did not identify as LGBTQ, the antigay statements made by the alleged offender highlight the disproportionate threat of homicide for gay and bisexual men, and people perceived to be gay or bisexual, and point to a possible ‘gay panic’ motivation in this homicide.”

Officers arrived at the Dallas apartment around 6 p.m. Monday and found Griffin, 54, dead on the living room floor. He appeared to have suffered blunt force trauma to the head, The Dallas Morning News reports.

Sadness Follows Murder of Man Motivated by Hate | Advocate.com

Atlanta Gay Man Bashed With Bat While Helping Man Change His Flat Tire | Advocate.com

Although I know some may say that Wilson "brought this on himself", no one deserves to have the shit knocked out of him.  Why must people always resort to violence?

He said when Johnson spotted him recording, he went inside his apartment, then returned for what Wilson thought might be a confrontation — but that Johnson simply asked for help changing a flat tire on his car.

Wilson said he offered to repair the damaged tire for money rather than replace it with a new one. Johnson then allegedly asked Wilson how much he would charge for the fix. Wilson said he quoted $10, but Johnson said he didn't have that much money. That's when Wilson made a joke.

"You already gave me a free peep show," Wilson told Johnson, telling WSB he was referring to how Johnson's pants sagged below his waist, exposing his underwear. "So I'll go ahead and do it for free." Johnson apparently didn't take well to the comment.

"During the time when I was fixing the tire he kept asking me what did I mean by the 'peep show,' and I kept telling him don't worry about it," Wilson told police, according to records obtained by Atlanta LGBT newspaper Project Q. "I finally told him I was joking about it and told him not to worry about it." But Johnson wouldn't let it go.

"He asked me if I'm straight and I said, 'No, I'm gay," Wilson recalled to WSB. "He went off telling me he wasn't gay, he was straight, he hated gay people." Wilson said he apologized for "coming at" Johnson, according to the police report.

But when he then collected his tools from his own car and turned around to leave, Johnson began hitting him in the head with a baseball bat. 

Atlanta Gay Man Bashed With Bat While Helping Man Change His Flat Tire | Advocate.com

Islamic State beheads first women civilians - Telegraph

Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant jihadists have beheaded two women in Syria for sorcery, an extension of the punishment which is normally reserved for men.

The women and their husbands were all accused of witchcraft, one couple in the town of Mayadeen, in eastern Deir Ezzour province, and one in Deir Ezzour city, according to the Syrian Observatory of Human Rights, which monitors the conflict.

Five people in all in Mayadeen were beheaded, the others on charges of “banditry” and “drugs”, with two of the men then crucified.

The case marks the first time a woman civilian is recorded as having been beheaded, though the punishment has been inflicted on women soldiers from the Kurdish militia, the YPJ, the female version of the YPG.

Islamic State beheads first women civilians - Telegraph

ISIS Celebrates Gay Love by Tossing 4 Gays from Roof of Building - The Gateway Pundit

ISIS celebrated gay love today by tossing four more gays from top of a highrise.

 Of course a crowd gathered below to watch the execution.

#Syria #ISIS Executed a gay man in #DirZour by throwing him from High building in front of the people #LoveWins #IS pic.twitter.com/dHvj7Jmku4

— الرقة تذبح بصمت (@Raqqa_Sl) June 26, 2015

Several Islamists tweeted out #LoveWins – the same hashtag that was used today after the Supreme Court ruling.
Of course this wasn’t the first time…
A massive crowd assembled to watch ISIS rebels throw another gay man off a building top earlier this month.
Hundreds of spectators came out to watch the brutal public execution.
ISIS Celebrates Gay Love by Tossing 4 Gays from Roof of Building - The Gateway Pundit