The Murder of a Gay Man in Greenwich Village: The New Yorker There aren't supposed to be hate crimes in Greenwich Village these days, especially ones involving people with guns and victims who die. There aren't supposed to be anti-gay hate crimes taking place almost in the shadow of the Stonewall Inn, the birthplace of the modern gay-rights movement more than forty years ago. In fact, there aren't supposed to be shootings of any kind in Greenwich Village - in all of last year, there was only one homicide. Yet this weekend, residents of the Village and all of New York were shocked to hear that a man named Mark Carson was stalked and gunned down in the heart of their tolerant neighborhood, apparently because the way he was dressed - a tank top and shorts with boots - suggested to the assailant that Carson was gay. Prior to the actual shooting, the alleged shooter taunted Carson, who was openly gay, with homophobic rhetoric. Police Commissioner Ray Kelly said that "this is clearly a hate crime." New Yorkers who read news reports about the incident might have been surprised to learn that over-all hate crime against gays and lesbians and other gender-nonconforming New Yorkers in Manhattan have increased dramatically in recent months. In May alone, a gay man and his partner were beaten up outside Madison Square Garden after a Knicks game, another gay man was attacked and beaten on Christopher Street, and a gay couple was beaten after leaving a pool hall on West Thirty-second Street. Each attack was accompanied by anti-gay rants and shouted homophobic slurs. Many are asking how this was possible in the same month that the legislatures in three states (Rhode Island, Delaware, and Minnesota) joined nine others in enacting same-sex marriage laws. Indeed, how could these crimes - targeting not just individuals but New York's gay community in general, as crimes of hate are intended to do - be rising along with the political reality that a lesbian elected official, City Council Speaker Christine Quinn, is the front-runner to be the next New York City mayor? The latest crime did not occur in some stretch of rural Wyoming, like the one where Matthew Shepard was killed fourteen years ago, but amid the lively comings and goings on a busy Friday night in one of the country's most gay-friendly (and gayest) neighborhoods. (There will be a march and rally in response to these recent attacks today (Monday) beginning at 5:30 P.M. at West Thirteenth Street between Greenwich and Seventh Avenues, and continuing to the site of Carson's murder, at Sixth Avenue and West Eighth Street.) How could any of this happen, anywhere in America? It was less than two months ago that Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts told us that our national leaders had come so far around and were enthusiastically supporting equality. "As far as I can tell," he said to Edie Windsor's lawyer Roberta Kaplan during the recent same-sex-marriage oral arguments, "political figures are falling over themselves to endorse your side of the case." The tragedy of Carson's death is a reminder that anti-gay bigotry and discrimination still exist everywhere, including in places where such things are not supposed to happen. The gunman, who was quickly apprehended, may turn out to be deranged or even mad. But his anti-gay rants and accusations that evening, right before and during the fatal assault - and documented by the fast-moving police investigations - made clear what was in his head. Many people are angry, and understandably so. Not because the police or Mayor Bloomberg or even President Obama - who, at the beginning of his first term, fought for and signed into law a new federal hate-crimes bill, which, for the first time, included gays and lesbians - had not done enough to prevent such heinous crimes but because we all have not done enough to eliminate prejudice in our political discourse and society more generally. And because we fool ourselves and do a disservice to our country when we entertain the idea that the fight for equality is over. Just for example: in the battle going on in Washington right now over immigration reform, a big question is whether the Republicans in the so-called Gang of Eight, seeking a bipartisan compromise, will abandon the bill if the Democrats continue to press for the inclusion of an amendment that would end discrimination against gay and lesbian American citizens who are legally married to non-citizen spouses. They can't get the green cards that heterosexual married citizens can, and thus can't stay in this country together. Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina has said that if the Democrats try to "redefine marriage" in the immigration bill, he will walk away from it, along with the key Republican senators John McCain and Marco Rubio. Democrats are left to choose between supporting equality and preserving a chance of achieving important immigration reform. It's not clear which way they will go. The same questions can be asked of White House officials who are advising the President not to proceed with an executive order prohibiting employment discrimination against L.G.B.T. Americans who work for federal contractors, a measure that would extend the same protections available to all Americans on the basis of race and other factors. They claim it's not the right time for such action. It may not be fair to connect the historically thorny debate over immigration reform and issues of employment discrimination to the horrific and fatal events of this weekend in Greenwich Village. No one is suggesting that opposition to civil-rights protections for gay Americans is an open endorsement of hatred. But when our national leaders have a debate about whether or not to treat gay Americans the same as everybody else, it sends a powerful message that perhaps gays are not entitled to equality. Why not? Is the argument still that they are not as good as other citizens or that they are engaged in some immoral or otherwise improper behavior - that they shouldn't be walking around openly at night? The people who commit hate crimes get the idea that their victims are fair targets from somewhere. The movement for gay rights may in fact have some "political power" behind it now, as Justice Roberts also went out of his way to point out, but gay Americans do not have equality, and they still can and are targeted for discrimination and violence every day, even on the streets of Greenwich Village. Photograph by Emmanuel Dunand/AFP/Getty.