Orlando: Deeper Than TerrorismBy Devon Douglas-Bowers Despite the victory of same sex marriage, there is still a large amount of bigotry against the LGBT community. One only need to look at the large number of states which have passed laws that protect state officials, faith leaders, and religious organizations who act on their beliefs that marriage is between a man and a woman, that sex is only acceptable between husband and wife, and that gender is established at birth.[1] This is done under the guise of religious liberty, in which it is argued that someone is just practicing their faith when discriminating against LGBT people, yet actually inverts the entire situation by promoting the idea that Christians who object to homosexuality on biblical grounds [are] victims of religious persecution.[2] Add to this the recent ongoing hysteria involving transgender people using the bathrooms of their gender identity. The situation which hadnt been a problem before, suddenly exploded into the mainstream when the North Carolina legislature passed a bill which [struck] down all existing LGBT nondiscrimination statutes across the state, on top of banning transgender people from using some public restrooms.[3] The arguments became so controversial that the White House stepped in and made clear that, with regards to public schools, transgender children can use the bathroom of the gender they identify with.[4] In response, states have sued the Obama administration[5] and/or have voted to ignore the directive.[6] Unfortunately, these bathroom laws have had a very real effect on transgender people, with calls to the transgender suicide hotline Trans Lifeline doubling after the passing of the North Carolina bill.[7] Thus, we see that there is a general atmosphere across that nation that is hostile to people in the LGBT community. It should be noted that Mateen attacked Pulse during its Latin Night[8] and it has been reported that a co-worker recalled him as a virulent racist.[9] It is quite obvious that there is an atmosphere against Latinos in the US, with everything from presidential candidate Donald Trump saying that he was going to build a wall to keep Mexicans out[10] and that Mexicans were all rapists and criminals[11] to the old and tired argument that immigrants (specifically Mexicans) were stealing jobs from people, the anti-Latino sentiment in the US is alive and intensifying, and has been for quite some time. Mateens racism isnt random, but rather a possible byproduct of the anti-Latina/o bigotry that has been being expressed more and more openly over the years. It has also been noted that he was abusive toward his wife.[12] This is rather important to note as there is a connection between gun violence and domestic abuse[13]; in addition to there regularly being an undercurrent of misogyny in many shooting incidents, from George Zimmerman who was arrested for domestic violence[14] to Ismaaiyl Abdulah Brinsley who shot his ex-girlfriend before going on to kill two NYPD officers[15] to the UCLA shooter who killed his estranged wife in Minnesota before driving to UCLA to shoot a professor.[16] Violence against women and gun violence are often linked together. On a personal level, Mateen may have lived in a homophobic household as his father released a video the day after the shooting, where he said that God will punish those involved in homosexuality.[17] There is also the possibility that Mateen himself was gay or at least attracted to men. According to the Palm Beach Post, One former classmate of Omar Mateens 2006 police academy class told The Palm Beach Post that he believed Mateen was gay, saying Mateen once tried to pick him up at a bar.[18] Mateen frequented Pulse as well,[19] yet, due to both the homophobia at home and in society more generally, he may have not wanted to come out and may have internalized that shame, finally acting on it in the shooting. The point of this isnt to play armchair psychologist, but rather to acknowledge Omar Mateens views didnt develop in a vacuum, they were caused by deeper cultural problems involving bigotry against the LGBT community, women, Latinos, and immigrants that are reflective of the larger American society. In terms of the response to the shooting, there has been focus on terrorism and ISIS, gun control, and some arguing that the tragedy affected everyone, not just LGBT people. Not soon after the tragedy, both presidential candidates Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton responded. Trump [lambasted] the president and Clinton for not using the words radical Islamic terrorism, seemed to advocate looser concealed carry laws, and repeated his call for a temporary policy to ban Muslims from entering the U.S. whereas Clinton said that she supports the U.S. efforts to contain ISIS and wants tighter gun safety laws.[20] Where both Trump and Clinton agreed was that the US needed to bomb ISIS more, which The Intercept writer Zaid Jilani noted was a bit of a problem as no operational links between ISIS and the alleged Orlando shooter, Omar Mateen, have been discovered and neither explained how escalating bombardments in Iraq and Syria would do anything to stop self-radicalized and/or unhinged attackers in the United States.[21] Yet, the pro-military argument plays into the terrorism narrative that has been going on non-stop since 9/11 and possibly plays into the larger regional game the US has as it could be argued that ISIS needs to be stopped permanently and the only way to do that would be to send in ground forces, something that would let the US stay directly involved in both Iraq and Syria for quite some time. There has also been much talk about gun control and how citizens shouldnt be able to access assault weapons, with President Obama saying Those who defend the easy accessibility of assault weapons should meet these families and explain why that makes sense.[22] Even Republicans, it seems, may be open to changing the nations gun laws.[23] Recently on the show Sky News Press Preview, host Mark Longhurst debated journalist Owen Jones (who is gay) on the causes of the attack, saying that it was an attack on the freedom of people trying to enjoy themselves on a night out and co-guest Julia Hartley-Brewer told Jones I dont think you have ownership of the horror (sic), of this crime, because youre gay.[24] On the other side of the pond, former Senator Scott Brown stated that Its so tragic that you have people, and a lot of them were gay and lesbian and transgender, and thats deeply unfortunate, but I think its more than that. They were Americans first.[25] There was even an article in The Advocate entitled There Were Straight Victims in Orlando Too.[26] While it is important to acknowledge that there were straight victims, by focusing the spotlight on those victims, it ignores the fact that Mateen targeted Pulse specifically because it had LGBT people there. His thoughts werent about the straight people that, to him, just happened to be there, they were on harming and killing LGBT folk. Saying there were straight people too only serves to erase the nature of the crime and relegate LGBT people to the back rows. What both the discussion of ISIS/terrorism as well as gun control laws does is shift the narrative of the shooting, turning it away from homophobia. This should be fought as rather than focusing on the tragedy of what happened and how to combat bigotry, the situation risks becoming another game of political football for politicians to use, using the dead bodies of LGBT people as their platform. The purposeful ignoring of the shooting as a hate crime, either explicitly or implicitly, and acting as if was a crime against all people only serves to ignore the fact that Mateen targeted Pulse specifically because it had LGBT people there. His thoughts werent about the straight people that, to him, just happened to be there, they were on harming and killing LGBT folk. Saying there were straight people too or that they were Americans first only serves to erase the nature of the crime and relegate LGBT people to the back rows. When confronting tragedy, there needs to be an examination of what exactly caused the situation, not only from a criminal perspective, but also a social and cultural perspective. These mass shootings occur in a modern context where race, sexual orientation, gender identity, and other factors intersect. To refuse to examine these intersections is a refusal to attempt to attain a fuller understanding of what occurred and why. It is a shame that people are obfuscating or ignoring the larger picture as it is extremely important. It may save us from the next massacre. Endnotes [1] Molly Jackson, How Southern States Are Now Challenging Gay Marriage, Christian Science Monitor, February 20, 2016 (http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Society/2016/0220/How-Southern-states-are-now-challenging-gay-marriage) Devon Bowers is an independent writer and researcher and is the Politics/Government Department Chair of the Hampton Institute. He can be contacted at devondb[at]mail[dot]com. This script has some blow back. HillBillary attempting to take guns away and the lbgt community is saying no that they need guns to protect themselves, even have endorsed the Donald. The no-name potus and his czars are the best gun salesman of all time. So based on the article it seems clear you believe that the shooting was real, that actual people died that night and that Mateen shot those people out of some genuine conviction. Does it concern you at all that there is no actual video of the event, even though it is almost certain that every person in the UK was carrying a smartphone? Also the same tired handful of crisis actors making the rounds already reminiscing about loved ones and calling ftgun control in the same breath? While you may be right about underlying hostility towards the LGBT community, this event was obviously a false flag designed to fan the flames of any such hostility, a la divide -and- conquer. Naw,aint buyin that.Mateen was gay.False flag. well there is just so much you can do to prevent the background factors of why? without intruding in others peoples lifes and creating an even bigger problem, there is always going to be the extremes of every average. As for the cause of the crime would it really matter if he said he was from isis? anyone could do that, as apparently was the case. that he hated gay people? well there is no solution to that, etc. What kind of obvious BS is this and why is this appearing on selfnews Post? Everyone should make note of and remember this writers name .Devon Douglas-Bowers because hes obviously either a complete moron or one of the many enemies of the truth that are simply working for a paycheck. I agree with you 100%! I have personally encounted some strange happenings on here Anyone with an intelligence quotient over room temperature (in degrees Celsius) will immediately realize after the very first sentence of this article what is about to shovelled. (For an added bonus take a look at the actual sources used as Endnotes at the end of this pathetically humorous of an article). 