This weekend, as people in Orlando, Florida, were enjoying a simple night out at Pulse, a gay nightclub, a shooter opened fire on the dance floor, killing 49 people and injuring over 50 more. That night marked the largest mass shooting in United States history. People between the ages of 20 and 50 brutally and violently lost their lives. Mere hours after articles were released describing the details of what occurred in Orlando, news broke out that a man was caught trying to bring weapons and explosive materials to a pride parade in Los Angeles, California. These two events are reportedly unrelated, but have both sparked a lot of conversations about gun control, religion, and sexuality. There has been an outpouring of support to the community in Orlando, with people lining up to donate blood to the survivors of the attack, and many others expressing their grief on social media. There have also been negative posts on social media, with dozens of people expressing support towards the shooter and hatred towards the LGBT+ community.
In the wake of this tragedy, it is time to continue the discussion about hatred and discrimination. We are reminded today that simply passing laws to allow same-sex marriage is not enough to eradicate the hatred and discrimination that still exists towards the members of the LGBT+ community. We live in a country where several states still do not protect discrimination against people based on sexual orientation and/or gender identity in the workplace or school system. We live in a country where there are still states that do not have laws surrounding hate crimes against members of the LGBT+ community. For more information on legislation surrounding protection for people based on sexual orientation and gender identity, you can visit http://www.hrc.org.
Turning the attention to the religion of the shooter will not help the problem. You cannot fight hatred with more hatred. We can't solve the problem if we keep creating more problems. Islamophobia and homophobia are two very serious issues. We cannot justify hatred of an entire religion just like we cannot justify the hatred of a group based on their sexual orientation and/or gender identity. It is also important to know that the shooter has been described as not being religious and rarely practicing in his faith. This shooting has little to do with religion. This shooting has much to do with hatred.
When it boils down to it, we, as a country, need to protect our citizens in any way possible. Criminalizing discrimination is only one of the ways in which we can help to keep people safer and try to end the horrendous crimes that have been committed towards LGBT+ people, especially LGBT+ people of color. In 2013, the National Coalition of Anti-Violence Programs found that when it came to violence against LGBT+ individuals, "transgender women, people of color, and gay men face the highest risk of homicide," and "transgender women, undocumented people, transgender people, people of color, and gay men face the most severe violence." (x) On the night of the shooting, Pulse was celebrating LGBT+ individuals of hispanic or latino descent with an event they called "Latin Night". (x) Since the vast majority of people killed or injured in this tragic event were hispanic and/or latino/a, these statistics are especially important to remember.
Keep the dialogue going. Don't remain silent. Use your voice to speak up against hatred and violence. We need to come together as a nation to protect our minorities against unspeakable acts of violence such as this.
