It’s been 49 days since 15-year-old Lawrence King was shot in the head as he sat in class in a California middle school. His killer was a fellow student, Brandon McInerney. The crime came shortly after King, as an open gay, had asked McInerney to be his valentine.
Last Friday, about 30 people, mostly middle and high school students, gathered in Denver’s Civic Park to commemorate the death of King and other hate crime victims. “To me, Lawrence King is a hero,” said Chris Turner, president of DU’s Queer Straight Alliance (QSA). “We lost King and Paul Mershon, a DU student, within this last year. These heroes should have never had to die, but it is our job as the ones still here to remember.”
Although some QSA members had to miss the vigil, the group will provide another opportunity to remember King and other victims on April 24, the National Day of Silence.
“That day, I will be silent for Lawrence and Paul. I ask everyone to be silent that day in remembrance and let the world know that DU cares,” Turner said.
Like some DU students will do on the Day of Silence, participants at the vigil were solemn and silent. The sun was setting as the first participants began to arrive, and its tinted light cast a peaceful glow on the steps of the Greek theater where the assembly was held.
The event was organized by Hillary Montague, a 17-year-old from Thunder Ridge High School. She wanted to help raise awareness, she said, of King and many other LGBT hate crime victims who receive less media attention-victims like Simmie William, a 17-year-old gay from Florida, and Sanesha Stewart, a transwoman from New York, both of whom were killed in February. In her discussion of the event, three themes stood out: sexual identity, the imminence of violence to the LGBT community and the role of religion in hate crimes.
As the shadows grew deeper, volunteers unfurled a plastic sign and placed small candles on the steps, ready to be lighted. A number of young gay and lesbian couples stood around in small groups. Lynette, a middle-school student, was one of them. She said that the event was important to raise awareness that hate crimes are an important problem.
She spoke from experience. Last summer, as she walked to a gas station, two men followed her, overtook her and beat her up. But even when violence is not a threat, she feels that hate makes its presence felt.
“You hear people saying, ‘That’s gay,'” she explained. “They don’t realize that it really does hurt people,” she said.
Lynette tries to make her friends more conscious of their language.
“Whenever someone says that, I’ll say, ‘Don’t use that word,’ and usually they’ll stop or they’ll start correcting themselves.”
Angela Palermo had a similar experience last summer. In an informal speech she gave as the sun disappeared, she introduced herself as a volunteer for the Colorado Anti-Violence Program (CAVP) and a transsexual woman.
“I am proud of being transsexual,” she said. “I am not ashamed of that.” Then she described how a man had broken her truck’s window several years ago.
“Hate crimes don’t always happen out there,” she stressed. Though not hurt in the encounter, it left an impression on her: “I can’t tell you how frightening it was to see someone’s eyes so filled with hate-and directed at you… Was that how it felt to be a Jew, when they were hunted by the Nazis? Was that how it felt to be a Native American about 150 years ago when they were driven westward? Was that how it felt to be an Armenian when the Turks came and slaughtered them all?”
At the end of the speech, she addressed religion’s role in hate crimes.
“I guess I’ll close by saying, ‘Love one another.’ Someone said that two thousand years ago, and often those who claim his name the loudest-it seems they just don’t get it.”
Montague, the student who had organized the event, agreed. Religion is the prime motivator of hate crimes, she said in an interview. But Sara Rosenau, who is studying to be a pastor at Illif School of Theology and who opened and closed the vigil with “kind of a prayer, kind of a litany,” has a different take.
“Religion is a system for people to make meaning out of life,” she explained. “Unfortunately, it’s malleable and-this sounds so cheesy-it can be used for good or evil.” She added: “People draw on the meaning from both sides. In this country the side of hate has had a public voice.”
That, perhaps, is why the vigil was held. Amid solemn silence and flickering candlelight, Rosenau read words which expressed the purpose of the evening: “Gathering together, bearing witness, and saying no is itself an act of justice.”
Hillary Montague’s speech hinted at a different reason for the event. “Education is the key to ending this,” she stated. Then she turned to the subject of the shooting.
“I respect Lawrence for figuring out what I at 17 and my parents in their 50s haven’t-self identity.”
