Last week, an odd rumor circulated up through the Midwest. There was talk of a slaying of a teenage homosexual male by a group of vigilante types who had decapitated him and carved “F-A-G” into his forehead. I thought that this would be all over the news immediately, yet, when I looked into all my internet news sources, nothing was found. I kept looking. The facts were hazy and few. It had apparently happened in Illinois and was described as a kind of revenge killing in the name of Nicholas Berg, but that was about it.
Why was this an urban myth going around? Am I guilty of spreading it further? I just want to know, did it or did it not happen? I looked everywhere, from police blotters to the obsessive compulsive’s favorite news provider, YAHOO!, reporting around the globe in seconds flat. If anyone knows what I am talking about, please write me and let me know.
This incident spurred me to research historic cases that were clearly motivated by hatred. James Byrd Jr.’s horrible death by dragging in Jasper, Texas was one I looked back on. It is a sad story, making me sick in the senselessness of it, the violence of it. The man who was convicted of this murder has a hard time in on death row because there are so many Black people who want to tear him limb from limb.
I would like to tear that man apart myself, frankly, because the crime is incredibly, unbelievably inhumane, and the punishment for it seems like it merits the loss of my own humanity. He was even rejected by the Imperial Wizard of the Klan, who lived in the town just next to Jasper at the time of the Byrd’s murder. The Ku Klux Klan renounced him. You have to be just shitty if the fucking KLAN says they don’t want to have anything to do with you.
He maintains his innocence, which is certainly possible, however, he has numerous tattoos celebrating Aryan power. He even has a large image of a Black man hanging from a tree emblazoned on his arm. You can bet he doesn’t ever go to the showers without multiple guards flanking him. I am sorry for him, that hate would consume so much of him that it isn’t enough to have the emblems of it embedded permanently into his flesh, he had to live out the stupid shit on his arm like it was the story of his life. Like it was fucking directions telling him what to do. What an asshole. And who the fuck would do that tattoo?
Tattooing is an ancient warrior art with a kind of infernal beauty few understand, and less take as seriously as they should. What self respecting tattoo artist would say – “Oh – okay, lynching. Gotcha!” Maybe I have no idea the array of Aryan tattoos readily available. Maybe the alleged killer’s tattoo is one you could pick off the wall, right next to the “MOM” or the anchor, or the playing cards. Man’s Ruin.
The fact is, that this nation brought slaves here from Africa was the biggest hate crime of all. Then when the slaves were freed, there wasn’t anywhere for them to go. Then there was the wave of terror the Ku Klux Klan began that never really ended. Then there is the fact that none of this is taught to children in American History, at least not the details. They are skimmed over in order to get from the Revolutionary War to landing on the Moon as quickly as possible .
Then there are the laws against homosexuality. Then there is the Asian exclusion act. Then there is the internment of Japanese Americans. I am not even going to talk about Guantanamo. And then there is the first American hate crime; taking this land from the Native Americans.
We can keep it up forever. Hate crime Trivial Pursuit. There are enough hate crimes to play a decent round. I’d hope I could play it with Cornel West, bell hooks, Harvey Milk, Martin Luther King, or even just a cool gang of ACLU lawyers.
I just want to love everyone. I don’t care if that sounds stupid. I want to love everyone.