Thoughts on Daytona Beach Beating

Responses from members of Phi Epsilon Mu, the Central Florida Tri-Ess group, on the attack on a gender variant person in Daytona Beach, Florida.

Well, all good information, and I can certainly understand how a common situation can get ugly and dangerous. Probably the real thing with me that tends to label something like this a “hate” crime is the language. The attackers used words that are degrading to anyone in the GLBT community; and then proceeded to continue to beat this person. If this were a situation of racial cultures and attackers used slur words to address the victim, then it identifies them as being hate motivated. The same applies in a case like this.

The tricky thing is, how much abuse and discrimination will we as a minority in this country take? Yes, we need to be cautious, but Orange county has a human rights ordinance that includes gender identity, but Volusia county does not. So, in some spots across the state these crimes can be put in the proper context and handled as being “hate motivated.”

It wasn’t so many years ago that some people seemed to feel there was free license to abuse others based on race, and using slur words was quite acceptable; not so today. To hint that this person in the video may have invited a beating with such contemptible language is akin to a woman being raped and slur words used while the violation took place; then people said she had probably asked for it, like that excused wanton violence against another person.

The saddest thing is the people who stood around and watched this whole episode. Can you imagine using your cell phone to video such a crime instead of stopping it or calling someone who can stop it? The apathy shown is a real indicator of how morally unhealthy our society has become. Soldiers fight and die to uphold a way of life that promotes freedom and personal security, then we see more and more of this sort of behavior. So sad; it breaks my heart.

Just my opinion as I see it.

Brandi

I could not help recalling that a close friend of mine, who was cross-dressed at the time, was severely beaten (she ended up in the hospital) right here in Orlando. This was about 10 years ago. She’s was slight, about 165 pounds (she isn’t any more (lol)) and 5’5″ tall. When she dresses, her outfits are pretty flamboyant. The beating didn’t happen at a gas station in Pine Hills. It didn’t happen in a dark parking lot behind Disney. It happened in the middle of the Parliament House, on a Friday night, with lots of bystanders around. No one nearby where she was being beaten lifted a finger to help her until quite a bit of damage had already been done. Truthfully, it may have been the staff that interceded and no bystanders at all. To this day I have get the creeps remembering this whenever someone talks about the Parliament House.

Things have changed, for the better, among Americans since then. But, Orlando is a venue that attracts people from all over the world. Some of the cultures from which these people come do not practice any gender tolerance. However they have have a right to be here and one can never truly predict their behavior in moments when they’re afraid or angry.

As a hypothetical example. A non-passing cross-dresser (which means, this could apply to 95% of the cross-dressers out there) is having dinner in a restaurant in one of the places right along US 192. She gets up from her table and goes to the lady’s room. She’s attacked in the lady’s room by a man who claims he saw her follow his daughter into the lady’s room. Far fetched? Well; yes, and no. Many of the people entering the ladies room will be female. In fact, almost all of them. A significant percentage will be children. The cross-dresser has no idea who went into the ladies room just prior to her getting up to go in there. But, a watchful parent is always watching the door of the ladies room when his/her daughter is in there. What happens? It’s matches and gasoline for someone from a culture ignorant to our world. The parent may assume something is happening that is completely false. At that point, fear and anger  leads to bad behavior through misunderstanding.< What happened in Daytona Beach? Who knows? It may be just that the girl that the cross-dresser’s girlfriend had a fight with went and got her friends to come and beat up who she claimed had attacked her while she was fighting with another girl? In that case, how this girl in the video was dressed had nothing at all to do with the attack. It’s just another case of battery. Now she claims it wassolely a result of prejudice against how she dressed and thus, expresses her gender As such, she claims that this was therefore, an “hate crime”. Frankly, I’m a little skeptical. Two altercations were involved and I think they’re probably related. So, I’m skeptical. But, who really knows? >And that’s my point. Who really knows? Who knows how 100% of the people will react in 100% of situations, 100% of the time? I don’t.

In my opinion, we need to continue to exercise caution by considering that in Orlando, we may be among people who may truly be “strangers” to our culture. Caution and a modicum of restraint never hurts. Carrying pepper spray isn’t a bad idea either.

Alysson