An important post from Written Rebellion..

Melissa is a wonderful woman and a fantastic blogger. She is strong, she is an activist and damn does she get busy when she gets pissed about inequality and hate crimes. This is quite long and happened over a period of days..but I love this post and had to reprint it here..hoping more people will see how hate crimes are swept under the friggin rug by our police departments around these here United States of America. I heart you M! - Dusty

Thursday, November 08, 2007
So Proud I Could Burst

This is Jess. She’s one of the most amazingly strong and courageous women I know. I first met her more than eight years ago when she was moved to southern California to become a union organizer. At that time, we were assigned to the same campaign and she quickly became my closest friend and ally in the movement for economic justice.

When we first met, she had not yet come out to her immediate family. I had the privilege of loving her and supporting her through that process, and she was an inspiration of hope to me when I divorced. In a sense, we were both working on our identities, learning and growing together.

Our kindred friendship has endured a vast geographical separation, and over these years I have grown to love and respect her even more. We have both faced significant challenges over the years, and we have managed to become stronger, better women as a consequence.

The events of last Saturday night inspired my poem. I was just so angry. Angry at the women who attacked her, angry at the society that condones this behavior, angry that I live more than 1,200 miles away and could not be with her to support and comfort her.

Then, when she sent me a link to the local news article that described her assault, I became even angrier:

Two random assault attacks that occurred over the weekend have police looking for answers in Missoula.

Authorities say that four college-aged males attacked another male student while he was walking on the UM Footbridge at 2:30 a.m. Saturday. Police say the victim was accosted, hit in the face, and kicked repeatedly.

Then less than 24 hours later, at 9:30 p.m. Saturday, a woman was accosted on Main Street in front of the Missoula Public Library. She says she recognized her attackers from an earlier incident at the Press Box. The victim claims four women followed her in their car and then attacked her, punching and kicking her until she couldn’t move anymore. Police say the suspects then stole her wallet and that alcohol was a factor in this assault.

Authorities are warning people who are out walking at night to be mindful of the areas where they choose to walk and if possible always walk with a group of people.

If you have any information about either of these assaults contact the Missoula Police Department.

I was furious that the local media had failed to mention that she had been attacked because she is a lesbian. How could they have left out such an important part of the story? I clicked on the appropriate link and I wrote this letter, which I also sent to Missoula’s local newspaper:

To whom it may concern:

This letter is in response to your reporting of the violent assault of
Jess Keith that occurred on Saturday, November 3.

In the article titled “Missoula Assaults Investigated,” your reporter
answered all of the basic journalistic questions except for one: why was she
targeted for this crime?

The women who followed Ms. Keith and then attacked her were very vocal
that they chose to victimize her because she is a lesbian.

The notable absence of the motivation for this attack in your on air
and web-based reporting is evidence of your news organization’s inability, or
perhaps unwillingness, to ask the necessary and difficult questions this event
requires.

Ignoring this level of intolerance will not make it go away. Quite the
opposite, pretending it does not exist provides de facto permission for it to
continue.

Hate can only exist in the shadows. It is your responsibility to
illuminate your community.

And exactly NINE minutes later the news director sent me this reply:

Melissa-Thanks for writing on this. It’s actually the first
we had heard that this might be a hate crime. There had been no evidence of
that, at least in what my police reporter brought forward. It’s certainly not
because of any attempt on our part to make that “go away”, if in fact this can
be proven an actual hate crime. We’ll look into it a little further.

To which I replied:

Dear Mr. Bragg,

Thank you for your prompt reply to my correspondence.

It is unfortunate that you did not have access to the full police
report at the time these events were reported, or you would have had the
information you needed. I would encourage you to contact Ms. Keith directly at
406-xxx-xxxx. I have copied her on this email by way of
introduction.

According to the Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI) a hate crime is
defined as “a criminal offense committed against a person,property, or society
that is motivated, in whole or in part, by the offender’s bias against a race,
religion, disability, sexual orientation, or ethnicity/national
origin.”

The FBI has been charged with maintaining the nation’s hate crime
statistics since the 1990 passage of the Hate Crimes Statistics Act. While the
most recent reports show that most of the hate crimes reported in the state of
Montana are racially motivated, this is not true for Missoula. In fact,
Missoula’s only reported hate crimes in 2005 were related to sexual orientation.
And while these numbers may be small, empirical research has consistently
demonstrated that hate-related crimes go under-reported.

It seems to me that this is an excellent opportunity for your news
organization to raise public awareness about hate crimes: what they are, what the physical and mental health consequences of victimization can be, how hate crimes can be reported, information about local organizations or agencies that offer mutual aid support to survivors of these crimes, and other issues that might be relevant to your community.

I hope you would consider such news worthy of your organization.

To which the news director replied:

Just an update… We did talk with Missoula Police again and
did some additional research. We found out that under Montana law, gender isn’t
a basis for hate crime (although it is under federal law). We were surprised by
that, and I was in particular having worked on several hate crime stories in
Seattle over the years. I’m still thinking about whether there is a story
here… Or whether we may wait to talk with your friend as part of an overall
story about this difference between state and federal law. I’m going to hang on
to her contact info and we may do something in the near future on this…

I wasn’t sure how I wanted to reply to the news director, and while I was thinking about it I learned that TODAY they DID “do something on it.”

Today Jess went to the news station, at their request, and consented to an ON CAMERA interview of her experience. She discussed, at length, how she hopes that her story will help give other people the strength they need to come forward and report when they have been targeted for criminal acts because of who they are and who they love. She also expressed her outrage that the there are no state laws that further criminalize her attack. This is particularly important because without a state mandate to maintain accurate records on bias-motivated crimes, such records do not exist.

(As a precaution, the local police department has been briefed on her work schedule and they will be assigning a patrol car to watch her house for several days after the story airs.)

Eleanor Roosevelt said, “You gain strength, courage, and confidence by every experience in which you really stop and look fear in the face. You are able to say to yourself, ‘I have lived through this…I can take the next thing that comes along. You must do the thing you think you cannot do.”

To my strong, courageous, confident friend… I am so proud of you. I am proud to know you, proud to love you, and proud to call you my friend. You inspire me with your grace, your passions, your spirit, and your vision for a better community. The world is a better place because you’re in it, and I am a better woman because of your influence.

11/09/07: UPDATE: Here’s a link to the new story! Make sure to take time to watch the associated video of the LEAD story on tonight’s evening news.

Then, please take just a couple of seconds to thank Dennis Bragg, KPAX news director, for acting so quickly to raise public awareness of these issues. It’s especially important that he know that this issue has attracted attention from around the country. His email address is: dennis@kpax.com

11/11/07: UPDATE: Remember how I cc’d the local newspaper? Here’s a link to the article that ran yesterday.

Here’s a link to the story on QNews from Seattle. Here’s another, via Queerfilter. The story was also reposted on LGBT Rainbow links here, and the Helena Independent Record here.

Monday, November 05, 2007

An Open Letter

To the f o u r
nameless, faceless cowards
who
in the safety of your numbers
took it upon yourselves
to respond
to the kindness of a stranger
with your serpent’s tongues
(”stupid dyke”
“fucking faggot”)
and then follow her

she alone
my friend
my comrade
my love
she alone
the one who eats French onion soup without the onions
she alone
the one who paints her hair blue to make her nephews laugh
she alone

To the f o u r
nameless, faceless cowards
who
in the safety of your numbers
stopped your car
and in a dark parking lot
took it upon yourselves
to strike her
repeatedly

she alone
my friend
my comrade
my love
she alone
the one who worships Cubs baseball
she alone
the one who urges the world to be kinder than necessary
she alone

To the f o u r
nameless, faceless cowards
who
in the safety of your numbers
took it upon yourselves
to steal her wallet
and then drive away

to you I say:

your hate
your fear
your bigotry
your violence

empowers me
energizes me
encourages me
ignites me

and I am not alone.

Love.
Is.
Love.

and that is much
much
M U C H
stronger

than the f o u r
of you

-mld

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