LGBTQ Breaking News

LGBTQ Breaking News Service

World Gay News

Mar-A-Lago is Stonewall? Gay Republicans grovel for Trump – Los Angeles Blade

News Editor

Editor’s note: Content warning: this article contains a homophobic slur and accounts of violence some readers may find traumatizing

By James Finn | SANDY, Ut. – See the young men in the photo? Jacob and Christian are celebrating their 3-month “boyfriend” anniversary TODAY! They’re supposed to be enjoying an idyllic Utah summer together. Christian just turned 18 and started college this spring with a major academic scholarship after graduating early from high school.

Last weekend shattered the couple’s peaceful plans, shocking Christian and angering his family, who supported and defended him fiercely (and effectively) in the face of a foot-dragging local police department.

I called the family last night to ask about the attack that landed Christian in the ER with a concussion and brain swelling — struggling with memory loss, disorientation, and serious pain for days. Details are available in this Los Angeles Blade story, also reported by the Salt Lake Tribune.

When Christian picks up the phone, he sounds happy.

That’s what strikes me the most. His mom Stefanie tells me he’s one of the happiest kids she’s ever known. She says one of his teachers asked her once if he was ever NOT happy. She chuckles, remembering.

* I ask Christian if that had ever happened to him before, some stranger calling him a faggot. *

I tell Christian he and Jacob make a handsome couple and I can hear his voice swell with emotion. “Jacob asked me to be his boyfriend three months ago tomorrow,” he says in that sort of awestruck tone you only hear from young people in love.

As Christian’s sister Jocelynn, one of the heroes of this story, interrupts cookie baking to tell me how much she enjoyed going to high school with her younger brother, I think this family sounds like one so many LGBTQ young people only dream they could have.

Stefanie says she knew Christian was gay when he was four.

When he was fourteen and struggling with anxiety trying to come out to her, she gave him a boost: “If you think I’m gonna choose religion over you, you’re crazy.” When Christian screwed up his courage and told her he’s gay, she woke everybody up and the whole family celebrated.

Stefanie even took to Facebook, posting, “Yes, my son is gay. Yes, I support him. Yes, I’m Mormon. Yes, I’m a Democrat.”

When I ask Christian about the attack, he sounds like a different person

His voices shifts into a lower register. He hesitates and stumbles over words. I have to ask him to repeat himself a couple times because he’s talking so softly.

He was standing at the end of his Sandy, Utah driveway late last Friday, almost midnight or maybe a little after. Jacob was supposed to be headed home after spending the evening with Christian’s family in the sleepy suburb 13 miles south of Salt Lake City. But it was a lovely night, and the couple were reluctant to part, leaning into each other, talking, looking at stars.

Hugging.

A car drove by slowly and Christian saw a window rolling down. Somebody shouted “faggot” and yelled that they don’t want gay people in their street. Then the car roared off and Jacob didn’t go home after all. They stayed in the driveway talking.

I ask Christian if that had ever happened to him before, some stranger calling him a faggot.

“Yeah, a few times,” he says.

I’m not sure what he means. “Ten times?” I ask. “More? Less?”

I expect him to say “less,” and we’ll narrow it down to a much smaller handful. But he doesn’t. He tells me ten is the right number, but probably more, counting being called a faggot in his high school corridors or out on the street when he’s running for exercise. He’ll see a window rolling down and someone will shout “faggot” at him.

Too often for him to remember how many times.

“I don’t wear rainbow clothes or anything, except at Pride,” he explains. “People around here know I’m gay.”

Video of the immediate aftermath of the assault, where you can clearly hear this young man say he punched Christian because Christian is a “faggot,” while continuing to make threatening gestures.

Christian tells me about what happened when the car came back

Thirty to 45 minutes later, the same car drove up and two strangers in their late teens jumped out and confronted Christian and Jacob, shouting “faggot.” Three guys stayed in the car, in Christian’s words “hyping up” the pair that got out.

One of the guys got right in Jacob’s face, pushing his shoulder, saying, “What, faggot? You gonna do something?” The other one took off his shirt and gyrated lewdly, asking, “Am I turning you on, does this make you horny?”

I ask Christian what he was thinking and feeling at that moment.

“Scared for my boyfriend. Thinking they’re going to hurt him. Thinking I have to protect him.”

He stepped in front of Jacob to shield him with his body, saying “The most repressed people are the ones who bully gay people. You must be gay yourself.”

That’s the last thing he clearly remembers.

The guy punched him in the face, leaving teeth marks on his gums and knocking him senseless. As the attacker threatened Jacob, Christian staggered around, and his sister Jocelynn ran outside as Jacob filmed with his phone. You can scroll up and watch the video to see what happened next. The attacker continued shouting “faggot” and admitted he punched Christian for being a “faggot.”

Jocelynn got a clear photo of the license plate, told the guys she was calling the cops, then watched them jump in the car and roar off. She jumped in her own car to follow them but couldn’t find them.

She raced home and posted the video and license plate number to Instagram, asking her friends to identify the attackers.

Sandy, Utah police and an EMS unit showed up fast. Christian refused to go the hospital, being stubborn, he says. Nobody realized yet he was seriously hurt and lacked the capacity to make good decisions.

Here’s where things took a weird turn with the police

The Sandy police took the license plate number from Jocelynn. She and Stefanie expected they would do a thorough investigation, track the car down, and then find and arrest Christian’s assailant.

The Sandy police did not do that.

Officers later told the family they’d called the phone number associated with the vehicle. Somebody answered and said they’d sold the car. That was a lie, and hardly an unexpected one, but the cops stopped investigating. Dropped the case.

That would have been the end of the story, except that Jocelynn’s Insta post got results. Somebody told her who owned the car, and SHE tracked the assailant down in the town of West Jordan, a short drive away. She talked him into coming to the house to discuss having the charges dropped.

Instead, Stefanie called the police. She tells me she was super worried about Christian’s health as he was seriously disoriented but refused to go the hospital. “Oh, heck no,” she said to herself. “He is getting arrested.” The attacker was arrested, but not before he stared Christian down silently, making him feel worried and uneasy.

I ask Jocelynn how the Sandy police treated her and Christian

She sounds angry as she starts to answer, which surprises because I’ve read press reports about how the Sandy PD is anxious to charge the attacker with a hate crime and has issued press releases saying they take this incident very seriously.

Jocelynn tells me the Sandy officers who came to the house were hostile and unsupportive. She says they barked orders at her and treated her like she was a problem instead of a good citizen helping them put a violent criminal behind bars.

They did arrest the attacker, but when Jocelynn and Stefanie asked them about charges, an officer told her there was, “zero chance we can charge with a hate crime,” explaining the assailant would have had to admit he hit Christian because he’s gay.

Have you watched that video yet?

The same video the Sandy police watched when Jocelynn gave it to them? Scroll up. Listen to the assailant say he hit Christian because he’s a “faggot.” Ask yourself if it’s less than clear and convincing. Ask yourself why the Sandy officers said there was zero chance of a hate crime charge.

Stefanie tells me the police didn’t have audio in the video they first had access to, which may have impacted their response.

Then Christian went to the hospital and social media blew up

Christian was in serious pain all weekend. It got worse instead of better and he looked very unwell. Finally, late Sunday night, his family convinced him to go the ER. He had a cat scan and got diagnosed with brain swelling and a concussion. He was not admitted, but remained disoriented and confused.

Last night as I’m talking to him, he’s better, but lapses into confusion more than once. He’s evidently not quite recovered yet. Physically or otherwise.

Meanwhile, social media exploded. Jocelyn’s Insta went viral, and the Rainbow Youth Project, which provides free mental health counseling to LGBTQ youth in need, amplified it, and it went even more viral.

Jocelynn and Stefanie heard from the Sandy police again, who told them, “Social media is coming for Sandy, we are being contacted like crazy and even the mayor is involved now. and so we’re going to try to charge with a hate crime.”

As they tell me this, I feel a twinge of pain. This isn’t my story, so I’m way more concerned about what the family are feeling, but I can’t help thinking, “The public are coming for Sandy? That’s why you changed your minds? Not because an 18-year-old boy was seriously injured while being called a faggot? That’s not enough for you? What a sad world we live in.”

Christian turned 18 a couple days later, Stefanie tells me, spending his birthday in pain.

Jocelyn sounds indignant, but Christian and his mom sound tired and sad.

Sadness and joy are the themes of this story

Christian is struggling with sadness as he processes what happened to him. So is his mom. They tell me Sandy, Utah is not the kind of place this happens. Yes, it’s in a conservative part of the country dominated by the LDS Church, but Stephanie’s stake (similar to a church parish) is pretty liberal and she’s not the only mom in her congregation with a gay kid. Everybody LOVES Christian, she says. They’ve known him since he was a little boy.

He decided to leave the LDS Church after he came out as gay, but the community didn’t reject him for that. He maintained a rich social life, excelled in school, and got into a highly selective academic program with a scholarship to boot.

He met Jacob!

Christian says he and Jacob have decided to continue holding hands in public sometimes, even though Jacob is nervous. I can hear in Christian’s voice that he’s nervous too. Courageous, but very nervous.

He says, “I want people to know I’m sad. I thought we were in a different place in society.”

He sounds more than sad. I think he’s still processing. I think he’s coming to terms with how many times random strangers have rolled down their windows to call him a “faggot.” I think he’s asking himself how safe he really is.

When we start talking about his family, his future plans, and Jacob, his voice brightens again. He turns back into that happy kid his mom told me about at the beginning of the call. His attacker didn’t kill his joy and love of life.

We say goodbye and then I sit and think. I ask myself if the LGBTQ backlash we’re living through right now is to blame for Christian’s assault. Are politicians who are leveraging anti-LGBTQ animous stirring up enough hatred that two star-watching teenagers got caught up in it?

If ask myself if the Sandy police dragged their heels for the same reason.

I don’t know.

But I know this much — no gay kid should ever go out for a run and hear “faggot” coming at him from inside cars. No gay kid should ever be beaten at the end of his own driveway just because he’s enjoying life.

This is 2022, not 1952, and those days are supposed to be behind us. Take a good look at that happy couple in the photo above. Ask yourself some of the same tough questions I’m asking.

What comes next? How do we stop the hate?

One of Christian’s friends is raising money to help pay for mental health counseling, which Christian says he needs. You can check out that link here.

************************

James Finn is a columnist for the LA Blade, a former Air Force intelligence analyst, an alumnus of Queer Nation and Act Up NY, and an “agented” but unpublished novelist. Send questions, comments, and story ideas to [email protected]

********************

The preceding article was previously published by Prism & Pen– Amplifying LGBTQ voices through the art of storytelling and is republished by permission.