When I saw this at A Stitch in Haste, I didn’t really think too much of it, other than it being sad, but I haven’t been able to get it out of my head and, the more I think about it, the more I’ve been getting more angry over the media’s treatment of it. Fifteen year old Lawrence King was raced to the hospital Tuesday where he was decalred brain-dead after being shot in the head by a fellow 8th grade classmate. The motive?
“It appears to be kind of a personal thing between these two students,” he [police spokesman David Keith] said Tuesday. “Some kind of beef.”
or
Police have not alleged a motive for the shooting, but said there appeared to have been “bad blood” between the teens.
Or, at best,
Investigators have not released a motive for the shooting. [Joel] Lovstedt [E.O. Green Junior High School Principal] says that King was often the subject of teasing. He had been targeted by bullies in the past. Students say the victim was often picked on for the way he dressed.
Only one media source sees fit to mention the most obvious motive for the crime.
Some students said the victim, whose name was not disclosed, sometimes wore makeup and feminine jewelry and had declared himself gay. They said he was frequently taunted by other boys and had been involved in an argument with the alleged shooter, an eighth-grader who also was not named, and others Monday.
It’s general knowledge around the school that he was regularly picked on for being gay, yet only one media source thought that might be a relevant fact to bring up after he was murdered by a classmate. Why the cover-up? I’m tempted to think, it’s because the soccer moms (and news readers) out there don’t like to be made to realize that their kids are noticing when they slap those “Marriage=1 Man + 1 Woman” bumper stickers on their minivans and SUVs. Anti-gay bigotry is not “bad blood,” it’s not “some kind of beef” and it’s certainly not “a personal thing between these two students.” It’s bigger than that, and this shooting is just the symptom of it. It’s easier for a certain segment of the population if this is nothing more than “a personal thing between these two students” because then there’s nothing they could have done. They can go about their lives guilt-free, never stopping to consider the message they are sending to their kids whenever they take an opportunity to demonize gay people. Eighth-graders don’t develop murder-provoking hatred on their own. It has to be taught to them, either intentionally or otherwise.
And it’s taught to them when adults utter sentiments like that of abc7.com commenter tabby789 (click the third news link above and scroll down):
well i do belive every one certainly have the right of speach and to presant them selves as they see their own slfe.. but to encourage the dressing and the high hills was a bit much, this poor boy had a rough life and for the school to continue to encourage this young person to but him self on the line day in and day out was also wrong. the bulliy that did the crime should of never played god to correct this young boy but there are more people for the blame.[sic] (emphasis mine)
According to tabby, the only real problem here is who “corrected” the boy. And the real blame goes to the folks who encouraged the boy to be himself.
As an aside, any idea who Jocelyn Salinas is? She’s not mentioned in any of the articles yet all but one of them use her photo as the story visual.
The captions say simply that young Miss Salinas is a student at the school.
Yeah, I saw that, it just seems odd to me that each news organization would have chosen different pictures of the exact same girl for their stories.
“Police Have Not Alleged a Motive for the Shooting…”
So says the Associated Press:A 15-year-old boy who was shot in the head at school was declared brain dead Wednesday but was kept on a ventilator for possible…