Somewhere Under the Rainbow

There has been a story in the news which has universally been described as tragic.  A mother of nine, Lauri Carlton, married to the same man for 28 years, put up a flag outside her store to show support for the gay community, and was shot to death for it.

The word “tragic” doesn’t do the story justice.

To start with, before even getting to that, the story has to be repeated, because it can’t be repeated enough – saying it once doesn’t convey anywhere near the full impact of what occurred:  a person put up a rainbow-colored flag to support people for being who they are, and someone didn’t like the flag and shot her to death.

But the reason this story far transcends tragic is because it’s about significantly more than a mother of nine being shot to death for putting up a multi-colored flag.  It’s about a murder that not only was inevitable, but part of an ongoing intentional pattern by the Republican Party.

This is not hyperbole.

This is also not a “both sides” thing.  Yes, there are crazy people on both sides, but this is not that.  This is a "The GOP has spent years intentionally demonizing people, riling their base for political gain, knowing they are creating hatred, and so people die" thing.

We all know this is hardly the first time a person has died or been attacked because of right-wing homophobia.  Only three weeks ago, O'Shae Sibley was dancing at a gas station when men began spewing gay slurs, telling him to stop dancing and then killed him.  (He was a professional dancer, by the way, not that that matters, but adds to the sickness.)  There’s even a law named for a young student who was tortured and killed for being gay in 1998 -- the federal government eventually passed the Matthew Shepard and James Byrd Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act in 2009.  (Byrd was an African-American killed by white supremacists the same year as Shepard).  And of course it's gone on throughout history.

But it’s one thing to hate and kill people throughout history for being who they are – that has its own special place in hell – it’s another matter entirely when a political party intentionally motivates its base to such actions for political benefit.

And the Republican Party does do that.  And knowingly.  And they (and their defenders) can’t claim that’s not their intent when they go to the lengths of demonizing a community and passing laws against them.  After all, as noted, it’s not like there haven’t been attacks and deaths over the decades.  When you rile your base with diatribes – and actual laws – for years and years, what do you think is going to happen?  It’s impossible to claim ignorance.  After all, at the very least you know there is a Matthew Shepard and James Byrd Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act.

And now, we've gotten to the point where a mother of 9 children who has been married for 28 years put up a rainbow flag to support people for being who they are, and someone so riled didn’t like the flag -- a colorful flag -- and shot her to death.

When Republicans go on the stump and claim "outrage" (!) against people they want you to loathe and pass things like "Don't say gay" bills, and laws that ban books that have “gender content,” and laws that ban drag shows in public, and ban AP psychology classes because they deal with gender, and ban healthcare for trans children, all of that can only serve to build hatred, increase attacks and ultimately motivate murder.

How can it not?!  They are laws telling you that such people are supposedly bad, supposedly a danger to society, supposedly harmful to children.  So, if your base to whom you've directed these laws and bans and speeches and angry cries of "outrage" sees someone in public who fits what you've been decrying and passing laws against, what does a politician expect will happen??  Republican politicians can plead ignorance -- this is the party that promotes how all it takes to stop something bad from happening is "A good guy with a gun" (tm) !!

Is this all caused by the crazy fringe?  If it is, it’s the crazy fringe being told it’s okay to be that crazy and hateful, since after all their fellow-Republican leaders are passing laws against it because it’s dangerous if they don’t do so.  Except, no, it’s not just the crazy fringe.  After all, politicians don’t go out of their way to enrage the fringe and pass laws to appease the fringe and create bans to encourage the fringe.  That’s a sure-fire way to anger your base and lose it.  If politicians realize they’re enraging the crazy fringe and pushing the crazy fringe to attack and kill others, that’s when politicians see their careers at hellish risk and quickly pull back to stop doing that and instead pass things like...oh, y'know, the Matthew Shepard and James Byrd Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act!  But when politicians cry out in supposed “outrage” and pass laws and enact bans, it’s specifically because so they sense it’s what their base is open to hearing from their party leaders, and so rile them up.

Just this Summer, there were attacks in Target stores for simply having a section of Pride shirts for children with rainbow colors.  The company closed down the section across the country out of safety concerns for their employees.  Bud Light took a financial pummeling for having an ad with a trans spokesperson.  All of that is not caused by “a crazy fringe.”  That’s the Republican base.  And the party leaders know it.  And encourage it.

That’s why this death of Lauri Carlton transcends the tragedy it is – to repeat:  a mother of nine children, married to the same man for 28 years, put up a rainbow-colored flag to support her friends and was shot to death for it -- and stands as just the latest symbol of the Republican Party encouraging hatred towards a community knowing full-well that it leads to violence and often death.

This is not “both sides.”  These is what the Republican Party does, and has been doing for many years, and passes laws to support it.  Attacks like this, deaths like this only occur from the GOP.  If anyone points to an example of sick craziness on the Democratic side, that is an individual act of fringe violence, it cannot be tied in even any remote way to a systematic, decades-old agenda by the party.  Indeed, to the opposite, it is Democratic encouragement for such things and being nurturing and thoughtful and open to others, most especially those in need of support, that Republican leaders have specifically used in raising their faux-“outrage” and decrying it all as being…”woke.”

Ron DeSantis has not only built a political identity on it, his slogan has taken on far too much sick meaning -- "Florida: Where woke goes to die."

Gee, what message does that send, as Republicans try to plead ignorance?

And the end, inevitable, knowing result of such a political platform is that when such acts of hate occur, they stem from a Republican Party demonizing a community so much that its base will kill that community -- even for just having a rainbow flag to show support.

There was a legend in World War II that when Germany overran Denmark, they required all Jews to wear an arm band with the Star of David.  But when the Danish king, Christian X,  appeared in public wearing an armband with the Star of David, much of the rest of the Danish public did, as well.  The story came from a political cartoon, though it was based on a similar foundation.  The Nazis had an order to transport Danish Jews to a concentration camp -- but King Christian X was vocal in his objections, and his encouragement led to Danish resistance groups, sympathetic citizens and universities (which shut down) to participate in a national rescue effort, hiding Danish Jews and smuggling them overseas to Sweden.  In the end, the public opposition by the king against Nazi tyranny lead to unified effort of the Danish people from which almost all Danish Jews were supported, protected and saved.