Okay, this is something that I don't want to post, but I am because awareness needs to be raised.
There is this video: http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=ec0_1303444048
There's a LOT of comments on it too.
TRIGGER WARNING FOR GRAPHIC DESCRIPTION
This video shows two women beating the shit out of a trans woman because she had the gall to go to the bathroom. Employees and bystanders don't do much of anything, some ineffective attempts to stop them, but nothing of substance. I have not heard the audio of this, but apparently you can hear people laughing in the background.
End trigger section
I don't know what to say. I haven't read the comments. I'm not sure I could. I saw it on tumblr, and I thought you all needed to see it too, to make others aware of this and why we wind up being scared despite good people out there. It's like Schrodingers Rapist for women, it's Schrodingers Attacker.
Anyhow... keep tissues nearby.
Comments
Link to story with audio
http://www.bilerico.com/2011/04/transwoman_severely_beaten_a...
This a link to the Bilerico Project the video is pretty disturbing but the victim left after refusing medical treatment.
Lisa
Access denied
I can't see it here, but then I don't really want to. Who took the video, and why?
'cameraman'
It seems that it was junior staff at the McD where it happened that taped this.
This is a disgraceful indictment
of teenage violence and while it happened in the US it could happen here too. The victim was beaten into some sort of seizure while bystanders watched until an older woman intervened.
I'm pleased to hear that two suspects have been apprehended but I'm equally concerned that women seem to be becoming more violent in society. I'm also disappointed that none of the staff made more than token efforts to intervene - I hope MacDonalds take major steps to compensate the victim and to discipline their staff.
Angharad
Angharad
The comments
From what I can tell through reading the video description and comments (the video itself won't play for me - not that I'd particularly want to watch it), the person who filmed the video may have been affiliated with those carrying out the assault. The assault apparently only stopped when the victim had a seizure, and someone (may have been the camera operator) encouraged the assailants to flee rather than waiting for the police to arrive.
As for the comments, having read the first ten pages, all the still extant ones are condemning the assault and the McD's employees who stood by and watched. Hardly any mention the victim was TG - they seem to be more concerned about a possible racial element to the motivation (the assailants and majority of McD's staff were apparently black, the victim was apparently white). Hence the majority of deleted comments are apparently racial slurs, and even many surviving comments either contain direct racial slurs or say the situation would have been handled differently if it was white assailants and a black victim.
There are 10 kinds of people in the world - those who understand binary and those who don't...
As the right side of the brain controls the left side of the body, then only left-handers are in their right mind!
Trigger Warning: I thought you all should know about this.
Me, hope the attackers go to prison.
May Your Light Forever Shine
May Your Light Forever Shine
This will get messy
Because one of the attackers is a minor, and because Baltimore has no law providing transgender persons the right to choose which restroom they use, this will likely turn into an ugly legal battle. It's not going to take a genius defense attorney to figure out how to spin it to try and shift blame to the victim. I sincerely hope the tactic doesn't work, and in this case the viral status of the video may end up working for the victim. The attack was brutal and extended -- both attackers walked away a number of times, only to return and renew the assault.
Now the civil case is another matter, and I dearly hope the victim sues McDonald's. The damning fact there isn't the actions of the manager -- he did try to keep the attackers away even if it was unsuccessful and the police were called -- but rather the fact an employee recorded the entire attack and then posted it online. McDonald's will undoubtedly want to settle out of court, and whether that offer is accepted is up to the victim. If it was me, they would have to offer a boatload of money before I'd let them off that easily.
And yet as horrible as this incident is, there is a ray of sunshine -- the woman who came to the victim's aid. She not only tried to place herself between the victim and her attackers, in the audio you can hear her telling them several times to hit her instead, and at the end she can be heard telling the manager repeatedly, "I want them arrested!" Whether she knew the victim was transgender or not isn't clear, but it also clearly didn't matter to her; she refused to stand by and watch another human being be brutalized, and placed herself at risk in an attempt to stop the attack. As long as we have angels like her then there is hope for the world.
Scott
Your Grace, I have only one question. Do you wish this man crippled, or dead?
David Weber's Honor Harrington -- Flag in Exile
http://genomorph.tglibrary.com/
Bree
The difference between fiction and reality? Fiction has to make sense.
-- Tom Clancy
http://genomorph.tglibrary.com/ (Currently broken)
http://bree-ramsey314.livejournal.com/
Twitter: @genomorph
Not sure how this could happen
I want to be clear that I am not racist at all. I have been attacked twice, and both times were by African American women, in the food court of the LLoyd Center. It was when I first came out. Strangely, since I became Muslim, and hijab all the time, no one has been mean to me save for one Vietnam Era Veteran, at the VA hospital where I volunteered. Showing him my Drivers license and my Veterans Card shut him up really quick.
It's not that easy for me to understand how two women could beat a T person up? So, I just have to go with what is on the tape. The problem with defending yourself is that it is likely that the T woman would go to jail over it and not the assailants. It could all get very twisted. It is not that hard to kill another person with just one blow.
Strange
Khadijah
Coincidence
How odd. A short while ago I was listening to this week's "Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me!" on NPR, which was broadcast from Baltimore and featured an appearance by the director and alternative culture genius, John Waters, touting the diversity and individual freedom of that city.
Evidently, it doesn't extend to every neighborhood.
He ended his pitch for his city like this, "Baltimore is the only city in the world where if you say you're moving to New York, people say, 'Why???'," and the live audience applauded wildly. Well, I think I have part of the answer: http://www.nyc.gov/html/cchr/pdf/trans_guide.pdf
Although I won't be watching the clip, thank you for posting this.
___________________
If a picture is worth 1000 words, this is at least part of my story.
Well, as of latest news
His laughing, his comments made on facebook and twitter (which is a major violation of McD's policy) and his help of the two perps to get away all led to the decision I have to figure. That doesn't mean the other two are going to get away.
Samirah M. Johnstone
Did this happen
purely because of the victim's transgender status? I saw the video but couldn't makeout the voices other than shrieking. Is this a hate crime?
Surely if you have worries about someone using the same toilet, you complain to the management not beat them up. We don't know what went on before, so there may have been some sort of altercation in the loos, if so what was said - but even so, such violence can not be tolerated. I suppose the only good thing is that if it had been young men who done the beating, the victim would probably be on a slab in the morgue.
The person who filmed and posted the attack should be prosecuted.
Angharad
Angharad
Even if it was racially
Samirah M. Johnstone
Attempted man slaughter
The two that were ganging up on the poor victum, should be found with no problem. I do think the person running the camera knew them. The two doing the beating should get it for attempted man slaughter and the one running the camera should get it for assisting or aiding and abetting. I also think the victum should get full restatution along with medical expences paid and for trauma sustained during and after this.
All three people should be liable for damages and should have to pay in full. The three involved (not the victum) should get the maxumin punishment law allows. They should also make an example out of all three of them to show others what will happen when they do something like this. What is this world coming to and where do our young people get the idea that they can do what ever they want, with out any consequences. Throw the book at them, they have no respect for people or life it's self!!!
McDonald's Assault. 5 years in prison.
http://articles.nydailynews.com/2011-09-13/news/30173690_1_c...
I ran across this when I saw Joy's Post again, and decided to try and look it up to see
if anything at all had happened. The Elder of the two girls who assaulted the Tg woman
in the McDonald's was given Ten years, with five being suspended. The younger girl, a
juvenile, they did not say, but she also faced hate crime charges.
One of the saddest things about this for me was, that because I could not remember any of
the names, I had to look for +McDonald's +assault. It came up near the top, fortunately,
but there were so many on the list that it was a little sad.
Anyway, since so many had commented, I thought I'd pass along the final.
Sarah Lynn
Thanks For The Update
I had almost forgotten about this incident and the post. Thanks for the follow-up. Too often, we never find out what happens.
I am actually surprised that this resolution was as quick as it was. Sometimes these cases drag on for over a year, with postponements, motions, judge reassignments, and legal maneuvers.
It's pleasing to hear that the jury, selected from the same population as the perpetrators, shared no sympathy for what they did. It would have taken only one out of the twelve to prevent conviction. Perhaps we can draw some solace that things are changing. It hasn't been unheard of that disapproving juries have punished the victims in circumstances like this again by allowing their assailants to walk.
Maybe John Waters was right, and we can add Baltimore to the list of cities which truly value diversity and human rights.