Love sucks. Hate sucks more.

My mother used to scold me for using the word "hate". When I'd say something like "I hate this park, there are bugs!" or "I hate this itchy shirt!"; or "This movie is so boring. I hate it!" I would get a swift reprimand, and an instruction to say "dislike" instead. I guess she was trying to teach me that hate is a potent emotion, not something to be thrown around lightly. Hate has consequences. The thing is, you can't beat up a buggy park*, you can't kill an itchy shirt, and you can't intimidate a boring movie with a knife (well, you could try, but... well... okay, you know what? Do what you want). Ooh! You know what you can intimidate, beat up and kill? Fags, dykes and trannies! And many people do. And sometimes it seems nobody cares.

*when I was about 10, I went through a phase where I would buy food at recess that came on styrofoam plates, and then gleefully break the plates into pieces as I threw them away, thinking that would release more CFCs, leading to global warming, and killing all those bugs that I hated so much.

From feministe, I clicked to this post, Epidemic of Hatred by Shakespeare's Sister about the media silence on homophobic/transphobic* violence.

*Note: Shakespeare's Sister doesn't specifically mention or reference any instances of violence against people who identify as trans-, but as Kate Bornstein said (I'm paraphrasing, obviously): we aren't bashed for "being gay", we're bashed for transgressing the rules of gender.

ShakeSis points out that the media and Congresspersons create political storms in a teacup over flag-burning and keeping the pledge of allegiance in schools, yet say nary a word about the numerous anti-queer incidents happening all the time:

How little it takes to whip up the media into an exploitative frenzy, all in the name of “protecting” us. How little it takes to move our Congress to pay attention to an issue and pass legislation to “protect” us. (Which is, of course, ever an excuse to limit our rights, but they nonetheless claim it’s about “protection.”) One or two incidents, or, sometimes, just an imaginary scenario of what might happen. That’s all it takes.

But in the course of two months, there have been at least six vicious attacks on the LGBT community, and the media is silent. And Congress, well, they were pushing for an amendment to deny equal rights to same-sex couples. Their focus was “protecting the sanctity of marriage.” They’re more concerned with protecting an institution, an abstract concept, than protecting people.

In 2004, according to the FBI, 1,482 people were victims of crimes motivated by hatred based on "sexual orientation". Of these, about 600 were targeted by violent crimes. The other incidents were mainly property damage and intimidation. That's just under 2 violent incidents per day! And that's just the reported ones. I hardly need to note the reasons why such crimes might go underreported (either not reported at all, or not reported as motivated by hate).

Even if someone reports a crime and mentions the motivation, there's no guarantee that the agency receiving the report documents it or passes that information on. Check out this table. Out of Alabama's 51 participating agencies, only 3 submitted reports of any hate crimes at all. Now, do you think that no hate crimes happened in the other 48 agencies' jurisdiction?

Now, you may be opposed to or ambivalent about hate crimes laws* (I'm ambivalent), but hate-motivated crime is still something that needs more media and community attention. Our communities need to address and change the culture of fear and misunderstanding underlying these crimes, as well as the too-prevalent underenforcement of existing laws, or victim-blaming in cases involving anti-queer violence.

*Actually, I make a distinction between laws requiring documentation of hate crime, laws requiring special attention to hate incidents (or preventing police or prosecutorial neglect of hate incidents), and laws requiring increased punishment of hate crime - I am unequivocally in favor of the first two, and ambivalent about the last one.

This need not involve criminal law at all. CUAV in San Francisco, for example, has a great volunteer speakers bureau program that puts on events in schools and other settings to educate people about LGBT issues by giving them a safe, non-confrontational setting to interact with openly queer speakers. My undergraduate college had a similar program, and speaking with a class of high school kids about LGBT issues was such a rewarding experience - I learned as much from it as they did, if not more.

So, as ShakeSis says:

write your Congress members and your local media and tell them to pay attention to this Epidemic of Hatred against the LGBT community. Donate to LGBT advocacy groups. Straight people, register your support with Atticus Circle and PFLAG. And keep talking about this. Blog this issue. Tell anyone who will listen and get them involved.

I would add: find out about your local LGBT/Queer community organizations and ask them what they are doing to address anti-queer hate and build understanding, and what you can do to contribute (it could be time, it could be money, it could be some other resource).