NYC Pride is this weekend and I have mixed feelings about attending. I was pretty gung ho about it until the graduate student I worked with said that she thinks NY would be an especially prominent target and that the LA guy was stopped by vigilance, but the fact remained that a heavily armed man was planning on going to the parade.
I’m not sure what to think. On one hand, I’m scared and also an only child, but on the other hand, I felt pretty terrible about not attending last year because I was too shy and didn’t know anyone, and it might be fun to see other gay people. The people I’m considering going with are a bit older and certainly more level headed, so that’s a plus.
I told my mom on the phone that I might be going to a parade but she hasn’t put two and two yet. I was pleasantly surprised by her response whenever I would mention that the victims were gay - she always says ‘so what,’ as if I’m insinuating something. :)) She still thinks it’s a phase though, welp. :-S
A good opinion piece (I’m biased because he’ll probably be one of my committee members) by the author of Queer Ricans about the double burden of violence that Puerto Ricans and queer individuals face (of course, many people face a double or more burden of violence but Puerto Ricans are often an invisible group.)
I had heard something similar about the families of some of the jumpers on 9/11. If your religion requires you to hate someone, you need a new religion. If your religion calls this love, you need a new religion. Or no religion at all.
As a mother, I literally can’t think of something my child could do or be which would make me reject her, either in life or death. That’s tragic, Donna.
I feel the same way about my son, LasMa. But it happens, unfortunately. Studies indicate that out of all homeless teenagers, at least 25-30% are LGBT kids who were rejected and thrown out by their parents. I know several trans people who were rejected by their parents. I also have a friend whose mother rejected her and said she never wanted to be seen with her again in public when she transitioned in her 20s – even though she accepted her just fine back when she was living as a gay man. Eventually, she came around. But I was still incredibly shocked to hear about it.
Reviving this since I was just in Orlando for a few days. We drove past the Pulse nightclub, by happenstance while running an errand. There were several people there and many, many pieces of memorabilia and support. The city has put up a construction jersey wall to guard it all from traffic.
BIL had some horrifying things to say about the attack. He had some photos on his phone of two people who had each gotten one bullet wound in their forearms. The wounds were just enormous, far bigger than the dime or nickel sized entry wound you would imagine. Bones were shattered. BIL says that the hospital doesn’t want them talking about it. I think we need to talk about it. Especially if the wounds were exacerbated by being caused by some kind of high damage or RIP bullet that perhaps should be outlawed. Maybe @awcntdb can chime in since he seems to know more about gun specifics.
@greenwitch,
Why would the hospital not want them to talk about it, and what authority does a hospital have anyway, with regard to a patient discussing his own condition?
perhaps she means employees not patients?(big difference) just like when a movie star goes to the hospital and a whole bunch of people start logging in to look at the records…and end up getting fired.
Hospital employees are not supposed to be talking about patients’ wounds whether they are extra gruesome or not, whether they were committed by terrorists or other criminals, etc., without explicit permission from the patient. This is federal law. I guess I’m confused about who @greenwitch 's BIL is and what his role at the hospital is. The thread is too long for me to go through in order to sort that out.
yeah, i think she means employees, last time I was in the ER the screen saver on the computer reminded employees that HIPPA prohibits them from looking at any records not pertaining to a current case…and that includes their own personal medical records.
if people want to see gruesome or gross pictures from accidents,stabbings,shootings, etc etc they can google them.
BIL is away now so I can’t ask him who any orders came from. HIPAA is what it is. However, I remember a trauma surgeon at Suburban Hospital in MD being interviewed by the Washington Post about the damage done by the bullets used by the DC area snipers. How frustrated he was, how he had lost the 3 or 4 people sent to their ER and how he vowed to save the “next one”. It was quite specific about the particular damage done by those bullets and where they had wounded the victims. You could easily know the names of the victims because it was in the news. Maybe they had gotten permission from the families? Maybe it didn’t matter because the people died? Maybe laws have changed since then?
HIPAA protections remain in place after death (I believe 50 years). Perhaps details of murders vs. regular medical details can be released as public record, I don’t know.
They were selling loads that were designed to be non-lethal if they encountered a wall, back in the late '80s… may still be, but they evidently never caught on with the drive-by crowd.
Just guessing, but… there’s likely some pistol load that’s designed for close quarters. A polar opposite to the bullet-proof vest rounds.