What happens when queers speak out against violence

On Wednesday, August 24th I got 5 text messages within 2 minutes about a friend of mine who had been held at gunpoint for walking hand-in-hand with her girlfriend in Bloomfield. Would I come to a rally in front of the Pleasure Bar that night and show some solidarity with my queer brothers and sisters? Of course. In the meanwhile I wept in my cube thinking about the futility of community organizing while people I care about are getting guns shoved in their faces for being queer.

I got word on the way to the rally that the cops had told people to move and everyone was moving to Friendship Park. I showed up around 7:30, half an hour after the official start. Some people had gone to the park already when I arrived, some remained. I wanted to stay in front of the bar too. In front of the Pleasure Bar is where another community member was hit in the face by a homophobe a year ago. We had a huge rally when that happened. Over a hundred of us probably stood on the sidewalk in front of the bar and got a lot of attention. Some media crews showed up, people spoke and cheered and we took up SPACE. It was amazing. Cops showed up mostly to keep us safe and stayed out of our way.

This time around it was clear things were different. When everyone got to the park, all the energy left us. It was downright boring. We weren't doing anything! We could have all just been hanging out and no one passing by would know that we were angry about something very specific that happened just over there, if only we could stand there and protest in peace like it is our right to do so.

Word got around that the cops said we couldn't block the sidewalk in front of Pleasure Bar but we could rally in the park or march, as long as we kept moving. So people started to move again. We wanted to take the streets! Show that anti-gay violence is not to be tolerated in our community! We wanted people to see us and wonder what happened and join us. But we got less than 2 blocks when cops started showing up. By the time I got in front of Nico's the cops already had one of us in cuffs held against a car! What did they do? I had no idea. I started filming. There was a round of "Let them go!" but now that they had one of us they weren't gonna back down. What did the cops do next? Called in more backup - a few scary K9 teams and a paddy wagon. Everyone froze. Why were they arresting people? Someone was arrested for asking. Scared and defeated, we made our way back to the park. Some kid yelled "fuck you!" to a cop. Yeah, like that helps AT ALL.

Once back at the park, anger and tension hit a peak. People shared information, hugged, felt like crying, uploaded pictures of the arrests, watched more and more police vehicles take over the church parking lot, watched our toes to make sure we stayed off the sidewalks and heaven forbid incur more wrath from the police. Where were the police the other night when my friend had a gun pulled on her?

I stood dazed and watched it all. The sun was setting. Channel 4 finally showed up and took some interviews. By that time, half the group had left. I was introduced to a man who was beaten so badly in Wilkinsburg a couple of weeks ago that his jaw was still broken. Why didn't we show up for him? I heard story after story about cops being unhelpful or downright abusive to queers for reporting incidents.

I know police reports could have been filed sooner. Yeah, we could write up a report for the Citizens Review Board or whatever. Yeah, we could wait 5 years for some inadequate cultural competency trainings for the city police. But we were angry NOW. We had something to say NOW. We were fearless together and we wanted to make the homophobes so scared by our love for each other that they would never show their faces again in Bloomfield or anywhere in the city that we love. We wanted to be SEEN. Not as "violent protesters", not as a rag-tag bunch of weirdos, but as a group of people who may not all know each other but could damn well show up (with posters, too!) at short notice to say "Pick on one of us and you pick on all of us!" (to steal a phrase from Ocean's sign :)

We clearly have the energy and the passion. Let's clarify our message, get it organized and keep showing up -- cops or no!

[Afterword: It recently came to my attention that the first time the cops heard about the rally was when a neighbor called the cops in earnest--not wanting this sort of thing to happen--and the cop said he couldn't do anything about us being there cause that is allowed. No one called the cops to give them a heads up about the rally which is what happened at the last one and gave us some credibility. We need to spread to the word about this kind of info. What are our rights when it comes to police interaction? How do we interact with the media to get the best possible representation? Workshops anyone? --R.S. 9/9]

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More coverage of this event, some clearly better than others:

Missing the Point: Protest arrests highlight disconnect between cops, LGBT community by Lauren Daley
Bloomfield Queer Rally: LGBT or was it an anarchist event? by Thomas C. Waters
Bloomfield Queer Rally: at the hearings by Thomas C. Waters
Only on 4: Gay Rights Demonstrators Taken Into Custody After Protest by "Crap Here, Crap Now" WTAE
Man arrested in gay rally on probation for G-20 by Pittsburgh "I Missed the Point" Tribune-Review
Protesters arrested at Bloomfield anti-homophobia rally by Pittsburgh "What's a rally?" Post-Gazette
YouTube: Arrests in Bloomfield at Anti-Violence Rally