Showing posts with label hoax. Show all posts
Showing posts with label hoax. Show all posts

Tuesday, July 13, 2010

Hoax = Bad Business

The recent report of the Ugandan gay rights activist, whose severed head was discovered in a latrine, and his dismembered torso in a field, has now been reported as a hoax. 
 
This discovery inflamed the international Pink Community because - well, hoaxes are more than just trickery and lies, they are damaging to our cause of GLBT human rights. Yes, at first those perpetrating such hoaxes seem to generate lots of sympathy and support - but when people realize they have been "played" they become very bitter and angry, and who can blame them? They also tend to evoke that common childhood parable of "crying wolf".
 
With much of Africa (and including South Africa) currently a hot-spot of homophobia and transphobia, we see a future in which a Pink genocide looms over the horizon - and in more than one country. 
 
These days, our worldwide communications are so good, reliable and quick, that reports like this can span the globe almost instantaneously - making timeous verification virtually impossible. Often, by the time what seems to be a very credible report turns into a hoax, it is far too late.
 
This gives very poignant credence to the Twain-ism A lie can travel halfway around the world while the truth is still putting on its shoes.”

Sunday, June 21, 2009

Shuffling A Pack Of Lies

On Friday I received notification that a hate crime had taken place in a small town in New York State. Rachel Roo, an 18 year old teen mentor on a popular transgender forum had been brutally murdered.

It was reported that Rachel who had transitioned quite young, had been involved in a car accident in which her mother had lost an arm. Upon testifying in court, the lawyer for the opposing party outed her - apparently her townsfolk did not take kindly to this revelation and she and her family now faced numerous death threats on a daily basis. It was reported that while riding to a nearby store on Friday evening, she disappeared. Her bicycle was found in a dumpster and some hours later she had been found lying at the side of the road. She was reported to have been gang-raped, and so badly assaulted that even her knee caps had been shattered by what was assumed to have been a sledgehammer. Apparently she was supposed to have been left for dead in a shallow grave, but supposedly managed to crawl out and towards the roadway, and collapsed where she was later found. She was taken to ICU where she died in the early hours of the next morning.
 
Like many others around the world, I was incensed on reading this, not to mention upset. Quite honestly I was shattered. I felt that I had lost somebody I had known and it actually brought tears to my eyes. After all, hate crimes like this are the reason I became an activist for gay and trans rights.

Imagine my shock and disappointment upon finding out that it was all a lie.