I’m probably going to get downvoted for saying this, but fuck it.

Its appalling to see all the generalizations being thrown around here. Both towards gays and muslims overall. Is it horrible that there was a movement of largely muslim citizens banning LGBT education in birmingham? Of course, and I hope the local community is able to override it. But does this mean that all muslim people are homophobic? Of course not.

Many people tend to paint gay people as all being liberal and progressive, and muslims as conservative and backwards. But like in all walks of life there are some progressive/liberal muslims, and there are gay people who are conservative and dare I say Trump supporters. This amping up of stereotypes is the reason why we’re in this “us vs them” type of society today.

I’m not blaming my fellow gays for anti-muslim rhetoric, but anybody who believes that any one minority group is innocent of not contributing to perpetuating stereotypes is dead wrong. Just because youre muslim-american it doesn’t mean you couldn’t possibly be racist or homophobic yourself, and just because you’re gay it doesn’t mean you can’t be racist or heterophobic yourself. All I’m saying is, don’t demonize an entire group of people due to the actions of a select few. Is the muslim world at large generally homophobic? Yes. Does that mean they all deserve to die? No. I’m not ignoring the obvious cultural idiosyncrasies between the west and muslims, but if people are so outraged then why aren’t you talking about other culture’s treatment of gays? Look at Africa, or even Asia (our allies the South Koreans still classify homosexuality as a mental illness), not to mention Chechnya literally has concentration camps for gays and they’re white (ethnically russian but white nonetheless). Look to people like Megan Roper-Phelps and lets learn a lesson here about how we can communicate with people that have the capacity to have an open-mind.

We aren’t going to be able to move forward as a society unless we communicate with each other without hurling insults and death threats. People no matter what creed you are don’t respond well to threats. Those we can reach out and change their minds are worth it. And if despite all our best efforts if those individual homophobes (regardless of race, culture and gender) simply refuse to listen and act out violently, they’ll be dealt with. Lets not conflate the issue and focus on having a dialogue and save our wrath for those who will actually inflict harm on us.

*mic drop