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One week after 9/11, I rescued the above unsigned painting from the front wall of the elementary school on my Chelsea street. It was one of hundreds affixed there in what doubtlessly was a group therapy project for the children. A violent rainstorm had just begun when I removed it and by morning the hundreds of other drawings lay ruined in puddles. I'll never own one of the repulsive commercial 9/11 souvenirs still being hawked on downtown corners, but Hugging Towers (as I have dubbed it), I'll keep forever.
Despite the bone-chilling temperatures, a large crowd of LGBT activists, allies, and local politicians stood in the slush and snow tonight near the United Nations to memorialize slain Ugandan activist David Kato, who now stands accused being responsible for his own murder by the Ugandan police.
Speakers included the head of the International Gay & Lesbian Human Rights Commission, gay Ugandan nationals, gay clergy, and two NYC council members, all of whom vowed to get the truth about Kato's murder from the Ugandan government, which receives $500 million in U.S. aid annually. Money being paid, it was pointed out, to enable the brutalization and murders of LGBT people.
Not forgotten at the event was the murderous complicity of American and Ugandan evangelicals in this brutal crime and speakers repeatedly spat out the names of Scott Lively, Rick Warren, and Martin Ssempa, all of whom were promised that their names and reputations will forever be linked to this outrage.
After the vigil, candles were lit and the crowd proceeded silently two blocks away to the Uganda Mission, where a Ugandan lesbian activist laid a letter of demands and flowers against a placard depicting Kato which had been propped outside the building's entrance. As that occurred, the hundred or so people behind the barricades shouted up at the windows of Uganda House, "Stop the violence, stop the hate! Do your job, investigate!"
SLIDESHOW: Full-screen photos are here.
The International Gay & Lesbian Human Rights Commission is organizing a memorial vigil for murdered Ugandan activist David Kato. The starting point of the procession is not yet determined, but attendees will finish at the Ugandan embassy. I'll post more details as they are known.
