Weekly News Post #10

Homophobia On The Train

A 19 year old teen was assaulted on public transport for simply being gay. The victim experienced homophobic abuse since the two assailants boarded the train; experiencing both verbal and physical abuse. The assailants’s behaviour became more agressive once their behaviour was challenged. They then withheld the victim’s phone and proceeded to strangle him forcing him to apologise for being gay. The victim was also threatened to be stabbed whilst being placed in a headlock. A friend of the victim was also assaulted for trying to defend and help the victim, she ended up being punched and pushed to the ground. The two attackers have said to been arrested in correlation to the vicious attack.
Following the homophobic attack, a spokenan for the British Transport Police said ‘Hate crime will not be tolerated by British Transport Police... We won’t tolerate behaviour where someone is targeted because they are perceived to be different, or made to feel uncomfortable on thheir journey’

The Evening Standard’s (London bases newspaper) article gives a negative representation of the issue of homophobia, informing generally London based audiences on the fact that homophobia is still a major issue- even in the capital of England. The fact that this assault occurred out of pure hatred and ignorance is disgusting. Even in 2017, people still have a mentality of which being gay is seen as being wrong and people of the LGBT community are continually being victims of malicious attacks and discriminated against; although equality is supposed to thrive in our modern society- and especially in areas of the world which are known internationally. England has rightly given people of the LGBT community the right to get married, the right to live, and right and freedom to be who they are, and yet they’re still finding themselves under attack by narrow minded people who fail to understand that other people also have opinions and that their own opinions may be outdated and socially unacceptable.



References
Morrison, Sean. (2017). Teenager 'strangled and forced to apologise for being gay' in sick homophobic attack on Tube. Available: https://www.standard.co.uk/news/crime/teenager-strangled-and-forced-to-apologise-for-being-gay-in-sick-homophobic-attack-on-tube-a3709466.html. Last accessed 5th Dec 2017.