People took to the streets of New York this week to protest a rising rate of attacks on LGBTQ+ people in city and in fact, the rest of the world too.
A man was stabbed multiple times with a screwdriver whilst being repeated verbally abused with homophobic slurs last weekend in the Bushwick area and luckily survived. Abimbola Adelaja is a gay man and took arms when he could, organising a march to show the community that enough is enough.
Adelaja suffered a punctured lung and said in a post on Instagram ‘On early Saturday morning I was brutally attacked at my local bodega simply for being gay. I was stabbed repeatedly with a screwdriver and beaten with a liquor bottle. The bodega workers did nothing to help me or to stop my attackers, they wouldn’t even let me use their phone as my lung was collapsing from a puncture wound. My attack is one of many that has happened in the Bushwick area and this must stop.’
The march went ahead on September 9 and is something that we should all consider in our own local communities. These sort of attacks are happening even in countries where the LGBTQ+ community are protected by law and equality. Its even more disturbing that it’s happening more and more.