beating homeless men ?

On January 12, 2006 three teenagers were charged with the murder of 45-year-old Norris Gaynor. Norris was sleeping on a park bench when the teens bashed his head and chest with a baseball bat and shot paintballs at him. This is only one example of the many attacks on the homeless in recent years. The National Coalition for the Homeless has documented 386 attacks on the homeless over the past six years. These attacks include 156 deaths. Of all the attack, 211 of them have been recorded since 2002. Apparently the number of these attacks are growing, not decreasing.

These attacks are similar to the attacks in the 1960s and 1970s. These decades were a time of struggle for gay liberation. More people began to join the gay movement and fight for gay and lesbian rights. When this movement started to become popular there were a number of beatings that occurred against homosexuals or homsexual supporters. A civil war came about in which the two sides: gay advocates and gay opponents. It is even believed that police officers were involved in some of these beatings.

These beatings are very similar. But, there is a big difference if police officers really did join in on the beatings of gay advocates. This shows how much more ignorant people were just decades ago. The fact that the beatings in the 1960s and 1970s were socially acceptable is horrible. At least the country's authority has evolved over the four decades between the two cases of beatings.