I don’t think anyone, herself included, would think Miranda Greer is the most feminine-looking person in the world. She is a twenty-four year-old lesbian living in Halls, TN.
But there is a question as to just how severely she should be beaten for it.
While I’m certain there are many schools of thought on it, you can place me directly in the “not at all” category.
On the other end of the spectrum is the as yet unkown assailant who punched her in the face, jabbed her in the eye with a beer bottle four times, and then smashed it over her head at Tequila Joe’s on July 15th.
But it gets worse.
Her assailant wasn’t much of a man in more ways than one. When he tried to hit her again, he lost his balance, and she pinned him to the floor. So when what has to be the world’s most worthless bounce staff arrived on the scene, they grabbed HER by the throat and threw her out of the bar.
The story is disgusting on several levels. He thought she was a man, so he used a slur against her (Not specified in the newspaper article, but I would imagine it’s one Ann Coulter likes) and told her to leave. So when she said that she was a woman and a lesbian, this douchebag hit her.
First, even if she was a man— So the hell what? Is Jackson, TN a place where hitting a man for being gay is acceptable?
Even beyond that, he knew she was a woman when he hit her. Again, is Jackson, TN the kind of place where such conduct is acceptable?
At this point, I have to stop and laugh at “the man” again. He sucker punched a woman, partially blinded her, and hit her in the head with a bottle so hard that she suffered brain damage. And she STILL managed to pin him to the floor! What a wuss.
She called the police that night, and they spent the night outside the door waiting for him to come out. The staff at Tequila Joe’s snuck her assailant out the back door so he wouldn’t be arrested.
I think it’s the duty of all decent Americans— Even if you disagree with me on whether or not gays deserve to be beaten, we should be able to all get on the same page about WOMEN being beaten— To register our disgust with Tequila Joe’s.
I’m not finding a website (If anyone knows of one, hit me with it and I’ll modify this post). But here is the bar’s MySpace page. I personally will log in for the first time in many months just to tell these troglodytes how disgusted I am by the conduct of their bar staff.
http://www.myspace.com/tequila_joes
Their phone number is 731-256-1017.
Special thanks to Newscoma for tipping me to this story.
No one needs to be “disciplined” and “abused” for being different from the norm.
This case is heartwrenching because of the comments on the story as well.
This is just fucking sick! I cannot believe that people act this way. It amazes me everyday how far backward some are.
I can’t even finish…I am just so disgusted.
It fucking pisses me off too, SM.
This is a perfect example of why hate crime laws are so important. It’s not about giving special treatment to certain groups; it’s about giving federal help to victims in hick-towns that won’t help. If the employees of the bar snuck the assailant out past the police, then that is obstruction of justice. The bar should be shut down until the attacker is identified by one of the numerous witnesses. In such a small town, somebody knew who he was.
[...] Issued In Assault Case In Jackson Aunt B., Rick Maynard and Josh Tinley all have written about a young woman who was assaulted in a Jackson bar on July [...]
She definitely was treated poorly, and the guy deserved to be pinned. However, I want to cover a few areas touched upon here (sorry this is way late)
1-Violence against women is deplorable but there are a ton of women who are violent against men, why does no one every talk about that?
2-Violence against a different skin color, religion, or sexual orientation is wrong.
3-When you around alcohol, stupidity is about to occur.
4-I saw she was from Halls, Tennessee. That is the rudest place on the planet. I lived there for years and if you waved to someone they would stare at you and not return a smile or wave in kind. I have never lived in another place that acted that way.
I live in a small town outside of Jackson TN, called Bolivar (which is in Hardeman county one of the 3 predominantly democratic counties in TN), & I am a gay man. The discrimination in Jackson is horrible, I would just not recommend that anyone ever visit there, & I would actually go as far as to say people should not pay their county taxes. It is ridiculous the amount of social injustice that America allows, especially in the south. I would like to organize a protest & a boycott of Tequila Joes even though this took place a while back I remember hearing about it. This type of behavior is unacceptable & I honestly think they should be shut down & sued for discrimination by the woman. & I think that if we had enough protesters & got a few big gay friendly/oriented organizations involved it would work. I hate this place & don’t plan on living here for much longer. But in my town (Bolivar) I’d be willing to say that 70-80% of the people are at least closeted bisexuals or maybe even gays. & I personally haven’t faced any discrimination by the people I have alot of friends & am well known. I’ve only had one teach (back when I was still in high school) who gave me some trouble but I quit going to public school during that year, so after that I’ve been okay. Bolivar is not a nice town & it’s very small & impoverished. But the level of lgbt discrimination is almost none as far as I know. Jackson Tennessee is just a horrible place & I wish there was something we all could do to change the way the social politics work there. I know alot of LGBT people & nearly all of them are just afraid of what would happen to them if they all came out. If everyone would just be honest & say “this is who I am” I think things would get better for us. Harvey Milk said (back in the 70’s keep in mind) that if 1 person comes out that (I’m not sure but I believe it was…) either 2 out of 3 or 3 out of 4 people will change their minds about how they feel about gay rights just by knowing someone who is a member of the lgbt community. We need to stand up for who we all really are & we shouldn’t be forced to hide our true identities for fear of, well anything. “I’d rather be hated for who I am than loved for who I am not.” Kurt Cobain stated. The bottom line is discrimination of any kind at all is wrong period. We need to be active & come out & show our faces & defend ourselves. This is no longer political, this is personal. I don’t enjoy living in a country that allows so many social injustices against people who have done them no wrong & pay their god damn bills taxes. Even most liberals (which is who I identify with mostly) aren’t liberal or progressive enough to get anything done. When you do something like activism or politics you need to be passionately involved & not just make it “your job” I am very politically active although I as of now have no desire to become a politician. But it’s the people who make the real change happen & not the government. We can’t just change the government & hope things will be fixed overnight, you have to influence the population & show them what is wrong with what they are doing & how it could be improved if they would have the strength of heart to help out. But down here in the south east I honestly think that the majority of the population consists of bible thumping, biggoted, uneducated, selfish, complete drooling morons who would be willing to go out of their way to kill or hurt anything that is different from them in any way at all. People are so closed minded. I’ve been told that I was going to hell by a pentecostal woman from Mississippi, not for ANYTHING ELSE that was wrong, but simply because I had worn shorts… If that gives you an idea of how stupid these people are. But not everyone down here are bad people.. There are very nice, hospitable people & there are open minded people. I have quite a few lgbt or atheist friends such as myself who are actively involved with change & being social & getting things done. & disrupting conservative events =) If there are any actual lgbt people that read this from the Memphis greater area or Jackson greater area you can contact me at myspace.com/andyf09 you can always use more friends. & it’s important that we stick together & be amongst peers. So we can fight back in greater numbers.