AIBU to be feeling so hurt and angry about these comments?

[TFletchersWife]

My local town has created a Facebook event to hold a candlelight vigil for those lost in the Orlando massacre.

A lday has come onto the group and made the following comments;

Please don't misunderstand me when I say this. As all my Gay friends know, I love you all, and stand with you by your side against homophobia! However, there are thousands of Christians being murdered for their faith all over the world. Targeted for their way of life, men, women and children murdered and slaughtered for what they believe on a daily basis. LGBT are not the only group of people being targeted! Who's standing with us? Who is changing the colour of their profile pages to show their support. It goes un posted, and it goes unshared

Some people have said her comments are cold and she should simply remove herself from the group, rather than argue on this LGBT page.

She has now said

I am as hurt by what has happened as all of you. And most of those involved were Christian. I am simply saying that this is a crime against Humanity. There is no need to single out one community

I am absolutely livid. I am also trying to think of a response that doesn't come across as angry as I am.

I don't know whether I am overreacting and should just keep my mouth shut or whether I should tell her to f*ck off.

Even had a little cry in the car this morning.

Why are some people so cold?

I appreciate her views but to come on to a facebook page specifically to remember these people is just goady

Keema massacres of large numbers of Christians in the Middle East, Africa and the Far East are almost everyday news.

Seriously, are you unaware that, for instance, 67 were killed in a park by the Taliban in PAkistan in March this year? That is just one single instance.

By the words and sentences she used?

Mind you - she is pushing her agenda as well. What a kook. It IS the internet though. Expecting everyone to behave is a hopeless endeavour.

I get her point but it's not the place for it. I do, however think that your feelings are your feelings and if you feel so upset that is fine, fifty young people lost their lives and it has been covered extensively by the media, it's unavoidable seeing the videos of their last moments and the impact on the families in their interviews, the media choose not to do this when massacres occur in far off places, removing us from it unless we choose to expose ourselves. It's not right, but because the exposure is so in your face, it is more upsetting, I can see the point the woman made but it's not right to hijack a page like that, for all she knows every member of the group may well be campaigning for Christian rights in middle eastern countries, you can still be against homophobia

She is not asking you to stop your vigil. She is not saying that what happened is OK.

She is asking people to have a vigil for another group too, a group that she feels has been ignored.

If it were me I might reply "If you start a page, I'll share it. I abhor all terrorism and oppression."

I think it's really off to deflect the focus like that.

She may be right that other atrocities aren't getting enough attention, but saying so in that forum is wrong.

A facebook vigil group in a 'local town' - so, everyone is distraught, but not distraught enough to go out and hold a vigil in person?

I think you are really overreacting here. To be so hurt and crying over someone else's opinion of which she does have a point? It's not a competition but you wanting to challenge her over it makes you sound competitive.

To answer your OP, yes YABU. To react with anger, disgust fury and tears to comments that are ill judged and badly timed rather than factually incorrect, is over the top. I agree with a pp that if you are reacting this way then you would be better to step away from FB for a while.

love over hate - and you should respond in kind, ignore her comments, YABU to swear at her or respond angrily, ignore. I'm sad for each and every atrocity I read about - she's U to be posting on your page about atrocities she feels are less covered but it's a common enough line of thought.

She is right, but probably shouldn't have said it on a fb site dedicated to the memory of the victims in Orlando. I often think other massacres ( such as 50 + people getting blown up by a car bomb in Bhagdad) get so little coverage on the news compared to atrocities in western countries.

I agree that she is right but her timing is awful.

I don't like the use of the word 'community' in these situations. LGBT people are my community. Yes there were sceptically targeted because they were LGBT. But the talk of 'their community' and 'our community' makes me feel like the gulf between can't ever be filled.

It feels like a type of 'othering'.

I grew up in Northern Ireland. What people would do to other not from their community will haunt me forever.

She's right in that other groups are targeted too but it's very callous to bring that up where people are being mourned. It's for a debating group or similar.

So she's unreasonable for mentioning it but not for having that opinion.

It was totally the wrong place to bring it up and very rude.

But she is right. It's estimated 80% of religiously motivated attacks were against Christians despite them only making up about 30% of the international population. The current persecution of Christians has been described as a 'genocide' and etho-religious cleansing is common. It's mainly not in the West but in Asia (ME in particular) and Africa. 11 Christians are killed every hour of every day for reasons related to their faith. It's not just ISIS, it's far more widespread than that.

It's mainly done by Islamic extremists but also Communist N Korea, hardline Hindus and Buddhists. And for Islam it's not limited to ISIS, it's in Pakistan, Kenya, Sudan, Nigeria, Somalia, most of the ME...I could go on. It's estimated 200 million people in 60 countries face some sort of repression or discrimination.

But it is largely ignored. These sort of causes tend to be taken up by the left wing, and at the moment Christians are not 'trendy' enough for them to take up the cause. Plus it is rather inconvenient to the left wing narrative of Muslims as universal victims and a supposed tolerant 'religion of peace' to acknowledge this is going on so they choose to bury it, ignore it, look the other way.

Some articles here, make depressing reading:

www.theguardian.com/world/2015/jul/27/dying-for-christianity-millions-at-risk-amid-rise-in-persecution-across-the-globe

www.independent.co.uk/voices/comment/christians-the-worlds-most-persecuted-people-9630774.html

www.spectator.co.uk/2013/10/the-war-on-christians/

"Theres nothing stopping her having a vigil page for Christians and women murdered by ISIS.
Gay people wouldnt go there and say 'but what about the gay people in Orlando'."

Really ? I think some would - many wouldn't. LGBT people are just like everyone else -all different.

Quickest way to get blocked on my FB is to post a rant saying that because you are disgusted at X happening then you obviously don't care about Z (which can be anything from fluffy kittens to kids with cancer). Reasons for blocking them 1 Caring for one issue doesn't mean you can't care about other issues so stop trying to cause a row and 2 Don't tell me what I think - dimwit.

But it wasn't a "crime against humanity" (whatever that is). It was a specific targeting of gay people because they were gay.

She's just trying to make it all about her.

Agree completely with VashtaNerada.

Of course it doesn't! It simply shows that you are showing support to the families that have lost someone.

Showing support? by turning your profile picture rainbow, don't make me laugh it is virtue signalling, the people that you are supporting have never even heard of you and won't see your support so it is basically just you saying to your friends what 'a decent sort' you are

I don't agree with how she's phrased it, it was an attack on the LGBT community.

But

I hate the selectivity of collective grieving these days. It seems there are some fashionable atricities that we all pat ourselves on the back for acknowledging, whilst ignoring others that are happening at the exact same time. Like the arguably ethnic cleansing going on in Sri Lanka (gov issuing flood warnings in a language that the people affected don't speak for example). That's just one example

All lives matter, love is love… while we ignore other lives… I dunno it doesn't sit right with me at all. That's not to say that I am not deeply saddened by Orlando, or that I don't understand the collective grief in the LGBT community right now.

The only answer or hope we have is to focus on love and tolerance for all, humanising all victims, not some.

It was a specific targeting of gay people because they were gay

Please can someone help me articlate my thoughts.
I understand the outrage from the LGBT people about the attack on their community but what about, for example the attack at the Bataclan. That was a targeted attack on a section of society as well.

I am, I think, a bit uncomfortable with it being highlighted as an attack on LGBT people, which it is when I see it as a bigger picture which is an attack on a lifestyle certain groups don't want to have. In otherwords it's an attack on lifestyle in general and lifestyle of Westerners. I also think that the reporting in some of the countries who are against IS but are also homophobic have almost sneered at the attack. Their media reported it as an attack on 'perverts' I think this is another reason why I don't like the attacks against each groups been highlighted as a particular community has been targeted rather than a attack on Westerners.
Please don't flame me I am just trying to make sense of the whole atrocity and I am not very good with words.
I also realise that there may or may not be an IS connection as there have been conflicting reports in the media.

It's absolutely not the place for it, whether or not she has a point. It's comparable - certainly in tactlessness and thoughtlessness - to coming on to a memorial page for a woman killed by her husband and saying 'yes but men are victims of domestic violence too'. Yes, they are, and if that worries you then start your own campaign, don't hijack someone else's. This was a targeted homophobic and racist (remember it was a Latin night that night) attack, just as the shooting in a black church in the US was a double-whammy of racism and - yes - anti-Christian hatred.

The LGBT community were targetted because they were LGBT, the attacker didn't attack because it was a western nightclub that happened to have gay people in it.

It's a LGBT tragedy, just like the paris attacks were a french tragedy and no fucker said "well I don't think he french should own it, the paris attacks belong to humanity and not the french" did they?

Allowing it to be owned by the LGBT community does not mean that the wider community cannot be saddened or worried about it in a wider sense

You might also remind her of all the hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of people who've been tortured and murdered over the centuries in the name of Christ

Can you or anyone explain to me what, if any, the relevance of this statement has today?

The Arabs enslaved millions of people from Africa - is that relevant today?

I do need to point out to a couple of bucketheads on here describing the Orlando victims as a 'fashionable white group' that most of them were actually not white.

And this particular attack was specifically targetted at LGBTQ people. All terrorism is a crime against humanity, and nearly all mass murders by bigots are cause by toxic masculinity. However, trying to claim that Dylann Roof, for instance, was motivated by hatred of Christians rather than (or more than) hatred of black people would be equally inaccurate.

Can you or anyone explain to me what, if any, the relevance of this statement has today?

Because it still happens, particularly in America! there are violent groups in America that do it "in the name of Christ"

Because it still happens, particularly in America! there are violent groups in America that do it "in the name of Christ"

Nope, the violent history of Christianity has little relevance to today and should not be used as a retort to "50 people killed in a club by a person driven by a hateful ideology"