As communities across Colorado are shaken and in mourning following the weekend shooting at Club Q, an LGBTQ nightclub in Colorado Springs, officials and residents are pointing out the attack followed an election season marked by a rise in anti-LGBTQ messaging.
During this year’s midterm elections, Republican candidates and elected officials across the country, and right here in Colorado, embraced and promoted messaging targeting queer people. Hundreds of anti-LGBTQ bills have been introduced in state legislatures just this year, and hate crimes targeting LGBTQ people are on the rise. The Federal Bureau of Investigation reports one in five hate crimes in the US are now motivated by anti-LGBTQ bias.
In Colorado, Representative Lauren Boebert has been perhaps the most prominent voice in the state spreading misinformation about queer people. Boebert has repeatedly made false claims about the LGBTQ community, including rhetoric that the LGBTQ community is “grooming” children. Boebert won reelection in the Western-slope based Third Congressional District in an unexpectedly tough race.
“To say the things that are just untrue for political purposes, when there's real ramifications and lives that are affected by that, they're just fueling the fire,” says State Representative Brianna Titone, Colorado’s first openly-transgender lawmaker.
Titone says that doesn’t mean all ramifications are as severe as a mass shooting. Sometimes they can lead to bullying, discrimination, or...
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