Box Turtle Bulletin
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News and commentary about the anti-gay lobbySeptember 30th, 2010
The reigning “Riverfest commodore” for a La Crosse, Wisconsin, annual festival reportedly shoved a 14-year-old girl who was carrying two rainbow flags just before a parade on Saturday.
According to the La Crosse Tribune, the girl was rollerblading and carring two gay pride flags as part of the Seven Rivers LGBT Resource Center’s float when the ugly encounter occurred:
Commodore Mark Schneider, who was on a float nearby, approached the girl and put his hands on the flagpole, [the LGBT center’s Executive Director Rosanne] St. Sauver said. St. Sauver walked over, placed her hands on the pole and told him, “Please stop, she’s a 14-year-old child.”
“He said, ‘I do not care. Look what you are teaching them,'” St. Sauver said.
That’s when, St. Sauver said, Schneider shoved the girl with his body.
St. Sauver said Schneider told the girl: “Go to a country where they will hang people like you.”
The incident left the teen crying, and others upset, St. Sauver said. This is the first year the center has participated in the parade.
Schneider denies shoving the teen or making offensive comments. Schneider claimed that his objections were to the alterations to one of the two flags. One of the flags’s design was based on the American flag with the red and white stripes substituted for rainbow stripes.
Schneider has been cited for disorderly conduct. He has since apologized for the confrontation. The Riverfest president, Mike Schieber, and the LGBT center president Kathryn Heitbrink have written a joint statement following a meeting yesterady evening:
Mark Schneider, Riverfest Commodore for 2010 offered his personal apology to Emily St. Sauver and others that might have been affected for events that happened that day. This apology was accepted with the understanding that both organizations will collaborate to promote La Crosse and the surrounding community as a safe place for all people, where all members of the community can be celebrated.”
With all the craziness we’ve seen over the past two weeks, it’s good to see at least one incident come to a satisfactory conclusion.
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Regan DuCasse
September 30th, 2010
Satisfactory conclusion? I don’t know.
It shouldn’t have happened in the first place.
I’d question the sincerity of the apology.
It came grudgingly only after there was a witness, a citation by authorities. Otherwise, I doubt anything would have happened except another upbraided kid.
A grown man physically bogarding a young girl? So tough are these homophobes. And what a LAME ASS excuse for his actions?
Really? You didn’t like how the American flag was reconfigured?
Seeing gay people truly sets off the worst in people doesn’t it?
Then gay people get blamed for the shameful responses that men like this have towards gay people and what represents them.
The anti gay are truly cowards at heart, aren’t they?
elaygee
September 30th, 2010
Someone should remind Marc Schneider that his ancestors come from a place where they murder people by the millions in gas chambers and killing fields.Maybe it is still part of his genetic makeup.
He sounded more sorry that he couldn’t have “people like her” killed here.
Emily K
September 30th, 2010
he claims he was upset because the flag was altered – that it disrespected veterans – but I doubt a 1969 Jasper Johns flag would have incited that kind of rage, nor the comment about hanging.
It’s because it was altered to be “gayer.” That’s what undoubtedly upset him. He also no doubt believes there are no gay veterans and that associating LGBT’s with a patriotic symbol is like calling America weak and limp-wristed.
This is only a hypothesis. But I strongly suspect these things.
Jason D
September 30th, 2010
This is not an apology:
“Mark Schneider, Riverfest Commodore for 2010 offered his personal apology to Emily St. Sauver and others that might have been affected for events that happened that day.”
This, however, would be:
Mark Schneider, Riverfest Commodore for 2010 offered his personal apology to Emily St. Sauver and others that have been affected by his actions that day.
I’m so sick of the non-commital apology that occurs far too often these days. Things like “I’m sorry you were offended” rather than “I”m sorry I offended you”. If you’re not accepting blame, you’re not apologizing, you’re sympathizing.
ebohlman
October 1st, 2010
Here in Illinois behavior like that could get you onto the sex offender registry.
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