After a trip to the shops accompanied by older brother Warren (23), eight year-old Marley was approached by members of the Dynamic Christian International (DCI) in Balbriggan, says mother Sarah Morgan, who was left speechless when her young son brought home a homophobic pamphlet filled with hate speech.
Entitled Doom Town, the pamphlet was written and illustrated by American cartoonist Jack Chick, known for his Christian evangelical fundamentalist works. It featured contemporary references to Sodom and Gomorrah framed as a “compassionate plea to repent of homosexuality”.
“The ONLY way to escape the sin of homosexuality is through Jesus Christ. Please trust him as your saviour,” it read.
Equating gay men with “lust-filled mobs” of sexual predators and paedophiles, and blood donations from them with “blood terrorism”, Doom Town explicitly degrades same-sex relationships through offensive language.
“The blood drained from my head that my eight year-old son was subjected to that language,” Sarah Morgan told Dublin Gazette. After reading the comic, Sarah rang the local Garda station before running down to the DCI stall in utter shock.
“They [DCI] tried to tell me it was all about love, but it is inciting hate,” she asserted, continuing that “the fact there was an ice cream van there means they were enticing children. It’s absolutely disgusting.”
However, a spokesperson for the Dynamic Christian International, a church group that meets weekly in Balbriggan and elsewhere across Dublin, stated that the homophobic comic was not intended for minors and was handed to Marley by accident. “This comic is all about faith. It is the word of God,” he added.
Other leaflets handed out by the DCI depicted beheadings and other explicit material inappropriate for young readers. After Sarah Morgan’s complaint to the Gardaí, the gathering was apparently moved to another location, though the Gardaí refused to comment on any “named individuals or organisations.”
This kind of extreme homophobic hate has absolutely no place in Ireland and it is especially disturbing that a child was targeted in this way
Enacting effective Hate Crime & Hate Speech legislation is a priority for us.
https://t.co/QhKG1kdMPT @gcnmag @hhrgatUL @dublingazette
— NXF (@nxfie) August 1, 2019
© 2019 GCN (Gay Community News). All rights reserved.
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