Mostly I feel ashamed because it continues. I'm outraged and deeply hurt by his murder. It seems to require a specific kind of martyr to bring the killing to light. Lawrence King was too young to be offered as a martyr, and that's what's so terribly sad.

It's hard for me to fathom it.

Bigots continue to try to oppress LGBT people in this country through violence and execution. I read a figure recently that said that about one person a week is murdered for being gay. (the number I believe was 50? last year) These are the ones we know about and the ones who actually died as a result of a bashing.

What kind of reaction would there be for 50 lynchings of African Americans a year? Black lynchings have been called a holocaust. (www.yale.edu) It's been almost 100 years since 50 lynchings per annum has occurred. Were people finally outraged by it because it was a quasi-vigilante with a rope slung over a tree rather than an aluminum baseball bat and random attack?

Today it seems insane that someone would murder a black man for kissing a white woman, but what black mother didn't warn her son against it 100 years ago?

You can teach kids to stand up to bullies, by all accounts Lawrence did just that. But you can't teach anyone but Superman to stand up to a bullet. My heart goes out because a sweet and vibrant gay boy was killed. In hind sight many of us would have done anything to keep him in the house that day, or stopped his attacker. That's silly. It's ridiculous to think that way. But I do.

So, we look for blame. Hopefully things will improve. Maybe we ask for a spokesperson, a voice of reason and an advocate of change. Well, I doubt Lawrence's parents are fit to speak for him. That leaves the rest of us.

I think I finally understand why people all over the world pray to various martyrs. To beg forgiveness.