Police are investigating the vandalism of a New York City church’s sign that conveyed anti-gay messages as a hate crime, the New York Daily News reported Monday.
Surveillance video captured a suspect spray-painting “God is Gay” on both sides of the ATLAH World Missionary Church in Harlem’s sign early Saturday, according to the Daily News. The suspect also removed letters from the sign, which read “Harlem Is a Homo Free Zone,” “Jesus Would Stone Homos” and “Obama Has Released The Homo Demons on the Black Man.”
James David Manning, the church’s pastor who has previously accused Obama of destroying the black family, told the Daily News on Sunday that “Gay people are just outright bullies” and that he “expected them to act in a very violent way.”
Carmen Neely, the president of a support group for gays and lesbians called Harlem Pride, felt otherwise.
Regardless of the shock value of the church’s message, Donna Lieberman, chief of the New York Civil Liberties Union, has told the newspaper that it is still protected by the First Amendment.
h/t Slate
