Frank Ocean writes emotional response to the Orlando shooting on Tumblr
As the world continues to grapple with the aftermath of the Pulse nightclub shooting in Orlando, Florida, on June 12, Frank Ocean took to Tumblr to express his own thoughts on the matter -- and then some.
Ocean started off his post with reactions to troubling news about the torture and killing of gay men abroad, tying it to anti-LGBT sentiments from religious leaders at home.
"I read in the paper that my brothers are being thrown from rooftops blindfolded with their hands tied behind their backs for violating sharia law. I heard the crowds stone these fallen men if they move after they hit the ground. I heard it's in the name of God," the post read. "I heard my pastor speak for God too, quoting scripture from his book. Words like abomination popped off my skin like hot grease as he went on to describe a lake of fire that God wanted me in."
Moving along that thread, he quickly tied in the Pulse nightclub shooting and Omar Mateen's suspected issues with internalized homophobia. "I heard on the news that the aftermath of a hate crime left piles of bodies on a dance floor this month. I heard the gunman feigned dead among all the people he killed," Ocean wrote. "I heard the news say he was one of us."
Ocean went on to chronicle his own experiences of his father's intolerance and the hurt that way of thinking can cause and how it connects for the struggle for LGBT rights.
"Many hate us and wish we didn't exist. Many are annoyed by our wanting to be married like everyone else or use the correct restroom like everyone else. Many don't see anything wrong with passing down the same old values that send thousands of kids into suicidal depression each year," he wrote. "So we say pride and we express love for who and what we are. Because who else will in earnest?"