The massacre in Orlando (Florida) on the night of Saturday June 11 to Sunday June 12 is the deadliest in the history of the United States. At least 49 people died (plus the shooter himself) and 53 others were injured at Pulse, an LGBTQ (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer) nightclub, according to an unfinished toll. The alleged shooter, Omar Mateen, pledged allegiance to the Islamic State organization.
The main thing to remember
- A heavily armed man opened fire at Pulse, an Orlando gay nightclub;
- The FBI confirmed that it was Omar Mateen, a 29-year-old US citizen, born to Afghan parents;
- He took several people hostage before being shot down by special forces;
- 49 people died, 53 were injured;
- The Islamic State organization claimed responsibility for the attack.
Mass shooting, terrorist attack, homophobic crime… What words should I use to describe this drama? While Americans pay tribute to the missing, for the LGBTQ community, the recognition of the victims also depends on the choice of words.
Mass attack or shootout?
Here are the definitions of the different terms used to refer to the Orlando massacre:
Shooting. According to the definitions, the shots must be reciprocal or not. In practice, there is widespread use in the media regarding murders perpetrated by an active shooter without an exchange of fire. In addition, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) speaks of mass killings from four victims. We can therefore speak of a “mass shooting” in the case of Orlando, given the seriousness of the toll.
Attack. Le Larousse defines it as a “Attack on the fundamental interests of the nation”. We find the same notion in Robert, who sees in it a “Criminal attempt once morest a person” Where “Against something” (a politician, freedom, state security…).
The attack would therefore go beyond the simple notion of murder or criminal act and would rather be characterized by its symbolic significance, even beyond the facts. Which opens the door to interpretations. US President Barack Obama helped give this symbolic dimension to the Orlando massacre by evoking “An act of terror and hatred” Sunday June 12. Regarding Orlando, we can therefore speak of both shooting and attack, knowing that the two expressions evoke two different aspects of the drama (the massacre by arms for the first, the horror and its symbolic repercussions for the second).
Terrorism or homophobic crime?
Homophobia. For the Larousse, it is “Systematic hostility towards homosexuals”, which can be extended to the entire LGBTQ community. In France, homophobia is also a legal notion: article 132-77 of the penal code provides that committing an offense by reason of “The sexual orientation of the victim” is an aggravating circumstance to several crimes or misdemeanors.
Is the killing a homophobic crime? Besides the fact that it was hard to ignore that the Pulse was a hotspot for Orlando’s gay community, statements to NBC News of Seddique Matteen, the father of the suspected terrorist, Omar Mateen, support this hypothesis. According to him, his son was angry when he saw two men kissing in Miami two months before the tragedy.
Terrorism. At what point can we qualify a killer as a “terrorist”? The question is debated depending on the situation and the country. In France, the Penal Code defines as acts of terrorism those offenses that are “Intentionally in relation to an individual or collective enterprise aimed at seriously disturbing public order by intimidation or terror. ” The American Patriot Act also sees it as a “Activity intended to intimidate or coerce civilian populations, influence government policy through intimidation or coercion ”.
At least three conceptions are opposed to define the terrorist act:
- we cannot distinguish mass killing and terrorism, which therefore automatically makes a murderous shootout like the one in Orlando an act of terrorism;
- it is the motivations of the culprit that are taken into account, an “imbalance” not being able in particular to be considered as “terrorist”;
- it is the claim or not of the facts by a terrorist group that prevails.
In the case of Orlando, the debate is therefore whether the claim of the attack by Daesh is enough to speak of “terrorism”, or whether to wait for the progress of the investigation into the profile of Omar Mateen and his motivations for speaking out. American justice will also have a say in qualifying the facts from a legal standpoint.
A terrorist and homophobic act?
The difference in meaning between the words “racist and / or homophobic crime” and “terrorist act” has a particular meaning for minorities. This was already the case in Charleston, South Carolina, in June 2015, when white supremacist Dylan Roof opened fire at a church frequented by African Americans. If he was finally indicted for “racist crime” by federal justice (which requires the death penalty once morest him), the question arose of qualifying the attack as a “terrorist” act. President Barack Obama, on the contrary, underlined the political dimension of this slaughter, which recalled “The darkest hours in history”.
In this case, the Orlando massacre can be viewed as both a terrorist act and a homophobic crime. It remains to be seen which of these two qualifications will be highlighted.
For the LGBTQ community, the challenge is to qualify the event as an anti-gay attack, and therefore to include it in the long list of attacks once morest gay nightclubs since the 1970s:
- in 1973, in New Orleans, the UpStairs Lounge was burnt down, killing 32 people in less than twenty minutes;
- in 1996, Eric Robert Rudolph, the “Olympic Park Bomber”, bombed the Otherside Lounge, a lesbian nightclub in Atlanta;
- in 2000, Ronald Gay opened fire on the Backstreet Cafe in Roanoke, Virginia, killing one and injuring six;
- in 2013, Musab Mohammed Masmari set fire to Neighbors, a Seattle nightclub, on New Year’s Eve. He explained that he thought that gays “Were to be exterminated”.
These attacks on party venues add to the long list of individualized homophobic assaults and murders.
Already voices are rising for protest once morest the media treatment of the attack at the Pulse, more often described as a terrorist crime than a “hate crime” (“hate crime” in French, implied “homophobic”).
Nicolas Martin’s press review broadcast this morning on France Culture, speaks “Invisibilization” in the French press, because this information is relegated to the background, according to him. “There isn’t a big title that includes this information, which is not incidental. This disco, this club… it’s a gay club. “
