A gay couple in the UK is trying to recover following a brutal beating outside a gay club that left both with serious injuries.
Dan Wilson and Rob Morris suffered violence at the hands of five men outside the nightclub Colors in Basildon, England in the early morning hours of October 10. The two had spent the evening out partying, and Rob had dressed in drag for the occasion.
As the two walked home toward their flat, the gang approached them shouting homophobic slurs.
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“It was terrifying, we didn’t know if they had any weapons,” Dan told the UK outlet Echo News. “Rob had been dressed in drag at the time. We knew straight away they were coming straight for us.”
The men began attacking Wilson & Morris, punching and kicking them to the ground, then stomping on them. Both men suffered serious injuries.
“We’re covered in cuts and bruises, and I’ve got cracked ribs,” Wilson said. “Rob came off worse, we had a heads stamped on by them. It was horrible. We’re so grateful for the couple who stepped in to help. They prevented it getting any worse. This kind of thing just shouldn’t be happening. Basildon is meant to be promoting the LGBT community.”
Wilson also added that both he and Rob “thought they were going to die.” Both men received treatment at a nearby hospital, and were discharged later that day.
Following the attack, the couple called for police assistance, but no officers came. Law enforcement did not open an investigation until the following day.
In a statement, local police defended their response (or lack thereof), and offered an official update to the case.
“We are investigating after a man was assaulted in Southernhay, Basildon in the early hours of Sunday 10 October,” the official statement read. “The victim sustained a number of injuries after being attacked by a group of five people who also shouted homophobic abuse at him. An officer has been allocated to the investigation. He has been in contact with the victim and our inquiries are ongoing.”
“We know how distressing these incidents are and we try to respond to as many calls as possible with officers attending as many incidents as possible,” the statement continued. “However, a number of factors could impact on our ability to respond including the number of incidents taking place within the district, or within the county, that require a high-level resource. There may also be a large number of emergency calls that officers are attending. At the time this incident was called into us, all our available officers were deployed elsewhere.”
Invader7
Carry a weapon. !!!!
Chrisk
Very prudent advice. Dressing in drag might as well of painted a target on his back for every homophobic thug out there. I’m surprised neither one of them had a weapon.
biagra2022
I disagree……………….. only viable solution that will not get your prosecuted is to learn Martial arts Primarily
Standup: Any of these Muay Thai, Kickboxing, Karate
Ground: Any Japanese Jiu Jitsu ro Brazilian Jiu Jitsu.
Kangol2
Even in a liberal European country like the UK, homophobia and anti-gay/anti-trans attitudes and violence against LGBTQ people exist. Attacks like this are still happening. I hope the authorities catch the assailants, and I also hope Britain makes the penalties for homophobia and transphobia and anti-LGBTG violence as severe as possible.
biagra2022
Who told you uk was a liberal country??? These attacks happen weekly here
tallskin4
“Even in a liberal European country like the UK, homophobia and anti-gay/anti-trans attitudes and violence against LGBTQ people exist.”
Attacks on trans are VERY RARE in the UK, but attacks on gays and lesbians are much more frequent. It is much safer to be trans, despite the constant trumpeting about “trans being the most vulnerable group in society”, than to be gay/lesbian.- in absolute and in percentage terms. The murder and assault rates on trans are BELOW the percentage rates for any other group.
It would be nice if trans and their fans could stop lying about this, please.
Dread Blimfimby
I’m appalled by this attack and equally appalled by the response or lack of from the police. I really hope the victims get justice and make a speedy and full recovery.
I’m sorry this is still happening in the 21st century.
barryaksarben
Hey, Dave Chappelle, how many poc were attacked outside clubs in Britian that night? Ill bet none
Kangol2
It’s not either/or, it’s both/and. Hate is hate! Don’t feed into it.
Mr. Stadnick
What a horrid comparison. Shameful.
SDWalker96
to be fair, this is the comparison Chapelle is making in his latest special, it’s not barryaksarben’s
biagra2022
Stop your American POC nonsense this is the Uk we say the races here!
Celtic
We really must come up with a term other than “homophobic”. It is not fear of gay. It is HATE of gay. And, take notice how these anti-gay vigilantes always travel in packs.
Kangol2
The hate often accompanies fear and vice versa. Psychologically people who hate often fear what they hate and also desire it too, which increases their hatred.
Max
there really needs to be very severe punishment for this and all other kinds of hate crimes.
there is zero respect toward another human being by these terrible aggressors. when is it okay to exact this kind of treatment to people that simply exist?
Hank31
Another story about putative men who are incapable of even attempting to defend themselves. This is something like the 7th
or 8th story like this in just the last few months.
And it’s not always 5 vs. 2. Sometimes, the attackers are equal in number to the victims, and indeed, sometimes only a single attacker takes on multiple victims. The numbers don’t really matter in these incidents because the victims never defend themselves. If it were 1 attacker vs. 15 “men” of this ilk, the result would be the same. They lack the fighting skills and psyche. To put it more honestly, they lack the manhood to fight.
Chrisk
5 against 2 and they don’t look to be the fighting type. I’m not sure what you expect.
However usually I would agree with that. Almost every story has gay men not fighting back. It’s kind of pathetic. I just can’t imagine not fighting back or running away from some asshole thug. There are worse things to suffer than a bruised face.
Kevan1
@ Hank31 let us know how it goes when a gang off as-holes beat your as- in. Then I would be more interested in your opinion.
wikidBSTN
Manhood? Or maybe we just tend not to be animalistic. According to you, Gandhi and MLK also lacked “manhood”.
Hank31
@wikidBSTN It is not “animalistic” to defend yourself or your loved ones from violent attacks. These fem cowards don’t defend themselves or their friends – or even their own spouses — not because they have some sort of noble philosophical objection to violence like MLK, but because they are timid and weak and scared. They lack courage and manhood.
MLK and Gandhi opposed violence to achieve political ends, not to defend oneself or loved ones from physical danger. I very much doubt that MLK would have stood around passively and watched as Coretta Scott King got beaten up by thugs, which is essentially what happened in another of these recent stories. In that story, from July or August, 2 fem cowards who were married to each other, were attacked by 2 guys. The numbers were even, 2 vs. 2. Both fems let themselves be used as punching bags and neither one assisted his spouse. It finally ended when passers by — actual men — intervened and saved the fake men. Shameful.
tallskin4
This really goes to illustrate the need for action against Homophobia in the UK, and is contrary to the hysterical shrieking hyperbole by trans activists that trans ‘women’ suffer the most murders of the LGBTQ++ alphabet soup.
It shows the need for us gays and lesbians having an organisation dedicated to fight against homophobia
So far, just from my memory, we’ve had 3 gay men murdered in a Reading park last year, some gay lads seriously beaten up in Birmingham just last month. A couple of lesbians were beaten up on a bus by youths Now this attack.
Not one trans ‘woman’ has been murdered in the Uk for the past 3 years. Note that the UK is not a European anomaly – in Germany there hasn’t been a murder of a trans person since 2008, while 26 countries in Europe have reported no murders of trans people for the entire period.
In other words if you’re trans in Europe the chances of you being murdered are well below the murder rate FOR ANY OTHER GROUP. Whereas, as we see, if you’re gay or lesbian you stand a much greater chance of being murdered.
BoredReader
Would the Americans please stop assuming.
I lived in the UK (London) and worked in Essex ( I refused to live there ) for 30 years.
Basildon is in Essex, you are now comparing rural Alabama to San Fransisco . Basildon has a rough reputation in a rough county, its a place to go to have a fight after closing time. In central London the cops would have responded. whereas Essex police have a reputation for not responding to gay deaths ( google Stephen Port Grinder Killer ) , 30 years and living through brexit showed me England is 2 counties : Liberal dynamic inclusive London, and racist, imperialist, backward looking “little england”, where even an accent makes you a lower form of life then there bone idle english selves.
in Hollywood terms , London is as it looks in “Notting hill” whereas “layer cake” is a true story, the murder in the country lane happened on the main road into basildon a mile or so from Stephen Port’s first known Murder
For your information , its an hours drive -traffic, 90% down one road, from Basildon to Soho, or one hour by public transport , one of the largest (safest) gayest gay villages in the world.