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Our video of 7/9/06 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LyOuNkX3umg
This is the link to our video of the protest, pass it on.
Here is one link to the KCRA news coverage:
http://www.kcra.com/video/9490790/index.html?taf=sac
On July 9th 2006, a group of a dozen individuals gathered together and protested peacefully outside of a local Church known as the Bethany Slavic Missionary Church, Christian Education Center on Highway 16 East of Bradshaw. This Church was the source of many (but not all) of the protesters that hit a School board meeting before the day of silence, Gay Pride on June 10th in Sacramento, and then protested at the Capital against pro-gay legislation on the 12th.
KCRA (NBC) and a local Russian language cable station came out to cover the demonstration. The Russian news team was not unbiased as you would expect reporters to be. Upon approaching us, it was obvious of their views by the thumbs down sign he gave to our group and his antagonistic nature of interviewing. The KCRA team was extremely courteous to all people involved interviewing both sides in a respectful and professional way.
Our message was “Religious traditions do not justify oppression.” We spent some time in the morning talking and getting ready and arrived at the church just as services were ending. After talking with people from the church, a few seemed to understand and slightly sympathize. A representative from the church also told us not everyone attended the protest or share the same views. He told us it is shameful for people to take their children to such demonstrations, however most of the people at the anti-homosexual protest on June 10th had children with them, some actually in strollers. Despite the sympathy of a few good church-goers, the majority of our interactions resulted in receiving slurs of hatred that actually went as far as to make death threats. A few of the threats and slurs are documented in the video. Toward the end of the demonstration, a number of young men actually blocked traffic at the gate of the church, creating a traffic snarl and a great deal of stress for the church members trying to enter into the parking lot. We are not sure why they took this action as we were on the outside and never entered onto church property. We speculate that they may have been trying to make it look like we caused the jam for the russian news cameras to make us look bad in their news broadcast.
I would personally like to thank everyone involved in the demonstration for keeping calm and representing our community well. I congratulate you. I would also like to extend thanks to the number of church members that demonstrated a tolerance when interacting with us. A few people actually reminded me of what I believe godly people are supposed to be like. It was sad that a number of people from the church spewed language of hate and intolerance. I also than the members of the media for attending the event and giving the situation between our communities the respect it deserves.
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