RealityStudio.org

There is an in-depth article at Lawrence.com describing how James Grauerholz, heir and executor of the Burroughs Estate, was subject to a vicious gay-bashing in late 2005. Not only did he sustain serious injuries, he was then subject to a legal system whose apparent bias and homophobia caused it to turn a blind eye on the hate crime. As a result, Grauerholz has recently filed an official complaint with the Lawrence Police Department.

Since the 1970s Mr. Grauerholz has worked tirelessly on behalf of William Burroughs, his work, and his estate. Fans of Burroughs will certainly want to join RealityStudio in expressing support to Mr. Grauerholz in his efforts to recover from and redress this extremely unfortunate incident.

If you would like to leave a message of support, please add it to the forum here. Thank you.

I am so proud of James for coming forward with this. I am sure that he will suffer more because of his openness but his bravery might touch a few buttons that need to be touched. I wait for his book but i know that such a book should come from the heart and soul, not some deadline, especially not my deadline.

I think it's despicable how the police have treated this matter, I'm sure we all do. If the issue had been over his race rather than being queer, the Lawrence incident would be in the headlines: "Yeah, I kicked the coon to confetti cause he tried to lift my wallet..." or the old Naked Lunch routine about the blind black man they lit on fire for staring at a white girl, if the guy supposed that the girl was being raped by a black Grauerholz and the police didnt investigate AND find the white roller guilty*, CNN would have reported it ad nauseum.
I wish that the media were forced to cover this story, just to hear all the Nancy Grace and Bill O'Reilly queer bashing. But the media likes to keep its religious and political intolerance in the closet and just bury such matters under the rug. I wish Grauerholz the very best in justice and in the healing of his physical and emotional wounds over this whole incident.

*perhaps that's being too optomistic. There has been little to no coverage about those two cops a few months back who stormed into a black-wedding and shot the groom dead for no reason (was it in New Jersey?). In fact, what happened about that?

The picture above the article says it all. Why do I shake my head in disbelief? I don't want to dwell on what I know human beings are capable of doing to each other. I have witnessed this kind of thing before, in fact, when I was in high school in the greater Kansas City area. Stupid beyond understanding.
I still don't understand it; I don't get it. The reasons were never clear to me, what motivates such violence. Is it entirely due to ingrained social patterns or prejudices, or something deeper? Is it all about alcoholic insanity? Both, or something else? One can only speculate about the inner working of such behaviors. Another crime perpetrated by another "ugly spirit" lurking in a human being, ready to do damage, any where, any time, willing to use a trigger of alcohol, or anger, fear, or any momentary loss of awareness, to invade, occupy, and inflict suffering.
Best wishes to James Grauerholz, for strength and continued healing, and applause due to him for coming forward with this.

This is a terrible situation. People still think gays are witches!

Hopefully reason and truth prevail, though unfortunately those are concepts that America - the land of the free & home of the brave - seems to have flushed down the toilet.

I am reminded that hate and prejudice serves those in power, they use it, cultivate it, to insure peace as they know it. I am so proud that so many victims of abuse are turning from silent victims to avenging critics. If society does not speak out about the authorities failure to protect citizens from such cruel violence. It is a crime committed twice. One wonders about the criticism mounted against victims of physical abuse when informing the authorities about the crime. If one reports a robbery or theft, the first statement out of the cops mouth isn't usually one of personal remarks. No one gets by with saying i knocked over the grocery store because the clerk was from Idaho. They should not get by with saying, I beat someone because she was my wife, daughter, gay, etc. Society has listened to such crap for too long and too often.