Blueberries were splattered across the front entrance of Partners in Oklahoma City – Photo: KFOR.
The owners of a gay club in Oklahoma say their establishment has been targeted by acts of vandalism using food as a weapon on two separate occasions.
The first incident occurred last Tuesday, when staff at Partners, a gay bar in Oklahoma City, found a car in the parking lot that had been vandalized by having soup poured over it.
The following day, someone scattered blueberries on the walkway in front of the bar’s main entrance, with some of the berries creating a splatter pattern on the door and the doorframe.
“It was everywhere,” John McAffrey, the owner of Partners, told Oklahoma City-based NBC affiliate KFOR in an interview. “We first thought somebody got sick and then once we got closer, we realized that it was, it looks like blueberries.”
McAffrey said surveillance video caught the culprit in action, but he and his business partner don’t want to share the video until they speak with an attorney. He says the vandal was driving an early 2000s Chevy Silverado.
“They pull up, throw it out the window, slow down for probably like 10 seconds,” he said.
Soup was poured on a car in the parking lot of Partners, a gay bar in Oklahoma City – Photo: KFOR.
It remains unclear as to why the bar was targeted. McAffrey says it could be a form of protest related to COVID-19 restrictions and a local mandate that bars close at 11 p.m., but they have no evidence to confirm that suspicion just yet.
Partners has since placed a security guard in the parking lot to keep an eye out for trouble and prevent future incidents.
“It was completely childish,” McAffrey told KFOR. “There’s better ways to handle something if it is targeted at a certain individual but it’s not going to stop us for continuing and having somewhere safe for everyone in the community to come to.”
Thomas Niehaus has pleaded guilty in federal court to one count of malicious use of fire after setting Pride flags ablaze in several Cincinnati neighborhoods last summer.
The 52-year-old was arrested last July following an investigation into a series of arson fires targeting Pride flags attached to homes in Clifton, Clifton Heights, and Northside.
"These actions posed a serious risk to community safety in occupied residences," the Cincinnati Fire Department said in a news release. No injuries were reported.
A gay couple in Lairoux, France, say they’ve been targeted by a string of homophobic attacks, including death threats, anonymous letters, anti-gay graffiti, and vandalism at their home.
Referred to in news reports by the pseudonyms Alain and Hugo, the pair, who are teachers, live in a region dominated by the National Rally, France’s far-right populist party, which has historically opposed LGBTQ rights.
The couple told the independent French outlet Basta! that the harassment began in October 2024, when graffiti was scrawled on their front door reading, "No f**s in Vendée," referring to the region where Lairoux is located.
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