Who’s gonna run this town?

On January 25, worshippers at the University Christian Church in Hillcrest discovered that the night previous, someone had spattered paint on the Black Lives Matter sign adorning their building, as well as two of the rainbow-colored doors that normally stand at the church entrance to indicate the church’s open and affirming stance toward the LGBTQ community. (The other doors vanished, and have yet to be located.) Mayor Todd Gloria was quick to tweet about the matter, writing, “This is more than vandalism. This is hate.” The San Diego Police Department later announced that it was investigating the incident as a hate crime.

But according to Hillcrest resident Bill Bearbait, there is hate and then there is justice. “I didn’t do the painting, but I get why it was done,” says Bearbait. “In 2008, California’s Black population voted 70-30 in favor of Proposition 8, the ballot initiative that amended the California constitution to define marriage as between one man and one woman. A community that had been through so many hardships in its struggle for civil rights turned around and shut the door on a community that was undergoing the same struggle. And we’re just supposed to forget that and get all excited for them now that they’re struggling again? We’re supposed to put up banners honoring the community that gave us the hateful repetition of No Homo in their music? I don’t think so. The enemy of my enemy is definitely not always my friend.”