An Alabama preacher and politician killed himself Friday two days after being outed for having a secret life he shared online as a “transgender curvy girl.”
There’s probably gonna be a lot of trolls in here, but I have to say this is incredibly sad. I do hope his sermons preached love and acceptance rather than the hate that caused him to take his life.
The guy supported the party that routinely shits on minority groups…but when they turn in him it’s sad? He fed the rapid dog that turned and bit him.
Yes, I find it sad when someone is driven to suicide. It’s weird, I know.
I feel that a man who dresses up as a woman in their free time did not decide for himself that gay/trans people are evil. This man probably had been lying to himself and others about who he was for decades, living through self-hate and trying to convince himself that he was “normal” and not “one of those fags” and the like.
Now that he’s accepted himself and thought that he was safe to express who he was in private online communities (obviously stupid for someone in his position), his whole world is coming down on him. Now everyone knows he’s “one of them”.
I don’t know enough about the guy to comment with certainty on what harm he may have caused as mayor, if he actively made life harder for gay/ trans people then that’s really shitty of him. All I’m saying is, things don’t happen in a vacuum, and this guy is just as much a victim of hate and bigotry as anyone else who’s killed themselves over it.
He supported a party of hate and bigotry but let’s all feel bad when that same hate and bigotry are directed at him.
It’s amazing how many of you are only capable of seeing the world in black and white.
This isn’t a a gotcha: Are you gay or trans? Have you lived in a deeply red, effectively theocratic area of the American south or west?
No, and no
It’s easy for me to judge living in anonymity in a progressive city with a supporting network around me (I’m trans).
More likely she was raised conservative, built a career and family around it, in a small southern town where maintaining that facade is the only way to be accepted, then realized “oh shit I’m trans” and panicked.
At that point, I can totally understand how difficult it would be to escape decades of baggage. Many trans ppl are reluctant to come out for precisely those reasons: career, family, lack of acceptance. The result is turmoil.
I view her more as a lost trans sibling who was born into a cruel world and should be mourned, while not excusing her poor choices of political affiliation. I’m sure it was a daily struggle trying to reconcile what conservatives were saying about people like her, with her own identity.
Not everyone is strong enough to fight this fight.
She supported a party that hates trans people. Nobody could have seen this coming. 🙄
Seriously. He wouldn’t have killed himself if he was surrounded by accepting people.
It’s still tragic that someone felt they couldn’t be themself, but when you spend your time empowering intolerance and then find yourself a target of that intolerance? I have no tears to spare.
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She could’ve had the life she deserved, she could’ve still been the preacher, the politician, the parent, the anything. But for shame and fear, we have this. This is what all that “doing it for attention”, “pronouns suck” and “groomer pedo” talk amounts too. People so scared to live that we have a dead body instead.
I hope she is at peace.
Unfortunately the “shame” surrounding these things stem from the concept of sin and living as a “sinner” in a “fallen world”. I’ve been shamed countless times because of things the church did not agree with. I don’t know if he ever preached any transphobic ideas in his time, but biblical ideologies are rife with gender roles and toxic ideas about women and masculinity. Even if he didn’t preach any of that toxic garbage, he must have been struggling a lot with his own identity, even though he said it’s only for fun and stress relief (paraphrasing). Small towns don’t act gracefully towards people experimenting with their sexualities like this. Can only imagine the rejection he must have experienced having all of this play off on the grand stage of his life in that little town, since literally everyone there knew him.
Wow, you took the words right out of my mouth. This is just tragic in every way.
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4 day old account that has done pretty much nothing but post anti-trans bullshit.
Bro get a fucking a life you terminally online loser.
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And apparently what you find interesting is Conservative propaganda on trans people.
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Lmao, do you actually belive anything you’ve said on this app is a “debate” rather than you being an obvious right wing troll? Dude, get off lemmy and go the fuck outside for once, you terminally online redditor.
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He wasn’t trans; he was a crossdresser.
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He emphatically stated that he does not feel like a woman and has not undertaken a medical transition. However, he has offered his Instagram handle as a method for people to reach out to him, which he claimed was a means to “make friends.”
“Just my wife knows about it,” Copeland said. “It’s a hobby I do to relieve stress. I have a lot of stress, and I’m not medically transitioning. It’s just a bit of a character I’m playing. … I don’t go out and seek solicitation or anything like that.”
That was stated to the people who outed him.
Quotes from a right wing expose on him that asked him questions? okay and?
Of course he’s going to say that to a news site for right wing people.
Yeah, they were probably fucking panicking.
The username was “transgender curvy girl”, I think that speaks volumes for how she wanted to be seen. I would love to ask her how she identified, but since she is gone and all we know is “girl” and “trans” in the space she felt safe, then we should absolutely be following her cue.
He emphatically stated that he does not feel like a woman and has not undertaken a medical transition. However, he has offered his Instagram handle as a method for people to reach out to him, which he claimed was a means to “make friends.”
“Just my wife knows about it,” Copeland said. “It’s a hobby I do to relieve stress. I have a lot of stress, and I’m not medically transitioning. It’s just a bit of a character I’m playing. … I don’t go out and seek solicitation or anything like that.”
Quotes from a right wing expose on him that asked him questions? okay and?
Of course he’s going to say that to a news site for right wing people.
So, I have a question. From the Daily Beast article:
Lee County Sheriff Jay Jones said that deputies who tried to pull Copeland over for a welfare check witnessed Copeland step out of his car and shoot himself.
Why are we taking the word of the cops for what happened? We know the right-wingers don’t distinguish between cross-dressers and pedophiles. We know that some of them find great satisfaction in abusing, torturing and even killing those that they consider “other”. And we know that cops cover for other cops.
Yes, it’s entirely possible and plausible that this guy killed himself, but why are we just blindly accepting the cops’ version of events here?
This is the NY Post. It’s a Murdoch-owned, rage-bait rag. It’s going to be slanted, if not completely exaggerated.
I would hope there is dashcam footage to corroborate their report.
Good point, what kind of wellness check involves a roadside stop?
It seems quite possible that the police pulled him over to harass him.
Every cop had body/ dash cams, I doubt there’s anything conspiratorial in the mix.
Oh, sure. Nothing ever happens like that with cops. They never turn their cameras off or lie.
That doesn’t really count for anything unless people other than cops look at the footage. Not that I’m saying it should be made publicly available but somebody independent should see it.
If it turns out there’s no body cam footage that’s a problem too but again unless someone outside the police force can see that there’s no body cam footage the lack of footage isn’t ever going to be made public knowledge.
The police have body cam footage to make sure they’re doing their actual jobs and not something else, for the bloody useless if they turn them off or no one ever reviews the footage. They are not primarily there for the police’s benefit they’re there for ours.
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This is a god damn shame. This poor person probably could have had a much happier life if only they knew how. Knew how to escape the life that everyone else expected of them.
Instead it sounds like this poor soul spent their entire life supporting the very cause of their suffering. A lot of people would be happy to point out the irony in the double life he led. But, it’s hard to walk away from a life that’s all you’ve ever known.
We should all be like MuhammadJesusGaySex.
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This is really sad. People deserve to be who they are.
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This is the same website that initially outed them. Unless you can provide a less shady source, I’m not inclined to believe them.
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You are absolutely right…except the article even states that Brittni described herself as a transgender woman. So it seems appropriate for us to take Brittni’s word on that.
Sad story
Sad life, that he had to hide it, if he wanted to be out
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Just let people live their lives ffs
What’s really sad is this guy could’ve had a great support group among progressives.
Instead, he let the fear of retribution from his current peers dictate his decisions.
Copeland told 1819 News, which published the report on his 62nd birthday, that his online alter ego was a harmless “hobby” that did not go beyond his home.
“The only moral crossdressing is my crossdressing”
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So the guy wanted power so badly he supported the GOP…but when they turned on him it was suddenly very sad. LOL. Sure.
Some ppl think that just being LGBTQ means you’re really a good person inside. He was perfectly fine to shit on other people but once it came to facing his own scrutiny he took the cowards way out.
