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A SOCCER CLUB in Orlando has dedicated a section of its new stadium to 49 people shot dead in a mass shooting at a gay nightclub in the city last year.
Orlando City, a club in the Major League Soccer (MLS) league, unveiled the seats, which have been painted in rainbow colours to commemorate the atrocity.
On 12 June 2016, a gunman opened fire inside Pulse, a gay nightclub in Orlando, killing 49 people and wounding 53 in the deadliest mass shooting in modern US history.
Armed with an assault rifle and a pistol, shooter Omar Mateen, a 29-year-old American of Afghan descent, held police at bay for three hours until they stormed the building, killing him.
Phil Rawlins, the club’s founder and life-president, thanked staff and construction workers. He told the Orlando City SC website:
We are here to commemorate and unveil the 49 rainbow-colored seats that will sit permanently in section 12 of our stadium as a constant reminder of the senseless acts of 12 June.
“These are regular season-ticket holder seats. We put them in section 12 because obviously we felt that was pertinent,” he added.
It was 12 June last year when the tragedy happened.
They [the seats] are right down by the benches and will certainly be seen by everyone in the stadium.
In a statement on the MLS soccer website, the club said the rainbow colours symbolised the club’s mission to be an “inclusive, diverse and welcoming community”.
Homophobic
US authorities say Mateen claimed to be an “Islamic soldier” who had pledged allegiance to Islamic State. The extremist group later identified him as one of its militants.
The rainbow-coloured seats, which will act as a permanent reminder of the homophobic atrocity, will play host to fans when Orlando City host New York City FC on 5 March for the opening of the new season.
The Orlando City club may be best known in Europe as the new current club of Kaka. Now 34, the former Brazil and Real Madrid footballer who won the UEFA Champions League with AC Milan in 2007.
In June, Orlando City’s MLS game against San Jose Earthquakes was temporarily halted in the 49th minute as the whole stadium rose in unison to remember those who so tragically lost their lives.
It was the city’s first sporting event following the mass shooting.
Both teams wore purple t-shirts with #OrlandoUnited onto the pitch while also wearing rainbow and black wristbands.
With reporting from AFP.
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A lovely tribute. I’m sure the surviving victims and the families of the deceased will appreciate the sentiment of this memorial.
No tasteless joke for this article? Ah Daisy, what happened?
@Superfiends:
It’s only funny when the victim is a white male it seems.
@Jason Culligan: weren’t at least some of these victims white males Jason or am I missing something?
It was a jihadist gunman, an IS attack, terrorism, religious warfare and religiously motivated genocide against LGBT people. Homosexuality is punishable by death in most mainstream schools of Islamic law – sharia. Mateen was enforcing that.
That may be your truth
Was he also enforcing that when he slept with other men from the club?
@Deborah Behan:
“FBI investigators say they have found no evidence that Orlando shooter had gay lovers”
http://www.latimes.com/nation/la-na-orlando-gay-fbi-20160623-snap-story.html
@Jimmy Hound: Unfortunately that lie got half way round the world before the truth came out. And the apologists like Deborah etc are still spreading it. LGBT people who still don’t get it need to start realizing that their so-called allies on left and among ‘liberals’ will be right behind them on marriage etc but will dump them like hot coals every time it comes down to a choice between their lives and appeasing Islamists.
Why has the Obama administration refused to classify this as a terrorist attack? It was conducted by an Islamic militant who planned further attacks on targets in the US and ISIS claimed him as one of their own.
Why is it still referred to as a ‘mass shooting’ by a ‘gunman’ as opposed to a terrorist attack by an Islamic militant?
Because Obama is notoriously sympathetic to Islamic terror, as evidenced by his ongoing support of Jihadis in Syria
@Jason Culligan: Very good question. Most Irish and Americans probably still think this was a ‘closeted homophobic mentally ill’ perpetrator. Propaganda works.
Isis claimed him? That’s your proof he was a member of Isis? Psst they’re terrorists, they’d say it whether it’s true or not, it spreads fear… Terrorism.
According to his family he’d no strong religious views. It is known that he visited the Pulse nite club on at least 12 occasions. If he was anti-gay he appeared to have had no difficulties socialising with them. This guy simply appears to have been mentally ill….
Three men said they slept with him and he felt rejected by the men there. Really went under cover for ISIS!
I’m not for one minute denying that Isis couldve been behind this attack & theres no doubt they hate gays &would happy slaughter all if us but sonetimes the seriuosly mentally ill make wild claims like saying there Napoleon or Jesus or hearing the devil tell them do stuff. I think this guy was just a selfhating gay &thought somehow he’d go out as an isis wannabe
@Deborah Behan: propagating falsehoods once again.
“FBI investigators say they have found no evidence that Orlando shooter had gay lovers”
http://www.latimes.com/nation/la-na-orlando-gay-fbi-20160623-snap-story.html
@Deborah Behan:
“Three men said they slept with him and he felt rejected by the men there. Really went under cover for ISIS!”
The FBI proved that this was not the case months ago. Do keep up.
@Dave O Keeffe:
“Isis claimed him? That’s your proof he was a member of Isis?”
Actually it wasn’t just ISIS who claimed him as one of their fighters. He associated himself with them in his conversations with police on the day and introduced himself to negotiators as a soldier of the Islamic State:
http://edition.cnn.com/2016/09/23/us/orlando-shooter-hostage-negotiator-call/
@Stephen Duffy:
“According to his family he’d no strong religious views. It is known that he visited the Pulse nite club on at least 12 occasions.”
You know how in Christianity sins can be forgiven in the eyes of God through sincere repentance? Islam offers the same, however replace ‘sincere repentance’ with ‘dying as a martyr in Jihad’. The 9/11 attackers were known to frequent bars and strip clubs before their attacks as they believed that their sins were due to be absolved in their upcoming attack anyway:
Sahih Muslim (20:4649) – The Messenger of Allah (may peace be upon him) said: ‘All the sins of a Shahid (martyr) are forgiven except debt.
Jason, is there any proof that there was ever any contact between the two parties?
No there wasn’t and it wasn’t for the want of looking or investigating. No tangible link with any radical Islamic group..
@Stephen Duffy: So unless they’ve got an IS membership card and signed written orders from Al Baghdadi they’re not motivated by jihadism right? You’re really not grasping how this works yet are you. And while you’re busy lying, denying, appeasing and dissembling people are being killed. It’s clear where the priorities of the apologists lie.
Well you stick to you’re version of reality and continue to claim it was an homophobic attack by a gay man….
Do the seats vibrate?
You asking for a friend? I think some Citroën, Peugeot and Ford cars have this feature when you cross lanes (most of the other manufacturers use a warning tone in its place). Not sure what the practical application of this feature would be in seats of a stadium, which has a top speed of nil.
Got to keep that homosexual agenda front and center at all costs!
Homosexual Agenda:
1. Equality
2. See one
That is all.
@Yenreit: seriously question.
What exactly do you think the ” homosexual agenda” actually is?
I see people like yourself make silly comments like this all the time but you never expand on what you think the long term plan of this agenda is. So please, do enlighten us all. What do you think the agenda is exactly?
As Paul has pointed out it really comes down to just wanting equality and to not feel like second class anymore and to feel unsafe from bigots, that is a very reasonable so how anyone can be against this “agenda” is beyond me.
Well said !
@Yenreit: Centre. Not Center.
You’re a moron.
@yenreit And there you are, pushing the w@nkers agenda. What exactly is the gay agenda?
The gay agenda is to make all the men gay silly!!!
I hear there’s a conversion therapy centre opening in Athy. That must be what he’s talking about. Haha
“Homosexual agenda” – The normalisation and promotion of homosexual lifestyles and the choices that go with it.
@Yenreit:
What like… seats?
Are you a Monty Python joke?
@Jimmy Hound: the gay agenda: http://i.imgur.com/WfJwfn5.jpg
@Jimmy Hound: What actually is not normal about being, that homosexuality needs to be ‘normalized’?
@jimmy Normalisation? What’s abnormal about it? It’s no more abnormal than being left handed. Get with the times man.
@Barry Somers: Surely you know by now the gay agenda is to give you gay and make you quare for the bumsex!
16 hardhats to install 49 chairs. Bit OTT lads.
@Dell: I referred to the scrotes who abused a man with a mental disability as alt-KKK. Superfiends doesn’t like it when I malign his gang.
And I have no idea why my phone posted replies as separate comments!
@Daisy Chai NSaw: ahh he thought that by saying they are literally as bad as the kkk, their flip side so to speak, you were somehow belittling the hate crime?
Not belittling the crime, belittling the criminals and the idiotic MAGA mindset that normalises hate and hate crimes.
“homophobic atrocity” really? A self proclaimed (and also claimed by ISIS) Islamist murdered scores of people in a nightclub and because the the victims were gay it’s not an Islamist terrorist atrocity? It’s an insult to the victims to call this a homophobic attack. Just because a large portion of the LGBTQIA community are left leaning this kind of leftie BS gets accepted. Islamists view homosexuality as a crime against God. Leftists calling the murder of gays in the name of Islam “homophobic attacks” are showing themselves for what they are, mere apologists for a poisonous Islamic culture.
Oh sorry, I must have been mistaken, did he not target gay people by going to a gay club?
@Mike: Mike, your backward outlook was rejected by the electorate twice in the last two years, you’d do well to remember that.
@Joey Westland: Are you trying to imply that somehow I’m anti gay rights or something? It’s unclear. To clear that up, I’m all for gay rights for marriage, equality in the workplace etc. I’m against Islamist terrorism being dressed up as something else to suit people’s agenda.
@Dave O Keeffe: He did more than “target” people by “going” to a gay club. He murdered people by shooting them, in the name of Islam as it happens. It’s the “in the name of Islam” part that I am putting out there with my comments as the article was labeling the atrocity a homophobic attack.
Fantastic tribute from a fantastic city
This will confuse a lot of people
@Gonzo:
Maybe just the one.
@Gonzo:
only idiotic people
Maybe you’re confused Gonzo?
Nice touch
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