A right-wing Christian has set the bar lower than it’s ever been before and declared a man who refuses to cross the road on LGBT+ cross-walks “a hero.”
Steve Franssen shared a photo of a man standing beside LGBT+ crosswalks, which are painted in rainbow colours, and wrote: “This man in the state of Georgia is refusing to walk on the LGBTQ crosswalks. A hero! The eyes of the world are watching.” He has since put his account on private, so sadly the original tweet can no longer be seen publicly.
The original photo was actually taken in Atlanta, Georgia in 2015 by photographer David Goldman, according to Nola, so – shockingly – it looks as though Franssen’s claim was made up. In a shocking turn of events, the man may simply have been looking left and right before he crossed the road.
LGBT+ Twitter descended on right-wing Christian tweet and asked: ‘Is it gay to cross the road?’
Needless to say, it didn’t take long before LGBT+ Twitter users descended and asked the vital question: is it gay to cross the road?
Fellas is crossing the street gay. Sound off below https://t.co/4FXT0gLWDA
— Sylvia Plath OnlyFans (@saintknives) January 13, 2020
After one Twitter user urged others to answer the vital question, people jumped on the trend – and they had a lot of fun in the process.
What’s really gay is looking both ways before crossing. Real men wear blinders.
“I never leave my house because the gays are out there. So yes,” wrote one person.
I never leave my house because the gays are out there. So yes
— Deleuzian IDF Vegan Poly Gerald Ford (@GeraldFordVEVO) January 13, 2020
We have a rainbow crosswalk downtown and the local idiots do burnouts on it with their tires.
— Stay-at-home Artist (@true_norf) January 13, 2020
Another wrote: “What’s really gay is looking both ways before crossing. Real men wear blinders.”
Somebody else declared: “He’s rather be a jaywalker than a gaywalker.”
Rainbow crossings have become a staple of some cities across the US in recent years.
Franssen has been trolled mercilessly since sharing the photo alongside his bogus claim that the man is refusing to use the crosswalk in it, which seems to have prompted him to put his account on private.
Rainbow crossings have become popular in a number of cities across the United States in recent years, including in Atlanta, Georgia.
Last year, the Trump administration told officials in the city of Ames, Iowa that they had to remove their LGBT+ themed crosswalks, and ruffled a few feathers there as a result.
In a letter, the federal government insisted the crosswalks be painted over as traffic control standards mean they can only be painted white.