An Alabama LGBTQ rights group slammed a local mayor in the state after he made comments on Facebook suggesting that gay people and others should be killed on the eve of Pride Month.
Mark Chambers, mayor of the small city Carbon Hill, posted the comment on Facebook in response to a post by a friend, reported WBRC, which took screenshots of the conversation.
Chambers has since apologized and claimed his comments were taken out of context, but is refusing to resign as mayor over the incident.
"The mayor's repugnant and hateful comments should be roundly condemned," Randall Marshall, executive director of ACLU Alabama, which campaigns on equal LGBTQ rights, told Newsweek.
"Given the history of discrimination and physical attacks on members of the LGBTQ community, including the murder of Dana Martin, a black transgender woman, earlier this year, these statements from a sitting mayor are particularly dangerous.
"Having elected officials who deny the very humanity of the LGBTQ community is unacceptable. Our elected officials represent all of us."
The original Facebook post under which Chambers commented said: "We live in a society where homosexuals lecture us on morals, transvestites lecture us on human biology, baby killers lecture us on human rights, and socialists lecture us on economics."
A friend of Chambers reportedly wrote: "By giving the minority more rights than the majority. I hate to think of the country my grandkids will live in unless somehow we change and I think that will take a revolution."
To which Chambers replied last Friday, the day before Pride Month celebrations began: "The only way to change it would be to kill the problem out. I know it's bad to say but without killing them out there's no way to fix it."
According to WBRC, Chambers first denied writing the post before admitting it. He then said his comments were about what would happen in a revolution. "I never said anything about killing out gays or anything like that," Chambers told the station.
He also reportedly complained about a breach of privacy but that he was not concerned about any criticism from his constituents, saying that only one person in the town dislikes him.
In an interview with the Daily Mountain Eagle, Chambers said he would not resign. He also posted an apology to the 2,000-strong community on his personal Facebook page, which was later taken down.
He said it was wrong to say anybody should be killed but also claimed his comments were taken out of context and that he was talking in general about a "revolutionary war."
"It was a private message to start with it," Chambers subsequently told the Mountain Eagle. "But it is not right, whether it was private or not. It was the wrong thing to say. It was taken out of context.
"I mean, nowhere in there did I say I was for killing gays or killing transvestites or that sort of thing. I was responding to a comment a guy said something about a revolutionary war. What I had said was in a war, you know, the only way to get your way is to kill the other side out.
"I had no idea it would never be a thing like this. But I was wrong for saying it. In no way does that affect the thoughts of the city, for the city council. I apologize for saying it."
