Masked vigilantes have torn down almost every homosexual “pride” flag in Launceston, Tasmania, just hours after they were erected in the state’s second-largest city for the first time.
The City of Launceston council put up the flags, which promote homosexuality and radical gender ideology that results in the mutilation of children, on flagpoles in the Brisbane Street Mall for “Pride Month” at 2pm on Wednesday afternoon, but by the next morning they had been ripped down.
The backlash against the controversial ratepayer-funded far-left propaganda display came on the same day the city was hosting its first-ever forum on so-called LGBTQIA+ inclusion just metres away.
The flags, which included stripes representing the unscientific radical leftist concept of “transgenderism”, have now been replaced with banners for AFL team Hawthorn to promote a match taking place next week.
A local business owner said his CCTV showed a masked man climbing a flagpole outside his café to slash the flag before tearing it to pieces, and accused the man of committing a “hate crime”, The Mercury reported.
But many other locals said they thought the flags should never have been on display in the first place, and the council was forced to turn off comments on social media due to an avalanche of criticism.
“Good riddance to bad rubbish,” one person said.
“I hope the police investigate this with the same rigour as the decapitation of monuments and general public vandalism of significant public property,” said another.
Mayor Matthew Garwood was also heavily criticised on a post lamenting what had happened.
“Rates, roads and rubbish. Stick to the basics and you won’t go wrong,” wrote one Launceston resident.
“City and council building should only fly the national flag, the state flag and flags from countries that have dignitaries from that country visiting on official business. That’s it,” wrote another.
Women’s rights group Women Speak Tasmania said the outrage from radical “transgender” activists was telling.
“It’s hateful and spiteful they say. Not a single comment about the harm ‘gender affirming model’ does to children some of them who could grow up to be gay,” the group said.
“We guess they have their priorities.”
Header image: Left, right, before and after images of the flags (City of Launceston).
