The things that pop up on GoFundMe never cease to astonish me and yet often the backstory can turn out to be even more compelling, so here is an example.
Somebody, who opts to remain anonymous and signs herself “Relentlessly Gay”, started a GoFundMe to raise $5,000 to paint the roof of her house rainbow colours. She is getting lots of donations and a huge amount of support and has so far managed to raise (as I write this) $29,435.
OK, so you now know that you want to know the story here.
So it turns out that a “loving” Christian Neighbour took offence to series of beautiful homemade solar lamps (pictured above) and left her the following note …
And yes, the lamps that caused such offence are those pictured at the top, and now we also get to see where the tag “Relentlessly Gay” came from.
So in reply to this note Julie Baker, the lady in question, has started her GoFundMe …
I opened my door, and found a note from my neighbor. Regarding a set of rainbow jar solar lights hanging in my yard that spell out “Love” and “Ohana”. They informed me that the neighborhood is “christian” and has “children” and asked me to stop being “relentlessly gay”….
Needless to say… I need more rainbows… Many, many more rainbows….
So, I am starting this fundraiser so I can work to make my Home even More “relentlessly gay” If we go high enough, I will see if I can get a Rainbow Roof!
Because my invisible relentlessly gay rainbow dragon should live up there in style!
Put simply, I am a widow and the mother of four children, my youngest in high school and I WILL NOT Relent to Hatred. Instead, I will battle it with whimsy and beauty and laughter and love, wrapped around my home, yard and family!!!
Thanks for your relentlessly gay support!
Relentlessly!!!
The support she has been getting on the GoFundMe is just amazing, here is a sample of a few comments …
James McDonough – I’m a painting contractor in Baltimore. If you buy the paint I’ll ROY G. BIV your entire house
Joey Lazzerini – I live in DC! I’m happy to travel to Baltimore to help with painting or just to dance in a sequin shirt on your front lawn. Happy Pride month!
Hanna Coash-White – I vote for a rainbow unicorn fountain.
Sherry Eaton – My 15 year old son asks that you please use our money toward the color purple (his favorite color) in your journey toward the most Gay Home in the neighborhood. :)
Lisa Keipp – I have no funds to send you, but I DO have some rainbow shawls I’ve made and I would LOVE to send you one to wear in your yard, or drape over a rainbow chair on your porch. If you’d like one, please PM me your address!
Sarah Calloway – I would like to wear my most colorful outfit and dance around in your front yard. https://m.facebook.com/ilyannarainbow
There might indeed be a few obnoxious people out there, but beyond the authors of such notes, you will find that most people are simply not like that.
Updates
There appears to be rather a lot of doubt regarding this being real
One commenter on snopes reports:
I know this woman personally. She made these benign lanterns as a fun project with her teenage daughters. This story went viral because she is known by literally thousands of people that she has helped, loved, and believed in when no one else would. Her going public was encouraged and facilitated by those who love her. She didn’t respond to certain media because she is getting hundreds of friend requests, emails, phone calls, media, and visitors. She can’t keep up with all of the outpouring of contact. Maybe before you pass judgment and place assumptions on someone you don’t know; you should talk with/meet her if you don’t believe the story. I can assure you that if you did speak with her you would see her genuinity.
Another reports …
I happen to be a long-time, personal friend of this woman, and it honestly started as a Facebook post just shared to her friends. She only brought up the idea of a fundraiser after a few of us started talking about sharing her post publicly.
She’s had problems like this with the neighbors before (just not with such unintentionally catchy verbiage), so I have no doubt the letter is real.
Regarding the odd capitalization, yes I agree it is odd, but not unique to her, it appears to be popping up more and more within FB posts from different people. For some that alone is enough, but it really is not, and so the best it can lead to is doubt and nothing more.
So you’ve written this skeptical only mostly of peoples’ doubts, and not updated it to reflect what is almost certainly the final conclusion?
This was all last June, and while you might personally have reached a conclusion (and that is fine), there is simply insufficient evidence to reach a “final conclusion”.
By publishing this without ANY skepticism (or in fact, any basic research), you negate everything else on this site. The lay person could see this note was written in the same dialects/errors as the “victim”, and that a neighbor threatening to call the police for yard lanterns is overkill. The Christian church across the street (the only one in the neighborhood, in fact) she is blaming has a female pastor and performs GLBT weddings. Looking from the street on a simple Google Street View tells you that you can’t even SEE this spot from anywhere but right where she photographed because her yard is so trashed with junk and brush (in fact, you can see some of the trash in the background of the original photo). She had T-shirts for sale and the domain registered BEFORE it went viral (seriously, how can you miss an easy whois?). PUBLIC FB posts of hers deride her lack of funds, a public records search shows she owes a lot of money in taxes and such, a search on her kids reveals previous GFM’s for new computers.
I found all this in all of 15 minutes of search.
And you are willing to share this out, defaming an innocent AND GLBT friendly church and her neighbors to help perpetuate the fraud, and worse – create a blowback situation for the GLBT community, in which another “proven hoax” will completely mess with any progress, because of it.
Your criticism has merit … please do feel free to post additional comments with links to verify the information in your comment.
The domain was registered on June 17th. About the same time as it went viral. I wanted it to be MUCH earlier because I think that she made the letter herself but there it is.
If we’re to be ‘skeptical’, shouldn’t the lede be “Baltimore Woman Claims to Recieve Anonymous Gay Bashing Note” or some such? Or have we already forgotten the gay waitress who slandered her customers with a faked receipt saying no tip because she was gay, which was proven to be a hoax? This is already on Snopes, and apparently there is reason to suspect the woman wrote the note herself.
Your observation is essentially correct and yes, clearly I got this one wrong.
FYI, I’m not personally aware of the gay waitress with fake receipt instance (I don’t live in the US, hence such stories can come and go without going international), but the fact that somebody else has faked claims, does not imply all such claims are fake. Each instance should be judged on its own merits.
So that aside, the snopes entry is here … http://m.snopes.com/2015/06/18/relentlessly-gay/ …
Did she fake it? We don’t know, all we can do is make the observation that doubt exists, and perhaps (if it warrants it) articulate why. Clearly some are sure, and others are not, and so perhaps all we can do at this point is simply make the observation regarding the doubts until more information turns up.