Late Monday afternoon, I was quietly doing my yoga practices on the beach near the skate park when I was verbally assaulted by a by two men I had never seen before. I was 50 feet away, had no interaction with them whatsoever, and never said a single word to them, but they decided to attack me for being gay. For 20 minutes, surrounded by a mixed group of white and Latino youths, they screamed insults at me which boiled down to "F--ng faggot. Go back to San Francisco, or we'll come over there and kill you!"
I continued to do my yoga practices, but they came over, got in my face, and threatened to punch me if I didn't get off the beach. They screamed insult after insult about gay people not belonging in Santa Barbara as they followed me to the bike path. On the bike path I pleaded with people passing by for a cell phone, and no one would help me. While two men loudly screamed hate-crime epithets in my face and I begged for help, not a single person was willing to stop and help or lend me a phone. Many people actually on their phones just shook their head, kept talking, and hurried by while my assailants screamed, "That's right! Don't give the f---ng faggot a phone!"
I finally saw a classmate from yoga, and he bravely stepped in and distracted my attackers, enabling me to escape. I am grateful for his help, sickened by the level of vicious hatred of homophobia, angered that the skate park and surrounding area have become a dangerous place, and completely disgusted that so many people hurried by a fellow citizen in distress and refused to help.