London, Ont. family calling for love after hate-related incident

A London family is concerned for the safety of their child after vandals stole and destroyed a Progress Pride flag that was stolen from their property.

Sharla and Michael Thompson put up the flag in June in an effort to support their son.

“It’s just tragic that this stuff still happens and it’s really demoralizing for the Queer community,” says Sharla Thompson. “We have two sons and one of them is Trans so we feel like representation is huge and then when something like this happens it just really hurts the Queer community because then they don’t feel safe.”

London police are investigating the hate-related incident and released images of two suspects taken from a neighbour’s surveillance camera.

“They purposely ripped it down and tore it down so to me it’s like what were they trying to tell us something because to me they didn’t have to go to that extreme and then burn it,” says Michael.

Now the parents are worried for their child’s safety. Sharla says, “It’s awful, it’s super scary, and you’re like wow is my kid a target?”

But she goes on to say, “There’s no question that we will always be allies and represent for the Queer community.”

Josh Morgan is the councillor in Ward 7 and paid a visit to the Thompson family. He says this is what the city is fighting against with its Community Diversity and Inclusion Strategy.

“There’s definitely been an uptake in hate and racism and hate-related crimes in the city and across Canada and that’s why we took measures,” says Morgan.

The Thompsons say they’ll continue to show their support as soon as they get a new pole they’ll put another flag back in place with Sharla adding, “We need love, we need acceptance, we need kindness, we don’t need hate in our community.”