Gay cyclist passes a homophobic street preacher – what he did next left the crowd cheering
The streets of Glasgow recently bore witness to a bigoted street preacher shouting anti-gay “warnings” at passers by while repeatedly tapping what appears to be a Bible – but a passing cyclist was having none of it.
In a video shared on Facebook over the weekend, the preacher is seen in the middle of a full-blown homophobic rant when the cyclist passes. Having heard the slurs coming out of the man’s mouth, he abruptly stops, turns to the man and tells him: “I’m gay! I’m gay, so say it to me.”
The preacher responds by telling him he needs to repent, and find God’s love if he wants to avoid an eternity of damnation.
But without missing a beat the cyclist fires back: “I love me. I don’t need a god to do it.”
The man who filmed the video, Emlyn Pearce, revealed that as gay man himself, he’d found the preacher’s hatred in his home city “very sad and very scary”, and praised the cyclist’s courage in standing up to such brazen homophobia.
“I walk through Glasgow holding hands with my boyfriend all the time, and we have never experienced any homophobia. So to walk down the main shopping street and hear a man shouting that ‘the 99%’ need to stand up to the ‘1%’ who are gay was very sad and very scary,” he wrote on Facebook.
Explaining that the mystery cyclist had been identified as a man named Ryan Vance, he continued: “Then Ryan arrived and did that thing that we all like to think we’d do but few of us ever manage: he stood up to hatred and bigotry without any fear or hesitation.
“And Ryan is right, we all need to start by loving ourselves, and we don’t need anybody else’s permission to do that.”
He added: “Ryan Vance, as a gay man and a human being, I salute you. As I said in my private message to you, you made the world a better place. Thank you, sir – your pint awaits!
“A gay cyclist stands up to a religious bigot in Glasgow and gets a round of applause from the crowd! If anyone knows this chap, please tell him to get in touch because a fair few people would like to buy him a drink.
“I love myself, I don’t need a god to do it.” #legend
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