This is ridiculous, especially since the gay community here is such an accepted and integral part of our community. This could be a backlash for the recent gay pride march that took place a few months ago (I was at the head of that march by the way... kind of a strange feeling as a straight man to see your face so many times at the head of a gay pride march in all the media photos and video... but I digress) I can't imagine this going down in Seattle though. Especially since the logistics of it would be next to impossible. I take this as a personal insult though being a Seattle resident and having several members of the gay community as friends and I hope whoever made these threats goes down and goes down hard (no pun intended)

I'm 99% sure this is a hoax because the logistics of it make no sense, and if there was an individual or a faction that wanted to pull something like this, they would've done it at the several thousand deep gay pride march that happened a little bit ago.

[edit on 7-1-2009 by CuriousSkeptic]

I am must be missing out on the point or meaning of five from each of the 11 bars. So they want to poison 55 people over all. It sounds odd, I would think that if it was just about hating gays and wanting to poison them that whoever did this would try for more than five people per bar. I guess I am not smart enough to understand the meaning/point of this threat.

I hope it is a false/empty threat or that they find those making the threats though. Maybe it is some sort of new spree/serial killer.

Raist

This story is getting very little traction in the mainstream media. Maybe some national outlets will pick it up soon. We will see. I can't help but wonder if this would be a much bigger story if the targets of this perpetrator were not an unpopular minority group.
Would this be on FOX if the potential victims were Christian children ? Would MSNBC be covering this if someone was threatening professional athletes or film stars ? This is domestic terrorism in the form of a hate crime. I hope the FBI follows through in their investigation.

"It had a typed label on the front of it, it was taped to the front, no return address on it or anything," said bartender Michael Gilmore.

This is terrible, but I have to laugh at the comment "it had no return address".

Hopefully it's just a prank (a sick one) and probably caused by some homophobic who is still living in the closet or some religious fanatic belonging to (insert religion of your choice here).

Mikey

I somewhat doubt that they have purified ricin. Ive read that the purification process is very dangerous. But of course they could have a well built lab.

"The U.S. Centers for Disease Control (CDC) gives a possible minimum figure of 500 micrograms (about the size of a grain of salt) for the lethal dose of ricin in humans if exposure is from injection or inhalation."

I could see this happening in San Francisco. The Gay community tends to be extremely flamboyant, invading churches, graffitti on the churches, and essentially spewing hate at anyone who doesn't agree with them.
But Seattle? The only news I ever hear out of Seatle is about Starbuck's! This sounds like a really fundamentalist Christian survialist homophobe. And if you think I'm joking, just think. Lots of places the the Northwest to make yourself scarce and drop out. Bet there's a weird survivalist community within a few hundered miles of Seatle.

1. To the "really good lab" comment: I have no idea what either purifying ricin involves nor what production of methamphetamines involves, but I can say based on reading about them weekly in the local papers that western Washington has very advanced meth labs. If they can manage to build an advanced meth lab and operate it from virtually any apartment or extended stay motel in the Sound, then I'd assume the same could be done for any lab whose main goal is distillation of a toxic substance.

2. KettleBelly: I'm actually not that surprised that Seattle would be a target, but I disagree with your take that this person is a religiously motivated survivalist. I believe that Seattle is either the 2nd or 3rd most populous gay area trailing San Fransisco and (maybe) New York. I know I heard something about this on the KISW morning show some time ago, but I can't remember if they said Seattle now trails or now leads NYC.

3. Personally, I really hope this turns out to be a hoax because the idea of some wacko running around with purified ricin, regardless the motive, disturbs the hell out of me. I am not gay, nor can I say I have any friends who are nor do I particularly care to have any, but from a purely human aspect this is a pretty lousy thing to threaten, hoax or not.

Burdman. may I ask why you disagree with the religous motivatioon? To me thos makes perfect sense. These idiots have no real concept of what is right or wrong. Just a perverted sense of justice that says that any one who doesn't agree wotj them deserves to die. Just like the muslim fanatics. I'm really interested in your opinion.