The COC Eindhoven has reported to the police after a group of twenty people was attacked at a COC building on Saturday evening. A volunteer of this interest group for LGBT people was beaten. The police confirm that a report has been made and they say they are conducting an ‘extensive investigation’. The municipality speaks of a ‘terrible incident.’ Images have now surfaced of a burnt rainbow flag.
The incident happened around 7 p.m. in the evening. At that time there was a meeting for young people up to the age of eighteen in the building of the COC on the Prins Hendrikstraat. A group of strangers walked past the building and pulled the rainbow flag off. The volunteer who confronted them about this received a blow to the head.
According to COC chairman Benjamin Ector, the incident did not last long. “They walked down the street, it didn’t seem like a deliberate action. But as soon as they saw the rainbow flag, they pulled it off.”
Football supporters
According to the COC, these are football supporters. “A group of 20 men in black clothing who came walking down the street with a lot of shouting and roaring. One of them climbed on the shoulders of another man and they took down the flag,” the Eindhoven COC chairman told Omroep Brabant. “It was a very scary situation. We are still anxious. The young people do not dare to show themselves on the street with rainbow clothing or rainbow flags.”
PSV had to play against Excelsior later in the evening and the perpetrators themselves used the word PSV, according to the COC. The police have not yet said anything about the identities of the perpetrators. A video has surfaced in a closed Telegram group (Ultras not Reds) of (they say) PSV supporters burning a rainbow flag after their club’s match against Excelsior on Saturday night.
According to the Queer 040 Foundation, an organization founded last year to contribute to the integration and emancipation of LGBTIQ+ people in Eindhoven, the flag was stolen from the COC. That is extra bitter because the football club spoke out last week against chants of the fans of cup opponent Spakenburg, in which PSV player Xavi Simons was called a gay. “Hate words in the stadium are now turning into acts of hate,” says Ector. “Already in the street they tried to set fire to the flag.”
Based on the video images, the chairman of COC Eindhoven cannot confirm with certainty that it is the stolen flag. “It is certain that our flag is gone.”
Deputy mayor Rik Thijs: “A group of young people thought they had a safe place here to talk about their sexuality. Something they may not be able to do at home. Their meeting was cruelly disrupted. That is terrible. We cannot and will not tolerate this in Eindhoven. “
New flag
Queer 040 calls on the KNVB, PSV and the Philips Stadium to hoist the Eindhoven Pride flag as a statement. This flag, designed in-house. was made especially for the first Eindhoven Pride Walk on 10 June. Queer040 donated the first flag to the COC on Easter Monday. “It would actually only be provided on June 1, but the COC can already hang it up,” says Johan Stribos, chairman of the Queer 040 Foundation.