Sex! A Prescription for Aging

Richard Ammon, GlobalGayz.com
Laguna Beach, December 31, 2009

My partner and I had sex the other night.

No, this is not an expose or verbal porn. I offer these words as a reflection on at least three of life’s major happenings: aging, sex and love, i.e.long term relationships—all rolled into one.

I am almost 70. My partner is almost 59. We have been together for more than 20 years. Our sex was comfortable and pleasing and unplanned as usual. In the afterglow and a while later, I wondered that our little tryst defied certain cultural myths about sexual energy—that it diminishes with age and flattens out over time with the same partner.

Shouldn’t it? After a lifetime of moderate carnal experience shouldn’t my sexual energy be on the wane along with my muscular strength, my eyesight and mental acuity? I can’t run as fast, lift as much or endure as long as I did in my thirties. And in these matters I have adjusted downward both my behavior and my expectations.

But, strangely, my sexual energy has not diminished significantly and certainly has not flattened. Looking from the other ‘end’, from my twenties, I could not imagine ‘old people’ having sex; it was something that faded away or shriveled like going bald or forgetting recent events. Yet here I am—here we are—still intermittently charged to give it another go with the same guy.

Why?, I ask. Is this actually unusual? Perhaps not. And is this consistent across gay and straight orientations? How is it that a partnership maintains a repetitive sexual activity over many years? “Love” is the oft quoted reply but I have further thoughts.

I wonder if it has to do with the alleged ‘gay lifestyle’? Nearly all gay men I know, from twenties to seventies +, enjoy viewing sexy other men of different ages, races, shapes, colors, hair styles, muscle size, and a hundred other variants of appearance. (And I presume (?) the same for lesbians as well.) I irregularly swap internet photos of handsome specimens with half a dozen friends and they in turn swap with others. (On the other side of this, I am endlessly amazed at the countless ‘charged’ people who like to show off their bodies with stills or videos to a huge and anonymous public.)

Curiously, most of my fellow swap-mates are also in long term relationships which makes me wonder about their sex drives and if there is a correlation—or not--between this sort of stimuli and their private bedroom behavior. I can’t say there is a direct correlation for me. Exchanged photos are only occasional and sporadic. My activity with my partner is also occasional as well but does not follow in sequence upon the arrival of a hot fresh image of an appealing ephebe au naturale.

What the photo or video does is keep the ‘matter’ fresh. Almost like taking a vitamin supplement, a photo or a real-life beauty doesn’t jolt me (except for a rare one of exceptional quality) but more often it helps maintain an on-going level (a ‘minimum daily requirement’, if you will) of hormones as a re-energizer--a sort of light charge.

(I have no statistics, but it’s hard to imagine married heterosexual men exchanging exotic digital images of women with other married men—or wives with other wives of hot ‘Playboy’ guys. However, the porno industry is a multi-billion dollar business, mostly among heterosexuals simply because there are more of them, so there’s something going on.)

But I digress. The point here is sexual energy in ‘older’ gay men and how the current keeps charged. A close friend, aged about 70, insists that being sexual—online and offline—keeps his mind and body alert with a sense of vitality and aliveness. The opposite of withering.

Trolling bars and clubs with a leering eye is not what I’m talking about, not looking for erotic pickups to satisfy a craving or an addiction. Rather, a continuous 'spirit-like' energy revived regularly by spontaneous live sex with one's self or a significant other or a paramour or from pleasurable photographic erotica or a serendipitous quickie in a steam room at the club, or an occasional ‘evening out’ at a sauna with or without one’s partner.

And it’s not just the encounter that’s involved here; it’s also the readiness to allow it, the willingness to invite it, the ability and agility of mind to acknowledge the affirming energy of sexuality, even when it does not particularly look for or lead to an encounter, such as viewing a water-polo game. There is a ‘pleasant awareness’ in the event, not unlike acute listening for birds’ songs in a forest or aesthetic alertness to the ambiance of a sunset moment.

As we age, I and my peers value our health and take responsibility to maintain it with diet, exercise, preventive health care, cultural stimulation, productive interests that include hobbies, travel, creating art--as well as sexual stimulation.

Not a bad prescription for getting old, eh?

And I think the same goes for lesbian women!

Readings:
Aging Among Gay Men
Older Homosexual Males
Older Lesbian People
Lesbian Aging
Gay and Lesbian Aging

Author of Ugandan Gay Death Bill Fears For His Life

Richard Ammon, GlobalGayz.com
Laguna Beach, California
December 30, 2009

Another (bizarre and specious) public announcement comes from the author of the Ugandan gay death bill, David Bahati. In this outcry, instead of targeting gay people, he claims he is a target of hateful intentions and fears for his life. See this report from the San Francisco Examiner.

How awful!

Imagine this 'innocent' man being put under threat by some anonymous party who threatens his pursuit of life and liberty.

Now he might possibly (although unlikely) begin to appreciate the feelings of countless LGBT Ugandans who will live with the same fear thanks to his extremist and dangerous proposed bill he has submitted to the Ugandan parliament.

Being Straight and Not Married; Being Gay and Not Married

Richard Ammon, GlobalGayz.com
December 26, 2009

I visited my 94 year-old stepfather over Christmas. He lives with his 93 year-old girlfriend. He’s my ‘step’ because he married my mother when they were both 75; they had good years before she died of lung caner—she smoked when she was a young parent; it was the fashion then. He took loving care of her and she died at their home.

Fourteen years later John is weaker but stable and he is dealing with another failing ‘spouse’. He’s not married to this woman (they’ve lived together for about 6 years) and he can’t care for her as he did my mother. So he is faced with a dilemma as to what to do. Ask her family (she has two grown children and some grandchildren) to place her in assisted living? Move her to one of their homes? Bring in daily help? John’s daughter, who lives nearby and frequently talks to him, has suggested the latter.

She’s difficult and resistant at times and neglects her own hygiene. She doesn’t eat and drink adequately. It bothers John to nag her to eat, drink or bathe. He didn’t say it aloud but it was obvious during my visit that he is tired of her and would rather not be bothered with her care. Let her family take over.

It’s sad to see this bright and spunky woman fade but her body is deteriorating and John is not up to 24/7 care and he is not legally bound to her. Therein lies a quandary. With no legal ties to her and with former affection obviously worn out, what’s he to do?

As we talked about this, the conversation felt somewhat mean-spirited, as if the ‘friend’ was a visitor who had overstayed her welcome. Without the ritual of marriage and the legal papers to ‘seal’ his bond with her the situation is different from with my mother (also, my mother was more easy going and easier to care for). He is ready to see lady friend go—not to die, but to see her live and be cared for elsewhere.

I can’t generalize this situation too far but I wonder how this (heterosexual) partnership compares to a gay relationship where there is no marriage license. Nearly every enduring gay partnership lacks the legal document of marriage, even in this age of gay marriage. Most of us don’t expect it; it’s not a norm, not a tangible bonded contract ‘for better or worse...’ yet many long-term couples I know remain tight into old age, through illness and unto death.

What’s the difference? Just a piece of paper? One relationship seems separated by the lack of the paper and another seems tightly bonded by the lack. I have seen numerous long-term gay partnerships move toward the ‘final stage’, especially in the generation of AIDS, and I’ve not seen a dynamic similar to my step-dad’s. These gay couples stayed close right to the end. (To be fair, I do know of a recent older straight non-married couple who hung in there to the end of the male partner; but there was a lot of money to be gained afterward and they were together for almost 30 years. So perhaps it’s not an equal comparison.)

If John and lady friend were married I know he would not be saying these things about her presence in his life. Such is the symbolic power of marriage on the affairs of hetero people and such is the enhanced force of non-married love and commitment needed to surmount its absence.

Uganda: Stealing the Spotlight From President Museveni

Neophyte Legislator Proposes Deadly Laws Against Gays: Unleashes International Protest

Richard Ammon, GlobalGayz
Laguna Beach, CA

Yoweri Museveni has been president of Uganda for 24 years in a country that had suffered decades of government corruption, mismanagement, bloody guerilla activity and civil war, all preceded by the the horrors of the Idi Amin tyranny in the seventies. His rise to power through danger and rebellion and military manipulations were fraught with complicated deals and reprisals along the way. The long path to power was a high-risk-high-stakes political chess game--which he won by stealth and bullets.

Holding that power from 1986 through the tumultuous eighties while 'sort of' leading the country to a democracy has been a delicate balancing act by this seasoned political warrior. He is big improvement over the 'strong man' dictators in Africa who ruled most African countries after independence in the seventies and eighties.

He has brought relative stability and economic growth to Uganda, despite widespread poverty and an intransigent rebel war in the northwest near war-torn Congo. In recent years he initiated an effective national response to HIV/AIDS. But the disease pandemic has been a complicated thorn in the side of the government as infection continues to spread and it has also stirred a long-hidden cultural taboo: homosexuality in Uganda.

There are laws that criminalize same-sex behavior but they have been unevenly applied. This has encouraged the growth of gay groups, at first in the service of HIV education and prevention, and more recently, advocating for health outreach to the highest HIV risk group--men who have sex with men (MSM) and their 'right' to non-discriminatory treatment. Not surprising, this activist agenda brought homosexuality onto the public stage, in full view of political and religious leaders who at first denied there were homosexuals in Uganda. Since this ruse failed they shifted to blaming the West for exporting the immoral acts to Uganda. (photo left: David Cato of SMUG gay group)

Needless to say, this heightened publicity brought increased harassment and recriminations against LGBT citizens. Some arrests were made and police tried to blame gays for the corruption of youth. It became a relatively low-level culture war for several years. Most Ugandans had much more to worry about than the presence a few 'different' people.

Then came 2009 and the war erupted into an international scandal. Three American 'reparative' advocates held a tiny but highly publicized seminar in Kampala during which they proclaimed their (unscientific and discredited) views that homosexuality was a disease that should be legally opposed and cured with prayer. Hardly anyone paid attention--with the exception of a neophyte first-term member of the Ugandan national parliament named David Bahati, who liked what he heard from the right-wing Americans.

Six months after the seminar (the Americans met with local legislators during their visit) Bahati sponsored the most deadly anti-gay bill ever presented to the government. The bill, he said, was encouraging "constructive criticism" to improve the existing laws against gays and insisted that 'strict measures' were needed to keep homosexuals from "recruiting" children. Among other things, the bill calls for anyone convicted of a homosexual act to face life imprisonment. "Serial offenders" also could face capital punishment.

As well, anyone who "aids, abets, counsels or procures another to engage of acts of homosexuality" will receive seven years in prison if convicted. This includes landlords who rent property to homosexuals and anyone with "religious, political, economic or social authority" who fails to report a homosexual friend or acquaintance could receive three years in jail.

Needless to say this draconian and extreme proposal has resulted in world-wide condemnation and opposition from the United Nations, the European Union, western governments and religious leaders. Sweden has threatened to cut its foreign aid to Uganda.

This now presents Mr. Museveni--a president who has survived wars, political and economic crises, corruption, poverty, and an epidemic over the course of 24 years--with being upstaged by an upstart religious zealot legislator who has grabbed a tiger by the tail and is ignorant of the global consequences of his myopic bigotry. This surely was an embarrassment to the president, especially at the recent Commonwealth Nations conference where he was taken aside and warned by the British and Canadian Prime Ministers and pressed by the American secretary of state about this bizarre and regressive proposal. Even the Vatican has opposed the bill.

And how very ironic that Mr Bahati, who reviles the west for imposing their 'corrupt' lifestyle on Uganda's sovereignty should have been so attracted to another western 'import' in the form of a highly prejudicial and phony cure for homosexuality to the point of using it as a foundation for an evil proposal that flies in the face of all human rights decency. Talk about the blind leading the blind!

Gay Rights Activist Murdered in Honduras

Richard Ammon, GlobalGayz.com
December 17, 2009

Once again we are humbled and infuriated that yet another courageous gay activist has been gunned down for his human rights work. In a previous blog we considered the irrational persecution and killing of LGBT (gay) people across the world and how human fear and hatred make us inhumane.

The illegal coup in Honduras has taken many lives in the name of political idealogy. Many of the dead will be remembered by only a few family members. Some of the outspoken courageous ones will be mourned across the world. Walter Trochez is one of these.

From: Radio Mundo
December 14, 2009
25 year-old activist Walter Trochez was murdered Monday in Tegucigalpa. He was a gay rights advocate and a member of the National Front of Resistance against the Coup in Honduras.

Trochez, who had publicly reported the abuses of Roberto Micheletti’s de facto regime, was shot in Tegucigalpa’s downtown. A few days before his death, he had been brutally beaten by officers of the dictatorship while they were interrogating him to extract information about the leaders of the peaceful resistance.

The activist had recently published an article exposing the de facto regime for its human rights violations. The article, titled “Increase in hate crimes and homophobia towards LGTB as a result of the civic-religious-military coup in Honduras”, was about how what is currently going on in Honduras is a step backwards for the most inclusive processes that have been taking place in Latin America in the recent years. (Full text in Spanish of Trochez's open letter here.)

“It is worth stating that the explicit support of the church in Honduras to the military coup of June 28, 2009 prevented holding a referendum organized by the legitimate constitutional government, while it put dictator Roberto Micheletti in power”, reads the article. It also explains that homophobic hate crimes have increased since the coup, promoted by the Honduran church, with the complicity of the oppressing groups.

“Once again we say it is NOT ACCEPTABLE that in these past 4 months, during such a short period, 9 transexual and gay friends were violently killed, 6 in San Pedro Sula and 3 in Tegucigalpa”, said the activist in his article, following several press releases of the gay, lesbian, transexual and bisexual community.

The young activist finished his article saying “As a revolutionary, I will always defend my people, even if it takes my life”.

Historic Gay Book Signing at Beirut Book Fair

Richard Ammon, GlobalGayz.com
Laguna Beach, CA December 16, 2009

'Gay Travels in the Muslim World' editor Michael Luongo will be signing the new Arabic translation of his book at the Beirut Book Fair in BIEL on Tuesday, December 22, at 6pm, at the Arab Diffusion (Al Intishar al Arabi) Publisher's stand, number G18.

This is the first time a gay American book has ever been translated into Arabic and the first time a gay book has ever been presented at a Middle Eastern book fair.

The book is a collection of first person essays by gay Muslim and non-Muslim authors, featuring stories on Iraq, Afghanistan, Egypt, Morocco and other Muslim countries, serving as a bridge between cultures. The English language version of the book is published by Routledge Press. One of the chapters was written by GlobalGayz.com owner/writer Richard Ammon.

After Lebanon, Michael Luongo will travel to Syria, Jordan, Egypt and other locations in the Middle East. More on the book is at www.gaytravelsinthemuslimworld.com.

Luongo has been blogging about his time in Beirut for the Huffington Post:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/michael-luongo/beirut-book-fair-for-gay_b_396622.html

From that blog, he said:
I had already been told by Georges Azzi of HELEM, Lebanon's gay rights group, that the publisher had given the book prominence, a large poster of its cover on the wall. I found the poster was next to one on a book about the CIA, making me a little skittish in what kinds of conspiracies my own book might be considered a part of...
The book was also everywhere in the stand, piled in a corner and on the aisle as everyone walked by. I wandered around to get a feel for the Fair, looking also for people at the various Middle Eastern publishing houses I had met at other fairs around the world. In contrast to New York or London, the Beirut Book Fair is rather calm, but plenty of Arabic writers were around, surrounded by fans and cameras...
I feel my first day here was successful, and Mr. Mroue had sold quite a few books, and Mohammed, the friendly greeter I met on the way in, even made sure to say goodbye. The real test comes with the official signing event for the book, Tuesday December 22 at 6pm Beirut time. I don't know how many are likely to come, but word is certainly getting around. More...

Luongo is also the author of the Frommer's Guide to Buenos Aires.
He can be reached at mtluongo@aol.com and +1-917-270-6390 and in Lebanon at +961-70-560-970.

Human Myths That Make Us Inhumane

Richard Ammon, GlobalGayz.com
New York City

I am continually saddened by how far and deep irrational thought (myth) can infuse a society, especially regarding a political or religious issue.

Gay marriage is one issue that arouses irrational political and religious discomfort. It’s an issue that burns because it involves or implies human sexual behavior, which is an irrational force that urges many people into irrational behavior, usually surrounded by silence, rejection or advocacy—anything but indifference. Sex makes people squirm either in pleasure or in dismay. The myth of sex.

Marriage (hetero) on the other hand evokes a kind of charming myth, as some kind of ritual that bestows blessing, legitimacy and social approval on people. It’s associated with family, home, children, security—normalcy and stability in a world of flux and uncertainty. The ‘family unit’ is seen as the unquestioned bedrock of a culture despite its stressed and fraught reality and high divorce rate. The myth of family.

Add in the myth of ‘gay’ to the combination of sex and marriage and this creates another kind of myth that unsettles nearly every major society today.

Myths are countless, from Disney fairies to the magical figures who started world religions to alleged saints slaying dragons. Many are harmless and stimulate artistic imagination or are useful to perpetuate certain social ideals like ‘equality’. But other myths are dangerous and deadly such as the anti-gay myths that emerge from religious sources like the Bible and the Koran or the Talmud. The impact of these ancient books--all with mythological foundations--on the lives of modern LGBT people is staggering and forceful since out of myth comes very real behavior. And a belief in the rightness of one’s religious or political myths can lead to violence and repression and even warfare, or it can also lead to a Mother Theresa with boundless compassion.

Anti-gay mythologies certainly have led to a disproportionate tsunami against homosexually-natured people across the planet, from a mild silence among rural Thai farmers to Mormon excommunication to outright murder within the American (mostly Christian) military or to public execution in Muslim quarters, and even pervades wealthy corporate structures (where the myth of wealth reigns).

In the matter of gay marriage, myth has served as a lethal weapon against the current push for human rights equality. Something blinds the common mind from seeing the reality before them: human sexuality exists on a broad spectrum of behaviors, from monk-like celibacy to Copenhagen’s sex clubs to monogamous/polygamous marriage to secret transvestism, as well as transsexuality, open marriage liaisons and gay marriage. Human behavior is unquestionably the most diverse of any creature on earth.

But this is a reality that myth wants to deny, control, and constrain. A logical brain that deals with a thousands of ‘real’ decisions every week (driving, shopping, Twittering) suddenly becomes blind and irrational when sexuality or same-gender love and marriage come into view.

And people make big business off of this irrationality: churches evoke millions of dollars to defeat the ‘gay agenda’; bogus reparative ‘therapists’ charge big fees to ‘cure’ vulnerable homosexuals; marketing companies hire out their services to defeat gay marriage legislation and newspapers increase sales by covering ‘scandalous’ LGBT activity.

How deep these irrational myths go is seen daily in the reports from large and small countries, wealthy or poor: Americans defeat proposed gay marriage legislation; Ugandan and Rwandan politicians want to throw gay advocates in jail; Singapore will not consider disturbing the hetero-ist status quo. Jamaicans would be happy to kill you.
(Photo left: murdered African lesbian activist Fanny Ann Eddy)

The ‘real’ world of humans is surprisingly shaped by myths we do not see or recognize but urge us to act in inhumane ways.

PS: Another gay/human rights activist, Walter Trochez of Honduras, (photo right) was murdered on December 13, 2009. The madness continues. See story here.

Another Gay Ambassador Appointed

Richard Ammon, GlobalGayz.com
Laguna Beach California

Now for some good news among the waves of homophobia swirling around these days, especially from Africa.

The new USA ambassador to New Zealand and Samoa was sworn in the other day. Not a major political jolt or international flap but a decidedly moving event considering that the new ambassador, David Heubner, is openly gay. He was given the oath of office by VP Joe Biden, our good friend, as Heubner's 'spouse' Dr. Duane McWaine held the Bible for the ceremony.

Speaking after the swearing in, with the Vice President at his side, the new ambassador told the 100-plus people gathered that his grandfather came to America as an immigrant and his father worked for many years as a butcher. Observing this three-generation achievement Heubner said, ”I was sworn in next to a spouse of a different race and the same gender as I am. In America, such a trajectory is not only possible, it is natural.”

Heubner (photo left) joins the small rank of present and former openly gay ambassadors who have represented the USA abroad in a top diplomatic position. Two of whom I actively recall are James Hormel (Belgium), appointed by President Clinton, and Michael Guest (Romania), under Bush 2. However, Guest resigned in protest six years later after failing to persuade the State Department to treat partners of LesBiGay foreign doplomats in an equal manner as heterosexual partners. “This is not about gay rights. … It’s about equal treatment of all employees, all of whom have the same service requirements, the same contractual requirements,” said Guest.

Heubner will have a slightly easier time on this issue under the current administration which has already begun to offer more benefits to LGB partners, although still not fully equal.

At Huebner's Washington, D.C. law firm, Sheppard Mullin, Huebner was head of their China Practice. Home town for the new ambassador is Los Angeles. He is expected to leave immediately for Wellington this week. I am not sure if his partner, Dr. Duane McWaine, a respected Los Angeles psychiatrist, (photo right) will accompany him at this time. New Zealand is along way to go to cuddle!

The diplomatic seal of the State Department under which Huebner will now travel as Ambassador is shown above.

Now the question is, when will a lesbian diplomat be offered the chance to take the same oath?

Condemn the Ugandan Gay-Killer Legislation

Richard Ammon, GlobalGayz.com
Laguna Beach California

Populist pastor Rick Warren, the Jesus-loving pastor in California who proclaims Christian values as his life guides, has again elbowed his way to notoriety by his refusal to condemn the gay-killer legislation being considered in Uganda. (Read bill here)

He is hiding behind the charade of “not commenting on the political process of other nations.”

So his previous condemning of homosexuality only applies to the USA and to no other nation? Hardly

His invectives against LGBT people apply worldwide. We are everywhere and we are much more similar than different. Condemn one and he condemns us all.

What outrageous hypocrisy to posture as a Christian leader and not be aghast at the horrors of more impending cultural genocide in Africa. The intended Uganda legislation proposes the death penalty for a sexual act between consenting people and criminalizes a parent for not reporting their gay or lesbian child. "It's catastrophic," said Frank Mugisha, chairman of Sexual Minorities Uganda (SMUG), a local activist group. "People are already being arrested and intimidated without the new law. What's going to happen if it's passed?"

This is a step far backward, even beyond the 1885 British laws that forbade ‘unnatural acts’ between consenting adults. Those laws resulted in the spread of the disease of homophobia across the world to all the UK colonies, including Uganda, of which today 40 of the 53 commonwealth countries still criminalize same-gender love. It should be a source of great shame to modern Britain.

How could Warren, a ‘man of the cloth’, not immediately see the danger of such draconian legislation and not jump in to condemn it. Warren has protested that thousands of Christians were killed for their faith in recent times. Does he not realize that 95% of the gay people being put under threat in Uganda are Christians? He is, in essence, by his silence on this matter, saying that it is OK to persecute Christians for reason of their sexuality, but not for their faith?

Archbishop Desmond Tutu, a clergyman of far greater wisdom and compassion is against Uganda’s use of religious bigotry to formulate state legislation that criminalizes citizens who simply want to love someone. He sees this as a defiling of religious purpose and a violation of Jesus’ message.

Uganda’s misguided violation of human rights in this matter is frightfully similar to South Africa’s former president Mbeki’s misguided opinion about HIV (not being the cause of AIDS) that resulted in needless tens of thousands of deaths among his countrymen, until he was thrown out of office for incompetence.

Ugandan president Museveni stands on the verge of egregious incompetence if he allows this legislation to go forward without opposing or vetoing it.

And Rick Warren faces a similar challenge. Either you subscribe to Christian values or you don’t. Jesus didn’t say you should love only certain neighbors and not others. Every Christian should condemn Uganda for proposing such an un-Jesus bill.

And don’t just blame Warren and Museveni. Behind this malevolent legislation is the bill's author, lawmaker David Bahati, who claims the legislation is about promoting family values. "Homosexuality is not part of the human rights we believe in," he said. (Author Jeff Sharlet claims this bill came about as a result of Bahati's membership in The Family.)

And don’t just blame Bahati. It’s no coincidence that this dimwit submitted his egregious bill to parliament shortly after a pitifully small but highly publicized three-day anti-gay conference was conducted earlier this year by American homophobics Scott Lively, who runs the California-based Abiding Truth Ministries (and claims gays caused the Nazi holocaust), Don Schmierer from International Healing Ministries (and board member of Exodus International) and Caleb Lee Brundidge, "a dreadlocked 'former' homosexual who claims he is cured and now works as a mentor of homosexuals looking for a cure." All are advocates of "praying away the gay," and have ‘faith’ that gay people can be made straight through spiritual intervention.

The trio also met with Ugandan parliamentarians and Uganda-based groups working to diminish human rights of LGBT persons; groups such as Kampala-based "moral watchdog," Family Life Network whose leader is Ugandan Stephen Langa. In their publicity, FLN said that Uganda "is now under extreme pressure from homosexual groups to de-criminalize homosexuality." (Last year a Uganda High Court ruling cited constitutional violations of the rights to privacy, property and the fundamental rights of women in the case of a lesbian who was arrested and harassed by police.)

Subsequent to the mini-conference an anti-gay group called Anti-Gay Task Force was formed to "fight against the spread of homosexuality and lesbianism in the country," according to Langa.

The anti-human rights effort was also fueled by Pastors Martin Sempa, Solomon Male and Michael Kyazze who said they received about 150 complaints from alleged sodomy victims claiming to have been abused by a number of church leaders. Uganda's gay community (SMUG) challenged the validity of the claim especially since the sources were dubious and there is no breakdown of the figures into heterosexual vs homosexual abuse. Sodomy is ignorantly presumed to be only a gay activity.

The sad thing is that all this friction and drama is really a tempest in a teacup as very few Ugandans have any interest in homosexuality. Gays have lived their lives quietly among the majority population for generations. The issue is being manipulated by a mere handful of political, religious and media groups to whip up attention, which in turn brings in foreign funds to ‘save’ Uganda from the evils of homosexuality and increase newspaper sales. Meanwhile less attention is paid to government corruption and the nation’s decrepit road systems (to name two of many wanting issues).

And it points out that American nosing into the affairs of other countries is not all military.

See more news about this issue at GlobalGayz News & Reports (Reports #30 +)

World AIDS Day Sundown

Richard Ammon, GlobalGayz
Laguna Beach, CA

The sun went down across the horizon this evening on this commemorative day for people lost to AIDS. A small candlelit gathering on the beach in Laguna (California) named friends, family and lovers who now live only in the memories of those who spoke. The prayers offered were a slight balm to survivors; the eternal waves lapping on the sand, a full moon and a slight evening chill over-arched the remembrance. Life and loss on the edge of the ocean. The faces, the laughs, the wit and sexiness of the departed flickered up, held for moments of silence, then released into the blur of individual memories.

It's hard to wrap life around death for long; there's so much to do tonight, tomorrow and next week. The busyness of being sentient doesn't really know what to do with permanent loss. How do I hold the long-ago body and soul of a lover in my vision; "how do you hold a moonbeam in your hands" as the musical line went.

Clinton Bleecker (photo) was such a person in my life for a while and he was very alive with his ethos... and then sickened and passed away at the age of thirty four. Too young.

Now I am 'old', as he would have been, and I feel the shortness of my own life. How we both regretted his shortness far too soon... Remembering is easy, being mortal not so, either long or short. Sic transit gloria mundi.

Farewell to Gay Sydney--For Now

Sydney, Australia
Richard Ammon, GlobalGayz
November 21, 2009

Saying good-by to this remarkably intelligent city is tinged with sadness for me. For a gay person to live or visit, it doesn't get much better than here.

The LGBT community is vitally alive in virtually every fabric of daily life, from the highest reaches of government (gay deputy mayor) to the frenetic dance clubs on Oxford Street to the highly visible HIV-prevention campaign of ACON to the presence of former high court justice Micheal Kirby launching a country-wide outreach program for LGBT Alzheimer's patients. A recent guest in town, hosted by ACON, was the 'gay prince' Manvendra from India who held various forums in several cities including Sydney to present his work at home on behalf of his fellow LGBT citizens in Gujurat state.

There are organizations for religious, sports, political, artistic and countless other lifestyle interests. Sex is an undercurrent that infuses life here and it is not a nightshade issue. There are legal gay sex clubs here for that specific purpose. Instead of hiding carnal desire underground or into risky places the club owners--and the authorities--have created these safe and acknowledging venues where condoms and conversation are available along with up-to-date information for the newly out guy and about HIV and safer sex.

This harbor city is blessed with one of the world's most beautiful coastal terrains of bluffs and beaches that stretch for miles, each with a village with food shops and promenades for strolling under palm trees along the azure blue waters--with the usual fine lifeguards.

It's a place any LGBT person could live peacefully, safely and within a rich community spirit.

Gay Life Way Down Under - Tasmania

Richard Ammon - GlobalGayz.com
Hobart, Tasmania, November 9, 2009

Gay life is everywhere, as we know, even here in Tasmania.

Some people think of this place as some remote Africa country hardly worth mentioning. But they couldn't be more wrong. Tasmania is Australia's southernmost state, off the south coast of the continent and separated by treacherous seas. But flying in from Sydney is a smooth trip on JetStar Airlines into the modest and tidy airport. Immediately a visitor notices how friendly folks are here--even if recalcitrant legislators here were the last in Australia to acknowledge the presence and legitimacy of homosexuality.

Now, a few short years later it has the best school anti-homophobia programs, Anti-discrimination Act and same-sex relationship laws in the country, all with public support. In 2004 Tasmania became the first Australian State to establish a civil union scheme for samesex and other couples.

The state tourism agency produces a 31-page brochure specific for LGBT visitors (www.discovertasmania.com) with a full history of the struggle for rights and a complete listing of all venues.

Hollywood gossip provided Tasmania with its most famous queer citizen, film idol Errol Flynn of the 1940s and 50s. Famously, one director shouted at Errol: ‘Stop acting like a goddam faggot, you no-good Tasmanian, bum, son-of-a-bitch.’ In this on-set outburst, Michael Curtiz, director of Flynn’s first Hollywood hit, Captain Blood, summed up two major themes of Errol’s life: his Tasmanian origins and his reputed bisexuality. In his autobiography, Flynn reflected happily on trips into the wilderness with his biologist father, Theodore, trapping native animals like the now extinct Tasmanian tiger.

By coincidence, our arrival in 2009 coincided with the annual TazPride Festival, this year from 31 October to 15 November. For this, the GLC Centre produced a 35-page program of events stretching over two weeks, with the state tourism office as one of the major sponsors. Tassie has come a long way in a few short years. TazPride events include a Halloween party, concerts, film festival, family picnic, dances, story telling, radio propgrams and Divine Divas.

In addition to the special events during the Festival, the gay community in Hobart has groups and organizations that offer legal advice services, youth counseling, women's groups, hiking club, social organizations such as Human Rights Week, Coming Out Proud Program and the annual Rainbow Award event--as well as a bar (Flamingos), a gay friendly cafe (Fresh), and accommodations (Huon Bush Retreat).

Overall, gay life is quietly alive here. At a gay day picnic (part of the 2-week gay TazFest) about 50 people showed up for a friendly folksy afternoon of events one might expect at a town fair: pet dog showing, a three-legged race, a drag dressing contest, a potato-sack race and a purse-throwing competition (won by a lesbian) along with tasty lentil burgers, hot dogs, numerous babies and curious neighbors who lived by the Parliament Oval park venue.

As one picnic-goer said, "we used to be more active and vocal but now that they've made us legal there's not much to fight for", referring to the decriminalization of homosexual behavior in 1997. Gay marriage is a far off dream as is full equality. "But we have it pretty good here. People don't hide but we don't have a parade either. There are no grinding issues."

Love Among the Ruins: USA, an Indian Prince, Love & HIV

Richard Ammon - GlobalGayz.com
November 4, 2009
Sydney, Australia

While America was limping from the loss of two important marriage-rights elections (New Jersey and Maine), across the globe in India there was a cause for celebration of sorts.

Prince Manvendra Gohil, the famous ‘gay Prince’ from Rajpipla state in the western Gujarat area of India announced last night to an audience in Sydney that he had found his “soul mate”. Addressing a forum sponsored by ACON, Australia’s largest community-based LGBT health and HIV/AIDS organization.

During the two-hour conference, Manvendra answered many questions to put him from Andy Quan of ACON and from an attentive audience about his personal life and his HIV charity work in his home state. Some questions focused on his history as the only royal personage to come out as gay, in 2005, and his subsequent rejection and acceptance by his family, the media and the people in his ‘realm’. (His family has headed Rajpipla state for over 600 years and Manvendra is the 39th heir in line to that throne. His father is the current maharaji.)

Manvendra told how he suffered a nervous breakdown and was forced into an unwanted marriage (that failed) as he was coming to terms with his sexual orientation. Fortunately, he said, he was ‘saved’ by two important authoritative figures who helped him to see his sexuality as normal and as something not to hide from. “I was very fortunate in the hospital because my doctor completely understood my condition and told me there was nothing wrong with me... that I was normal and that homosexuality was an acceptable variety of human sexuality...he saved my life.”

The other person of deep influence for the prince was Ashok Row Kavi, India’s bold, colorful and articulate gay rights activist who led the gay movement out of darkness in the 1980s and 90s and is now in Delhi working for UNAIDS, and is still a major spokesperson for LGBT India.

“I love Ashok,” said Manvendra during the forum held at Paddington Town Hall, “he gave me the courage to come out of my closet and be proud of myself. He was my ‘mother’ and nurtured me—he still inspires me.”

The audience applauded the prince’s continuing boldness in spreading the message of gay rights and advocating for LGBT health care in a huge homophobic complex country through his charity work with the Lakshya Trust that he started in 2000.

Lakshya project manager Sylvester Merchant (left in photo) accompanied the Prince and responded to numerous questions about the health and education efforts of the Trust that especially targets MSM at risk people (including truck drivers) many of whom are marginalized or hidden from mainstream health and education in India. Lakshya also welcomes and supports another stigmatized population, the hijras, transgender/transvestites who live outside mainstream society.

Manvendra described a perspective that hijras have played a important symbolic role in his state’s cultural history going back over hundreds of years. “They have been considered as ‘auspicious’ personages” with special powers of wisdom and blessedness at such ceremonies as weddings and births. “So we welcome them and we make sure they have their own programs at Lakshya.”

As the questions opened for the audience, it was inevitable that the question would be asked about his own romantic life. One questioner cautiously asked the Prince if he had a significant other, with the rejoinder that of course the Prince did not have to answer.

With a wide smile and sparkling eyes and without dropping a beat, the Prince took the microphone said “I will answer that question, gladly. I have met someone recently within the past few months and I can say I have found my soul mate,” to which the audience responded with a hearty round of cheerful applause.

It was a special moment for all, to hear this brave and vulnerable royal of high bearing—once isolated by his status and sexuality-- offering his shared happiness and humanity with very supportive like-minded others who know well the difficulty of finding love and compassion in a homophobic world.

It was an evening of courage, wisdom and truth telling. As Manvendra said toward the end, there is a Hindi saying “Truth always prevails”.

Aslso see:
Global Forum on MSM
APCOM (Asia Pacific Coalition on Male Sexual Health)
(The Prince is on the Board of APCOM)

New Hate Crimes Bill: New Era of Civil Rights Recognition for LGBT Americans (?)

From: Examiner.com October 31, 2009
Sonoma County (California) Civil Rights Examiner
By Megan Cofey

The expanded federal Hate Crime Prevention Act, named for 1998 victims Matthew Shepard and James Byrd, Jr. and signed into law by President Obama on October 28, may end up being much more significant than its scope would suggest.

Although the Department of Justice avers that hate crime statutes deter bias-motivated attacks, it offers no statistics to substantiate that claim. Certainly the original 1969 federal law—which covered hate crimes based on the victims’ race, color, religion or national origin—was not sufficient to save the life of the new law’s less famous namesake, James Byrd, Jr., who was killed because he was black. And even if the new measure had been in effect when its other namesake, Matthew Shepard, was killed for being gay, it is unlikely that his crystal-meth-bingeing attackers would have been rational enough to be deterred by the threat of increased sentencing penalties for their crime.

What is much more certain about this latest incarnation of federal hate crime law is that it is the first ever piece of federal legislation protecting LGBT rights to become the law of the land (and the first federal measure to explicitly protect transgender people).

This fact could make the new statute far more significant than its debatable impact as a deterrent to bias-motivated violence. By its recognition that lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender Americans represent a group of people likely to be the targets of discrimination, the Hate Crime Prevention Act could be used to argue that LGBT citizens represent a “suspect class,” and as such, are deserving of “strict scrutiny” regarding any regulations affecting them.

In lay terms, this means that it may now be much harder for any government in the US to pass laws that discriminate against gay and transgender people, such as Proposition 8 in California or Question 1 in Maine. It also may speed the passage of the Employment Non-Discrimination Act and the demise of DOMA and Don’t Ask Don’t Tell.

Who knows but that this one seemingly modest new hate crime law could signal the beginning of a whole new era of civil rights recognition for LGBT Americans….

How Did These Homophobes Lose Their Humaneness?

(Humaneness: marked by compassion, sympathy, or consideration for humans or animals)

Well, isn't this a sweet headline from a government official:

Ugandan Ethics Minister James Nsaba Buturo spoke with journalists today. While acknowledging the great numbers of “foreigners” who express grave concern over the possibility of such a [proposed anti-gay] bill becoming law, he made it clear that he is not paying attention to them.

Buturo balked at the notion that the proposed bill — which, among other things, would criminalise any public discussion of homosexuality and could penalise an individual who knowingly rented property to a homosexual — constituted a human rights violation. “We are really getting tired of this phrase human rights. It is being abused. Anything goes, and if you are challenged? ‘Oh, it’s my right’,” the minister snapped.
Read more: African Veil, Asylum Law, Behind the Mask

And then there's Dr. Rick Scarborough of Vision America Action who declared: “This is a sad day for America. While a small minority of homosexual activists are celebrating, [signing of the Hate Crimes Bill last week] thousands of pastors, priests and rabbis are lamenting their loss of First Amendment freedoms. I for one refuse to bow before this unjust and unconstitutional law, and I intend to continue to preach the whole counsel of God as revealed in Scripture." [That is, homosexuality as sin; homophobia as virtue.]

Add to this Pat Robertson's rant against Obama's signing the Hate Crimes Bill:
"The noose has tightened around the necks of Christians to keep them from speaking out on certain moral issues. And it all was embodied in something called the Hate crimes bill that President Obama said was a major victory for America. I’m not sure if America was the beneficiary. [...] We have voted into office a group of people who are opposed to many of the fundamental Christian beliefs of our nation. And they hold to radical ideology, and they are beginning to put people sharing their points of view into high office," - Pat Robertson (Read the comments that follow his rant.)

Where do these homophobes come from and how did they lose their humaneness?

Are they so callous to the suffering of other human beings that they continue to advocate discrimination and 'spiritual violence'? Maybe if these Christian men had come upon Matthew Shepard or James Byrd and seen their bloody broken bodies they might have softened their fierce stance against a population of stigmatized 'different' people--or maybe not.

What kind of vision do they have for their society, for their fellow citizens who are not like them and who live and love beyond the cage of "counsel of God as revealed in Scripture."

A Princely Gay Man - Manvendra Singh Gohil of India Comes Out

Laguna Beach, CA - October 29, 2009
Richard Ammon - GlobalGayz.com

No question that rank carries privilege and privilege carries fame. This time it belongs to an Indian prince who came out as gay in 2005 and shocked his family and fascinated the Indian public.

Prince Manvendra Singh Gohil of the Rajpipla region in the state of Gujarat, the westernmost state in India (Mahatma Gandhi was also born in Gujarat) decided he could no longer live the heterosexual life his family expected. After a marriage debacle Gohil announced his homosexuality and was immediately disowned by his royal family.

Not a shrinking flower, Gohil publicized his ‘coming out’ on the Oprah show in 2007 and proved to be a charming, articulate and intelligent spokesman for gay authenticity and gay rights. Since then he has traveled the world speaking out against discrimination.

Instead of withdrawing behind gilded walls and silken pillows he has taken on charitable projects that include a hospital for HIV infected people and, most recently, building India’s first retirement home for elderly gays and lesbians (expected to open in late 2009).

Gohil’s coming out in ’05 happened coincidentally with a vigorous and determined campaign by courageous Indian activists to decriminalize homosexuality in India. In July of this year the Delhi High Court struck down India’s colonial era anti-gay law.

He and his family have reconciled as they have come to see him as a more empowered and purposeful person. In 2000, before coming out, he started the Lakshya Trust, a community-based organization that now provides support and education for HIV/AIDS prevention among men who have sex with men (MSMs). Lakshya Trust today runs three centers where men get health information, social support and counseling services.

The Trust has grown to become a research surveillance site for the Government of India’s National AIDS Control Organization and was awarded the Joint United Nations Program on AIDS (UNAIDS) Civil Society Award in 2006. His Highness is also the India regional representative on the Executive Board of the Asia-Pacific Coalition of Male Sexual Health (APCOM), a regional network addressing HIV issues affecting gay men and
transgender people.

The most remarkable aspect of this man is not his royal trappings or his constructed buildings or his charity organization but his out and proud gay presence in the vastly homophobic Indian culture. This is a place that has for over a century vilified, condemned, punished and beaten anyone caught or admitting to homosexual activity.

There are many out gay activists in India today and have braved the scorn of the populace and been brushed aside by a 'high society' brainwashed by punitive and archaic British anti-gay laws. It is easy to reject gay 'commoners' with no pedigree other than their intelligence and advanced university degrees. But it is not so easy to dismiss the blue-blood heir of a 650 year-old aristocratic dynasty, even though it carries no legal power today. In India reputation, rank andstatus have a persuasion that transcend normal social attitudes and carry authority and legitimacy above the ordinary.

Prince Gohil cannot be said to be heroic but he has un-common distinction and being homosexual he has unusual distinction as well, and he is choosing to use his distinct position to carry the message of social equality more noticeably than any non-royal can.

And that takes courage. To bring light into darkness. To bring tolerance into bigotry. To bring dignity to the outcast and compassion to the rejected. That is the true royalty of this man.

See this page for other recent News & Reports about India this year.

For Gays and Lesbians Apartheid is Alive and Well

Laguna Beach, CA - October 28, 2009

Richard Ammon - GlobalGayz.com

Last night on PBS a drama titled ‘Endgame’ was broadcast nationwide that focused on the intense and delicate negotiations in South Africa in the late 1980’s that brought down apartheid and brought a new dawn of democracy in that tormented country.

It was a gripping drama of real life brought close up with cameras, script and fine acting by players who had not previously been privy to the dangers and risks of the political and murderous chess match. At any one time, any one of the historical figures could have been assassinated, including Nelson Mandela whose release from 27 years in prison was the keystone to the new order of life in South Africa.

I couldn’t help thinking of the poignant parallel between the South African apartheid mentality that justified so much killing and violence, and the ongoing apartheid of today that continues against homo-affectional citizens around the world that manifests in murder, brutality, imprisonment and discrimination.

The singular enemy that the black-race ANC faced was the white-race National Party, a political authoritarian system of governance in place since the turn of the 20^th century, which in 1948 manipulated apartheid into an official policy of repression.

More than One Enemy
But the homosexual ‘movement’ faces more than one enemy embodied in a single figurehead with an armed militia. Gay and lesbian citizens are surrounded by many forces that wish to minimize or destroy us daily in many countries.

We are assaulted by political enemies such as legislative systems who pass anti-gay laws; as well as legal systems that hand down unjust rulings; religious enemies that stigmatize gay people as sinners; societal enemies such as schools who allow bullying and refuse LGBT clubs; secular institutional enemies such as corporations who fire gay employees or refuse to extend health benefits to domestic partners; a military enemy that forbids homosexual personnel; and individual enemies who walk the streets or schoolyards with hatred in mind to attack queer or queer-looking people.

Yet such ongoing anti-gay discrimination is not seen as apartheid because so many of these institutions justify it and declaim against gay rights or protections.

When a lie is told loud and long enough it eventually feels like a truth—a notion that worked so well in Germany in the 1930’s and 40’s that soldiers and militias and individual vigilante groups felt justified, even righteous, in the carnage against gypsies, Jews, gays and Poles and others, thinking they were actually doing good to cleanse the Aryan society of pollutants.

The Violence Continues
So too today as these many enemies (ex-gay ministries, family focus groups in addition to the institutions) seek to cleanse gay contaminants from their ranks and pews and homes and parenthood. Their messages feed simple minds toward violence and bigotry--even in ‘developed’ countries with ‘advanced’ societies.

Two apartheid-style attacks occurred recently, one in the UK against an off-duty gay policeman (also this report) The other attack in the Queens borough of New York City against a gay man on his way home.

Even in the face of real-life facts (“I was born gay”), scientific studies (homosexuality in nature), disproven fallacies (gays are pedophiles), human rights progress (UN declaration of human rights)... people committed to ignorance and blindness insist on seeing in the darkness and shadows strangers whom they do not know yet target as sinners and criminals - victims of apartheid thinking.

I think this struggle will never end because non-rational religious thinking infuses this mode of discrimination. Faith and belief rarely submit to logic, reason or evidence. The best we can hope for is legal protection against violence since there is no other means by which by which LGBT people can fend off the sword of religious contempt.

Their are exceptions of course. To their great credit, working uphill against spiritual violence are SoulForce and Other Sheep

Human rights are frail against prejudice and aroused emotion; anger will always cut through dignity with a bloody machete as it did in Rwanda and Burundi against enemy tribes and continues today in many African countries against gays (such as currently in Uganda), though nowadays not usually with hand-held weapons—except in Iraq where the killing squads use knives and guns for individual executions. In the USA fists and bats are favored.

The Matthew Shepard and James Byrd Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act, the first major federal civil rights law protecting lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people was just passed by the US Congress but not as a free-standing bill. It was attached to an obscene $680-billion measure for the Pentagon’s budget, which includes $130 billion for ongoing military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. (Photo left: James Byrd, Jr)

The great irony in this Congressional act was that under the cover of protecting some innocents at home with a hate crimes statute, Congress authorized massive acts of war against countless innocents abroad.

We welcome the crumbs of the Shepard/Byrd law but for gays and lesbians the pandemic of apartheid is alive and well.

Arab Homophobia, Poverty, Religion and Forbidden Sex

Westhampton, MA - October 18, 2009
Richard Ammon - GlobalGayz.com

According to a new UN report presented in Tunis, Tunisia, on October 20th, Tunisia, Libya and United Arab Emirates are the only 3 Arab nations where famine has been eradicated. The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations conducted the survey of 17 Arab states ahead of a global summit on hunger, malnutrition and food security, set for November 16th-18th in Rome. (There are a total of 25 Arab nations, ranging from Morocco in the west to Iraq in the east. Iran is considered Persian not Arabic.)

Certainly this is good news for a few but overall for the majority of the 325 million people in that swath of earth, it's not. Poverty and hunger are ills that should be resolved by good governance and grass roots organizations to relieve the problems. But these two 'plagues' persist in the majority of Arab countries as governments don't appear to take the suffering of their own people seriously. Leaders would rather buy weapons and tolerate corruption than cure misery.

And it's a curious fact that these same impoverished lands are also among the most homophobic cultures on the planet--in addition to Jamaica. The range of attitudes and treatments in these countries runs from stigma and rejection to actual death penalties.

Is there any common thread between these two phenomena, between deprivation and discrimination, between the anger within poverty and the anger at homosexuals?
(Photo right: traditional friendship kiss)

Deprivation breeds anger in it victims; deprivation is cruel and unusual punishment for no justifiable reason and renders a victim helpless and hateful. Since an individual can't strike out against something as amorphous and complex as a government it is more convenient and available to strike out against something particular and local, such as a person caught being sexual with someone of the same gender.

As well, these Arabic countries are also Muslim countries which interprets Islam's holy scriptures in a way that urges people to condemn and scorn homosexuals. This religious condemnation legitimizes expressions of anger, which ordinarily is suppressed by authorities. But gays represent a legitimate target for this displaced anger and the reaction toward them is often excessive and harsh or murderous (some call it 'spiritual violence') - even to the point of an honor killing of a family member to redeem family's shame for have a homosexual among them.

As if privation and religion are not enough drivers of violence, there is another urge against homosexuality in these Arab/Muslim cultures. This is the well-documented 'open secret' than many, if not a majority, of pre-marital men experience their first sexual contact with other males.

Usually this natural drive has to be shrouded in privacy, denial and guilt, oppressive forces that evoke silent resentment at having to hide what should be a thrill. Instead it becomes a shame; what should be pleasure is turned into anguish at desiring carnal intimacy. And for genuinely gay Arabs their sense of self is clouded and punctuated with fear and self-doubt.

(That said, not all male-male erotic activity is private: see this CNN video on boy sex slaves.)

At a certain pitch of anguish and frustration all these negative feelings can sometimes be expurgated, purged, by turning individually or in a group to verbal or physical violence against an actual or alleged homosexual who is found out or suspected.

It is a very sad entanglement of poverty, helplessness, social anger, religious conditioning, family shame and personal guilt (or any one of these) that drive homophobia into the blind recesses of most Arab minds.

And it's not just male homosexuality. In a recent book from Arab Jordan, Bareed Mista3jl, one lesbian recounted this most painful experience of enraged homophobia from her own father:

My father has a bad temper. One day a girl came back home with me after school. We were sitting on the floor of my bedroom kissing. My father walked in on us, did not say a word, and asked the girl to leave. Then he beat me up with his fists and his belt and his cane. "Shut up before I break my fist on your face...you animal...I curse the day you were born...' I begged him to stop. I begged like I never thought I would beg in my life. I cried out please, please. I screamed with all my lungs. He screamed, 'you will not learn your lesson unless I bury you. If I ever see you doing so much as looking at a girl I will pluck out your eyes and break your skull.' I begged and pleaded. No human being should ever have to plead for anything, especially from her own father. It's been eight years since. He broke so much more than my arm that day. Every time I remember the way I pleaded for him to stop, I start crying and can't stop... (more about the book)

The rage of homophobia is the rage of deprivation, religious repression, secret shame, family dishonor. Overcoming such rage will take generations of defiance and courage and truth-telling. This is true of many societies around the world, not just the Arab world. Poverty and deprivation and repressive religions and homophobia are everywhere.

Also see this Facebook Forum: Gay Arab Reality
And this report: The Gay Sons of Allah
A commentary: Love, Sex and Religion--Murder in Muslim Morocco
Links to other gay Arab sites:
Gay and Lesbian Arab Society (USA)
Gay and Lesbian Arabs
Village Voice Article on Gay Arabs
Gay Arabs Come Out in Beruit
Book: Gay Travels in the Muslim World
Book: Unspeakable Love