Gay Brazil 2011--An Enormous Community

Richard Ammon
GlobalGayz.com
April 28, 2011

Brazil is a dazzle. Every aspect of this huge country overwhelms, challenges, stimulates or puzzles the first time visitor, which I am. I came for three full weeks and each day has been a unique chapter in my memory book--even just driving a car on the main highways here. Brazil decided decades ago, unfortunately, to invest in roads instead of railways, thanks to the lobbying influence of the oil, rubber and auto industries. The result is that today tens of thousands of heavy cargo trucks--6 to 24 wheelers--blaze along the highways making pleasure driving anything but. But that's another whole story. (photo above: Iguacu Falls)

My story is about LGBT life in Brazil which is also a lesson in overwhelm. There are hundreds of lesbian, gay, trans and bisexual organizations in this country, mostly in the major cities along the Atlantic coastline which stretches over 4000 miles south to north. There are dozens and dozens of cities, large and small, gigantic and tiny and virtually most of them have some kind of LGBT social life and activist group worthy of respect and praise. This despite a larger national milieu that is Catholic and Evangelical and homophobic that tries to block any pro-gay legislation in the congress.

So the clever LGBT strategists have turned to the courts to work their will. By presenting numerous law suits to state and federal judges on behalf of issues such as immigration, employment, inheritance or same-sex relationship recognition a number of important 'rights' have been gained--without congressional approval. So these few rights gained are judicial not legislative and activists want those decision written into the country's statutes since court decisions are always subject to challenge and are sometimes overturned. (photo left: Florianopolis gay beach)

Meanwhile the presence of LGBT organizations across the country has mushroomed to the point where the organizations now have a 'meta-organization' that helps coordinate them all. Such an umbrella organization is called ABGLT: The Brazilian Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transvestite and Transexual Association, founded in 1995. Today, ABGLT is a national network of 203 organizations, of which 141 are gay, lesbian, bi and trans groups, and the remaining 62 are collaborating organizations involved with human rights and AIDS. ABGLT is the largest GLBT network in Latin America.

Two hundred and three, or a hundred and forty-one to be precisely gay, is a daunting amount of information for a writer to consider when attempting to write a story about 'gay Brazil'. Not to mention the spectacular natural environment of this country--the size of the USA--and 180 million people ranging from homophobic chic Mercedes owners to primitive jungle tribes with little outside contact some of whose spiritual practices are inclusive of homosexual behavior.

Where to begin? Next blog.

Gay Botswana - An Historic Event Unfolds

Intro: Peaceful Botswana in southern Africa is both modern-urban and simple-rural, rich and poor, prosperous and challenged, with both an anti-gay law and a playful assertive gay community the breathes freely. It's a huge country with elephants, deserts, paved roads, a tolerant President and intolerant churches, a big university and various gay-friendly venues and lots of out, young, bold LGBTs.

By Richard Ammon
GlobalGayz.com
March 2011

By coincidence I arrived in Gaborone, the capital of Botswana, on a quiet yet historic day of human rights in Botswana: for the first time ever a law suit was filed against the government of Botswana claiming that the existing law criminalizing homosexual behavior (not 'being' homosexual) is unconstitutional. (photo right, parliament building).

The suit was jointly filed by LeGaBiBo gay organization (Lesbians, Gays and Bisexuals of Botswana) and a Botswana human rights organization, Bonela (Botswana Network on Ethics, Laws and HIV/AIDS)who have been planning the submission for months. At the press conference the director of Bonela described how the law unfairly discriminates against a certain portion of citizens and is therefore against the constitutional guarantee of equal rights.

In their joint press release they stated: "Homosexuality has been in African culture since time immemorial; it is actually homophobia that is ‘un-African’. it was the European colonialists and preachers who imported the hatred against same sex behaviour. They brought the criminal categorization of that behavior. The acts were indigenous. The name and the crime were imported...

An in-depth report about gay Bostwana can be read at GlobalGayz.com
Also see Gay Botswana New & Reports and Photo Galleries

Africa and Homosexuality: Is It Natural and Native?

By Richard Ammon
GlobalGayz.com
April 10, 2011

On March 5 this year the British Broadcasting Company, always looking for unusual or controversial subject matter to entertain its audience, found spice in sponsoring a debate about homosexuality in Africa. It's a topic that is guaranteed to stir up dissonance and disagreement and, true to form, the televised 'discussion' indeed did just that. With a hand-picked audience of pro-gay and anti-gay activists from across Africa the stage was carefully set to hear rational and emotional arguments about same-sex orientation and behavior.

To me it felt rather like a staged carnival show with pre-set performers revealing (and some shouting) their reasons and biases for or against an imagined 'gay agenda' in Africa.

(Photos: protests outside the BBC studios during the debate)

The official title of the debate was "Is Homosexuality Un-African?" With five panelists (listed below), three pro-gay and two anti-gay, the underlying message was pre-set, appropriately in my mind, to help enclose gay rights into a larger frame of human rights. The moderator, Zeinab Badawi , made an effort to be polite to the homophobes--including panelist David Bahati, author of Uganda's proposed death-to-gays legislation.

Despite anti-gay comments from certain audience members who repeated the usual 'unnatural--man4woman--sinful--child-recruitment--procreation' arguments against homosexuals, the slant was clear. Leading African lesbian and gay activists in the audience were given turns to speak against the anti-gay arguments--including Monica Tabengwa whose group LeGaBiBo in Botswana is suing the government for its alleged unconstitutional statutes against homosexuality.

The positive flavor of the program was not unexpected since the UK (home of the BBC) has become one of the most pro-gay countries in the modern world, along with South Africa. The UK requires its world-wide ambassadors to advocate equality and human rights. (It should, as penance, since it was the 19th and early 20th century British Empire laws that criminalized homosexuality and set the stage for today's world-wide homophobia to take root in many former colonies.)

At the end of the debate Bahati said he was leaving the debate and South Africa "with a bleeding heart" meaning he was disheartened by hearing opposing views; he is not going to be dissuaded from his arch-homophobic attitude or his legislation no matter what reasoned or personal testimony he encounters. So the social disease of homophobia continues to be spread.

Someone should have said to him "now you know how gay hearts bleed in Uganda under your governance."

The debate was broadcast on the BBC system on March 12 and 13 and the video was released to the media. The video is available free and the link is posted here. It lasts 47 minutes.

See the debate here.

Debate panelists were:
Paula Akugizibwe - Human Rights Activist, Rwanda
David Bahati - Member of Parliament, Uganda
Eusebius McKaiser - Writer & Lecturer, South Africa
Festus Mogae - President of Botswana, 1998-2008
Sideeqah Tunde-Lawal - Muslim Youth Leader, Nigeria

Man`s basic vice, the source of all his evils, is the act of unfocusing his mind, the suspension of his consciousness, which is not blindness, but the refusal to see, not ignorance, but the refusal to know. Ayn Rand

Homophobia is an Addiction to Anger and Fear

By Richard Ammon
GlobalGayz.com

I have seen and read about homophobia for many years, from the streets in Eastern Europe to the recent debate on South African TV ('Is Homosexuality un-African?').

A report came across recently that Scott Lively--the American anti-gay crusader who stirred up gay-hate legislation in Uganda last year--was recently in Moldova warning legislators of the impending "outbreak of homosexuality" if they passed an anti-discrimination bill.

There are plenty of reactions to his trip, mostly critical. See JoeMyGod or Throckmorton and numerous others.

The usual vociferous pro and con voices are shouting at each other in public forums. Fortunately in quiet courtroom and research offices the truth about same-sex attraction as a natural phenomenon is proving itself legally and scientifically.

But regardless of these reasoned and studied efforts the homophobes continue their rants and raves. They will not drop their cause or cease their activities. One wonders why?

Homophobia is an Addiction to Anger and Fear
I think an essential force in all this fierce hateful drive against homosexuality is 'addiction'.

To quote the American Society of Addiction Medicine:
"Addiction is a primary, chronic disease of brain reward, motivation, memory and related circuitry. Dysfunction in these circuits leads to characteristic biological, psychological, social and spiritual manifestations. This is reflected in the individual pursuing reward and/or relief by substance use and other behaviors. The addiction is characterized by impairment in behavioral control, craving, inability to consistently abstain, and diminished recognition of significant problems with one’s behaviors and interpersonal relationships…"

It doesn't take much to read into this definition the angry behaviors of many religious fundamentalists and evangelicals who spew vehement and toxic curses against homosexuality; who are defiantly clear-minded that it is a moral plague upon the earth, a demonic drive, an agenda to destroy heterosexual marriage, an anti-Christ, a sexual disease (along with AIDS)brought about by unnatural behavior--and they are sure that all this is a matter of choice. End of argument.

Their anti-gay words and actions are driven by an addictive craving and fear; a craving to feel angry which feels empowering, bold, forceful. And out of control. They cannot let go and cannot reach a middle ground of understanding. Hence their impairment in behavioral control.

They cannot let go because of two irrational forces in their lives, religious conviction and fear of human sexuality. The craving for religious fervor and the feeling of insensate fear are both irrational conditions. In homophobic addicts religious anger and sexual fear are both aroused emotional states of mind, separate and distinct from the more reflective and moderating cortex.

(The monastic life is a balance between these mental conditions, a deeply felt devotion and a reasoned management of that devotion. They don't rant or bash the 'enemy' in public.)

For addicts there is no reasoned middle ground. A blind, tenacious, unquestioned conviction founded in unproven religious mythology becomes an hostile emotional substance that offers spiritual ease or relief against perceived enemies. Such self-righteous fervor they believe is to be shared.

At the same time fundamentalist spiritual addicts secretly feel a deep seated fear of their own sexuality (homo or hetero), that mysterious force within one's psyche that is ever present and on the edge of overt expression. It's an animal-like impulse for objects of desire. Such an urge is to be suppressed; it underlies their loathing toward homosexuals.

Religious fervor and sexual desire--one expressed the other repressed--grinding against each other in the 'souls' of addicts. This tension increases confusion and drives hateful emotional expression against a target (gays) outside themselves; it's done in the name of another target (pleasing God) outside themselves; God is used as a political weapon.

Clearly we see here the "dysfunction in these circuits" that lead to the bizarre "psychological, social and spiritual manifestations." Who in their right mind would profane a funeral with hateful posters quoting Biblical distortions! Who would encourage inhumane discrimination in foreign countries!

More than one religious clergyman has failed to balance these two internal forces--from Catholic priests to evangelical preachers. For clergy the result is incredible hypocrisy and crime. For laymen and self-proclaimed pastors the result is hate speech, irrational beliefs, gay bashing and dangerous legislation.

The great challenge is to find recovery. Homophobes want to 'cure' homosexuality, an impossible task. In return we ask if homophobia is curable. The answer, fraught with difficulty, is yes. We are born with a pre-wired sexual orientation. Babies are not born with anger and fear.

Also see:
-Avert: Homophobia, prejudice & attitudes to gay men and lesbians
-Wikipedia: Homophobia s a range of negative attitudes toward gay people
-ADL: Homophobia is hatred or fear of homosexuals
-Statistics About Homophobia: National Organization for Women
-Racism and homophobia ‘worse in chaotic environments’