Death for Gays in Iran Creates Underground Railway

By Arsham Parsi
Executive Director
Iranian Railroad for Queer Refugees (IRQR)
www.irq.net

Iranian queers have well-founded fears of persecution based on their sexual orientation or gender identity. The Penal Code of the Islamic Republic of Iran, permits the punishment of queer people by lashing, hanging, stoning, cutting in half by a sword, or dropping from a tall building or cliff.

My own and IRQR's experiences in researching human rights violations in Iran suggests that in "morals" cases, substantial evidence is likely to be flouted by the judiciary in the name of protecting cultural and religious standards. In Iran, four male witnesses who attest that a defendant is homosexual, even on the basis of rumor or slander, will have their testimony accepted instead of being more rigorously cross-examined.

Iranian legal and judicial procedures ensure that a judge's prejudice against a defendant, even based solely on a defendant's appearance or demeanor, is allowed near-limitless scope to determine a verdict based purely on subjective opinion. It is worth noting that even under the reform government of Mohammed Khatami, the Islamic judiciary remained one of the bulwarks of religious conservatism in Iran. This has now strengthened even more under the hardline rule of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

The death penalty for homosexuality does not merely exist on paper. It is practiced and enforced widely in the Islamic Republic. According to Amnesty International, at least 734 people have been executed in Iran in since 2008. It is certain Iranian queers were among them. Trials on moral charges in Iran are held on camera, but international outrage over the frequency of executions has led the government to exercise tighter control over press reports of executions. For these reasons, confirming the frequency of executions for homosexuality is effectively impossible. Yet those repressive measures have not been able to hide the ugly truth from the eyes of the world. I will report the following case for legal and historical records.

On May 27, 2010, Iranian security forces raided Reza and Alireza's apartment and arrested both men, along with some guests who were visiting. Their computer and personal belongings were confiscated as evidence. Reza, 23, and Alireza, 28, are partners and live together in a small rented apartment in Sari. Alireza works at his father's real estate office. Reza stays at home, as his more outwardly 'feminine' behavior attracts homophobic comments from neighbors. Neither of the men's families accepts their sexuality or their decision to live together as a loving couple.

The guests were released by the security forces a few days later, after being forced to testify that Reza and Alireza lived together as lovers. They say that during their arrest they heard that the police were responding to a complaint by the two men's families about their sons. Reza and Alireza were sent to the Revolutionary Court of Sari. We do not know what sentence they have received, but there are rumors that it is the death penalty.

As a result of all the pressure and well-founded fear of persecution, many Iranian queers have had to leave Iran and seek asylum. A refugee myself, I went through lots of difficulties and now because of my work with the IRQR I am in contact with hundreds of queer Iranian asylum seekers. Being in limbo is not only unjust and difficult, but also intolerable and frightening.

There is international support for Iranian queers today and I thank all elected officials, organizations and individuals who are working with us in order to help more Iranian queers. But we need more support since the number of refugees is increasing due to Iranian government's daily pressures.

Some governments sign conventions or issue statements that Iran must stop the violation of human rights of its citizens. But when it comes to refugee issues, they reject asylum seekers and advise them to go back to Iran, hiding their sexual orientation to stay safe. This paradox is very significant.

It seems that in the last few years, most organizations like the United Nations and international governments see Iran's nuclear program as the only issue of concern. As you know, the United Nation Security Council has passed another sanction on Iran for nuclear enrichment. So why didn't the first, second or third sanctions work, and what is the point of a forth and further possible sanctions?

In the meantime, queers, women, religious minorities, ethnic minorities, students and just about every single Iranian has no basic human rights or freedom - how long will we continue to talk about nuclear bombs? Why is human rights violation not the first priority of international organizations and governments? Is writing a few official letters and statement on Iran's human rights situation enough?

Especially regarding the Iranian queer community, we have the responsibility of documenting their unjust situation. Our most difficult issue is not dealing with the Iranian government, but lobbying the European governments to acknowledge the very real fear of persecution Iranian queers have, and their need for international protection. If they have concerns about refugee numbers, then it would be great if they could focus more on human rights issue in Iran and try to find a diplomatic resolution.

Finally, I would like to say that the Iranian Railroad for Queer Refugees is ready to work with all local and international organizations, officials elected, and individuals in order to improve the global queer community.

Let's dream of a day where no one will be discriminated against for their sexual orientation and gender identity, and everyone will have their peace and freedom.

Life is Hard

By Richard Ammon
GlobalGayz.com
July 4, 2010

Look at this daunting and harsh video. See the images and read the text. It was filmed in 2010 in the huge Methare district just outside Nairobi in Kenya.

With its neighbor, the Kibera district, the two are the largest slum cities in Africa. (photo)

I visited this 'city' in 2008 during a lull in the post-election riots that resulted in more than 1500 deaths from political and tribal 'warfare'. See my photo gallery of the visit.

What makes these images--the film and the photos--so disturbing is not just the dreadful living conditions for so many people but that the situation has been allowed to continue for so many years--generations. Nothing changes regardless of who is governing in central Nairobi, just ten miles away. Methare can be seen from atop the parliament building tower. (photo left below)

To add insult to injury, members of parliament are paid an astonishing $126,000 yearly salary and recently, in June 2010, had the effrontery to propose an increase to $175,000. The proposal was met with howls of protest.

The monthly minimum wage for farm workers is $40. In Kenya's capital, the monthly minimum wage for laborers is $82. Add to this the Corruption Perceptions Index 2005 that ranked Kenya 144th out of 159 countries for corruption.

This corruption is not just in money matters but corruption of the soul that is indifferent to the sufferings of fellow citizens. Corruption in the social conscience allows such misery to continue for generations.

Look at photo number 35 in my gallery and tell me that parliament members deserve such an egregious payroll amount. How can anyone with a human heart look at this scene--and the other photos and the video--and not be moved to action? One salary could build ten new houses in Methare.

Long-winded analyses have spread across countless pages of study after study determining why these conditions are so bad but no significant change has resulted from the paperwork. Small palliative gestures are made such as a health clinic in Methare but injured and sick people still go to local healers because the clinic lines are too long.

A friend of mine volunteers to teach French at a grammar school in Methare. His heart is in the right place but will the kids ever get out of that place? Look at photo number 8 and at photo number 33. What chance do these kids have for prosperity. education and quality of life?

Human indifference to human agonia (struggle) perpetuates bad behavior and attitudes among societies; among the worst is political indifference. Those in power want to secure and protect their own comfort and privilege first and if there is anything left over then it can go to the needy. How much of the $126,000 goes beyond the immediate family or tribe? Probably precious little.

For the man in the video (above), a mere annual subsidy of $2500 would allow him sufficient care to maintain his health and offer some dignity, but it will never happen because the social services network cannot afford much beyond his $50 wheelchair. How does that compare to parliament members' subsidies that are nearly 1100% more than the cost of his chair?

This is not just a Kenyan issue. Every major society is infused with 'me first' thinking. Even Communism which was idealized as an egalitarian system quickly became corrupt and murderous under Stalin who slaughtered millions of his fellow citizens to satiate his insane paranoia and protect his political and economic status. Africa since independence, two generation ago, has suffered similar carnage--not country against country but domestic citizen/soldier against citizen/soldier in the name of political power with its access to the treasury.

Kenya now does the same but with a democratic facade and far fewer bullets--looting the treasury by voting for their own huge salaries and stealing from the poor who remain in degrading conditions, in wheelchairs and in the mud.

What God and Dogs Have to Teach Us

By Richard Ammon
GlobalGayz.com
July 3, 2010

People disappoint each other a lot, whether intimate partners or friends, whether for a moment or a lifetime. People aggravate one another for petty things (picture on a wall) or expansive beliefs (religion).

The human condition, in addition to all its virtues and social values (companionship) which shape us as babies and influence us as adults, brings with it inevitable disagreement and agitation.

It seems built into the human psyche to not get along with certain others to greater or lesser degrees in the course of ‘civilized’ life. Some people are on the victim end of other people’s hostility and get blamed for problems; the blamers are angry at others who seem to disrupt or interfere with their plans or ideas. We call this disagreeableness, ‘bad chemistry’ between two individuals--or groups, which then divide off into segments, tribes, clubs or ethnic groups.

But consider this: even the most bothered, irritable angered individual or group often have pets, mostly dogs, they adore, toward whom they are tender and caring.

I had a dog (a sensitive and intelligent Australian shepherd, named Heather, photo right) for 13 years, now deceased. I am an easily irritated person, impatient, assertive, opinionated and usually wanting to ‘move on’ with projects, ideas, travel destinations... you get the idea.

However, regardless of my mood or situation over the years I was always gentle, playful, kind, cuddly and sweet-talking with Heather. There was a different energy between us and she was always happy to see me, tail wagging, tongue ready to lick my face, wining with delight at my return if I were away for a few hours. I baby-talked to her and she responded with her own playful growling and half-barks and doggie moans. Caressing her soft hair and absorbing her unconditional love was soothing for me, an uncomplicated affection with none of the subtle and overt personality interferences that often collide in human affairs. A sort of pure love and without the ‘stickiness’ of people.

(Be assured she was not a misanthropic substitute for human affection, which I’ve experienced much in my life; I’m not really that irritable.)

I see other many other people relating to their dogs with similar ease and delight in a special way that does not happen consistently between adults, whether same sex or opposite sex. There is a sort of child-like quality to the human-pet interaction that is pure and clean and a relief from humanoid ego.

I was reminded this kind of pure, clean, ego-free harmony during a recent trip to Central America which is very Catholic and very poor. In numerous ornate churches and simple chapels I saw humble peasants and laborers sitting or kneeling in silence alone or during a church service. (photo left, Panama City) Here in the mysterious grand, overarching and inspiring volume of the church (could be a mosque/synagogue/temple) with its other-worldly saintly statues, icons, paintings, venerated altars and stained glass, which gave it an ethos of divine, I felt a similar kind of innocent, pure, clean affection for God that I felt in the warm unconditional affection for and from my furry pet.

An other-worldly vibe that transcended the world of human affairs. Kneeling like a child before a master, sensing an unconditional benevolence and praying in soft supplicant and simple terms was akin to the loving baby-talk expressions I lavished on my pet.

The point is that it doesn’t have so much to do with the object of our affection here, an abstract God or an innocent animal. The point is the experience we have of ourselves in the interaction with such beings who are devoid of human ego, who listen to our voices, who hear us without interrupting, who receive whatever flawed offering of pain or kindness we bring. It is a moment or a while away from the trials of the worldly life, not unlike meditation or being absorbed in great music beyond the layers of ego and personality; restful serenity devoid of human noise or conflict.

If only we could approach people (loves and strangers) the way we approach our God or our Dog. Imagine a world of harmonious energy and the gardens of safe delight we could create.

The Days of My Life--What's Worth Doing

By Richard Ammon
GlobalGayz.com
July 1, 2010

This week I cut down a thirty-foot tree, scraped layers of old paint from window frames, pressure-sprayed a brick wall, ordered 3 tons of gravel for the yard, saw the film encore of the Metropolitan Operas' 'Romeo et Juliette' (Gounod), shopped twice for groceries and once for gasoline, bought a plane ticket to Bangkok in November, started to translate my 7 GlobalGayz.com Central American stories into Spanish, continued to read a biography of Tolstoy (photo right) after having visited his home in Russia earlier this year, went to the upstate New York home/museum of Edna St. Vincent Millay in Austerlitz, (photo left) bought house repair supplies at Home Depot, spent numerous hours answering e-mail for my website, had sex a couple of times with my partner (it's late spring), had lunch with a cousin to plan a visit to France to the place where my great uncle John (photo lower left) was killed in World War I, arranged repair work on my air conditioner in my NYC high-rise condo... and many other small assorted activities of daily living such as going to the gym or doing a swim workout (preparing for Gay Games VIII)…

They're called that, activities of daily living (ADL in health care terms). One after another in an endless stream of goings and doings that fill my days, my years.

I used to not mind the ADLs since I felt I was accomplishing something--as a squirrel gathering acorns or building a nest. But now almost 70 years on I mind more and more the busywork of my life, looking for more important things to do such as writing this blog, or composing another story for my gay travel-and-culture website or reading a substantive book or magazine article.

The question is, what is significant and worth doing in the last phase of my life? Having been a teacher, carpenter, nurse, psychologist and now a journalist and website owner who has traveled across most of the continents, what is significant, sufficient and worth doing?

The question is a tease since the meaning of 'significant' can't really be defined.

The biography of Tolstoy is a tease with its 700 pages that includes an analysis of 'War and Peace', which spreads across two thousand pages (took him 6 years to finish). The symphonies of Mahler (photo right) and operas of Gounod also tease me as obvious grand magna opi (plural of opus).

I regret very little in these past 70 years except for not having written a 'great' book. That to me is a meaningful effort, not a pulp novel but a thoughtful volume that probes into the dilemma of being human and being mortal--a worthy reflection at how to puzzle out the complexities of the social world and the mysteries of the physical universe.

Not that I haven't written. My website contains dozens of stories about gay people around the world. They are small gestures at explaining human complexity, human gay complexities; for that I am content. But a large tome would be impressive in it's scope and depth.

Impressive to whom? I think that's more the issue here: impressing other people, being known, being acknowledged--famous. It's the best superficial gain of reputation in one's life, short lived as it may be. (hello Tammy Faye Baker)

Is 'reputation' meaning? For the shallow mind it is. But fame is as hollow as life is short; it exists only as a social act among mortal humans. Everything has or will pass into forgetting. I look at the countless books already on library shelves packed with obscure and trivial writings positioned by catalog number next to well-known 'classics' that still circulate often. The pages inside the covers were composed by individuals with a need to say something to other people, mortals writing to other mortals who read the print then put down the book and forgot it after a while--like most literature, music, dance and art.
(photo, my great uncle John Ammon; see bio)

It's a sort of sweet but deceptive immortality because it is ultimately temporary--as are all human endeavors in the end; it's the best we can do.

I personally like writing. It's a creative doing vs the passive receiving of TV shows, eating, reading. Writing is verbal sculpture, creating something out of nothing, shaping sentences with felt words to express something not said before, or more accurately, saying old things in a new way.

That's meaning for me: creating something out of nothing using imagination and inspiration. It's the best I can 'do and I don't have to be famous to enjoy the feeling of generation.

Fathers on Father's Day 2010

By Richard Ammon
GlobalGayz.com
June 20, 2010

There have been several fathers and grandfathers in my life, some known in person, others through family stories, others by name only. My father and his father were the only ones I knew in person. My mother's father died before my birth. All my great grandfathers were long deceased before me with only tales and bits of memory to bind them to me.

I think about these men and their times and their families and how things have changed so much that separates us, my life from theirs. My great grandparents and grandparents were all born in the 19th century, my parents in the early 20th century and my siblings and I came along about mid-century. We are now into the 21st century and into a lifestyle hardly recognizable to my ancestors.

I'm tempted to say the most significant difference between me and my forefathers is that I am gay, but this has not the significance one might think. Rather, I think the big change is the freedom I have; the choices I have open to me--and the money to make the choices happen.

My predecessors were all married in their young twenties (a couple of the women in their late teens) and started having children. My mother was 22 at the birth of her first child, my father was 26. My grandfather was a parent at 25.

None of these men were outstanding in wealth but rather had steady, mundane and routine work in American industry, grandfather as a maintenance foreman, my father was an accountant. Great-grandfather wrenched his way from Switzerland and was a manual pick-up worker most of his 54 years.

Saddled with kids and hemmed in by modest incomes their lives, their choices, were circumscribed by events of their own making (not necessarily chosen), the sort of events that followed cultural tradition and heterosexual orientation. My non-collegiate grandfather did see all his six children go to college of one kind or another. My father went to Bucknell University where he got a wife as well as his degree.

The next step was a job and then came the kids, four of us, so he never saw London or Paris---but loved Beethoven. The closest my grandfather got to Europe were the letters he received from his Swiss aunts and from his brother John fighting on the Allied front lines in France. (He was killed less than month before the armistice in 1918.)

Before that my great-grandmother apparently took her own life leaving behind six young children (including my grandfather) to be put into a children's home, an institution. My grandfather never forgave his father for this perceived abandonment, although his father stayed in the area. (My grandfather refused to put a headstone on his grave after his father's death.) Then a generation later, my father also took his own life.

Angry men with unfinished emotional business, big families and little money. That's the significant difference I reflect on during this father's day, 2010.

I'm the first in all my generations not to be a father. I am the most educated (PhD) and by far the most financially well-off of any of these sires. From this well-appointed and comfortable life, along with my long-time partner, I can't help thinking back on the hard times of my fathers and the 'caged' lives they lived.

My great-grandfather likely wanted to be a horse trainer. My grandfather loved to sing and might have performed opera. My father played the violin and might have joined an orchestra (and might have been gay).

My heart feels heavy for these men. I wish they had had my freedom to claim their authentic selves without the hindrances of obedience and conformity. Instead they made families, intentionally or not, and spent their productive years providing for their offspring, going to work, repairing the roof, raising chickens or growing vegetables.

I look around today and see men in young parenthood pushing strollers and watching the birds fly and the wind playing with the trees, and I wonder...

Photo Memories as a Tapestry of My Life

By Richard Ammon
GlobalGayz.com
June 20, 2010

For more than forty years I took photos wherever I went--local family and friends, distant lands, famous landmarks, oceans, landscapes, handsome people, unexpected moments… or myself in 1990 (photo right). Whatever came into view that appealed to my sensuous eye or aesthetic intuition. Hundreds, thousands of images accumulated into hard-copy albums with plastic sleeves. Forty, fifty albums spreading up and down and across my study. Massive.

Then came digital cameras, SD cards and even more thousands of photos. But the hard copy albums stopped and iPhoto took over, now reaching toward 25,000 images that take up the space of a fingernail.

It became evident that the albums had to go digital as well so I hired a young friend with time on his hands to take the albums apart, photo by photo. It took him a month and the photos filled two large cardboard boxes.

The final impetus to go from hard to digital came when I discovered the brilliant technology of the Kodak Multi-scanner in a local photo store that could scan hundreds of photos onto a DVD in a few minutes. My decision was made for me.

I now have two DVDs of my hard photos, about 6,000 on each disc ranging from 1970 to the present, some of which will some day be edited and posted into photo galleries on my website GlobalGayz.com.

But this blog is not about digital photography, miracle that it is.

This blog is about letting go of some images of my past, about aging and having bigger decisions made as I age, about memories and what they are and what they mean.

It's easy to say the bulk of these colored glossy prints should just be tossed as so much clutter or excessive bits of paper to be taken away. But not so fast. The hesitation is that each photo I see is a moment of my life and how do I toss away moments of life?

Across the span of 60 or 80 years the mind absorbs billions of fragments--sights, sounds, touches, feelings and so on. Precious few of these are caught on film and frozen into a chemical or digital still while the rest are slowly forgotten for months or years or forever. Forgotten but not totally lost. Suddenly a photo from high school, or Nepal or Morocco or an ancestor or the GayGames of 1986, or my mother in 1977 (photo right) brings back the scene, a particular moment of life from long or short ago, reconnecting my present mind with a past that I lived in and passed through.

Of all the moments of our lives, we remember exceedingly few, the peaks of marriage, death, love or injury or beauty or war. The billions of others just flow on by as if they never happened, unrecalled among the countless mushy chemistry of brain cells. Some experiences we need or want to forget; usually we didn't take photos of hard times that left scars or deformities.

Most others are seemingly forgotten but not in the presence of a photo. These are the moments of my mortal life and I do want to remember them; I want to remember as much of my life as possible, to continue the meaning of my life, uncertain what that means.

Photos reveal the tapestry of my life. I want to see as much of it as possible, not toss it out, not forget it while I'm alive. Death will close my gallery soon enough and the rest will be silent and invisible. Until then, I will continue collecting images, collecting memories, collecting my life and adding to the tapestry.

Opera at the Gym

By Richard Ammon
GlobalGayz.com
June 5, 2010

I joined a 24-hour Fitness gym last year. I thought I was buying into an exercise venue. That it is, complete with a 5-lane pool which I use almost everyday.

But what they didn't tell me when I put up my cash is that the fitness center and equipment also came with a built-in concert hall, a rock n' roll pop-rock concert hall thanks to surround-sound speakers all over the place including in the bathrooms.

Pop is "commercially recorded music, often oriented towards a youth market, usually consisting of relatively short and simple love songs and utilizing technological innovations to produce new variations on existing themes." It's awful. The lyrics are immature, simple-minded, shallow and the music is repetitious, hyper-rhythmic-dance-beat, generic and boring. Need I say more to make the point?

Any effort to get the volume turned down is usually met with a incredulous expression by staff who invariably say "people like this." According to what poll, I ask in vain.

Obviously up against a cultural brick wall (more like a rack of torture) I had the choice to quit the gym--all gyms, since they all play this stuff--or not use the heavy metal/machines and only swim, where the sound is the caress of bubbling water. Or take the route of most other gym bunnies: wear an MP3 player or iPod with earbuds, which don't really remove the pop-rock music but rather add a layer of chosen music or podcasts. What cacophony that is, but most of "the people" seem immune to noise in their heads.

As it happened, in the midst of this dilemma I accidentally bought an iPad (I wasn't really shopping) and soon added Bose headphones that, together, created a fine concert hall around my head. But I can't carry my iPad around the gym so I plugged the headphones into my small Sony Walkman SRF-M37W Personal radio (with belt clip) and, thanks to the remarkable sound-reduction ability of the Bose headset, I could listen to my local classical radio station, KUSC from Los Angeles. About 85% of the pop-rock was shoved off the sound stage allowing Mozart, Bach, Strauss and Brahms to accompany my workouts. Lovely.

In addition to the everyday symphonies, concertos and chamber music, today happened to be in the middle of the phenomenon known as 'The Ring Cycle' (The Ring of the Nibelung), the most famous (or infamous if you're into pop-rock) set of four operas (each one lasting 4 hours) composed by the quirky but brilliant Richard Wagner ('Vagner' for those ignorant of German) (photo left) composed in the late 19th century. and sung today by a world class cast headed by the eternal tenor Placido Domingo (photo above right).

Despite some lethargic solos and slow sung dialogue the music soared at other times to be chilling and rapturous. I felt I was there in my Bose space capsule listening to the rich complexity of the finest of romantic opera. (photo top, Metropolitan Opera House)

Yet here I was among the hard metal and rocking' gym in an anonymous stucco building in southern California, not far from Home Depot, Wal-Mart and Costco--contemporary 'culture'--transported by the Los Angeles Opera orchestra and world renown singers (and KUSC tech staff) to a cultural world far away; from the vulgar mundane to the exquisite sublime. Do I exaggerate? Perhaps.

But one thing's for sure; I was probably (hopefully not) the only gym-bunny in California (the world?) in the middle of a carnal 24-Hour Fitness center being swept up into the exalted majesty of great art by a live opera broadcast of Wagner's 'Die Walkure', a fantasy piece about gods and mortals. It was hard to keep my mind on my workout, not that I cared, not that I wanted to.