Another funny anecdote about me in an awkward situation prefaces my next blog post, which is much more serious.
During the Summer of 2007 I went to Amman, Jordan to take an intensive Arabic course at the University of Jordan. Accompanying me was my good friend and fellow Claremont McKenna College student Alex, who, I hope he does not mind me saying this, is of the Reagan ilk and thoroughly enjoys his conservative placement. He is from Ski-Town Colorado and is incredibly knowledgeable when it comes to domestic and international politics--last I heard he was teaching Sex Education at a high school in New Orleans for Teach For America.
My first step upon entering any foreign environment is to find a place to take beer. I usually prefer a cold, cheap quaff of the local variety in a relaxed, erudite setting, though I often happily settle for less than perfect conditions. Thus, Alex and I, soon after arriving in the Jordanian capital, set off to find a suitable watering hole, somewhat of a challenge considering the whole Muslims don’t drink thing. However, rather rapidly we stumbled across flowering oasis in the midst of dry Arabia: an outdoor two story bar with relatively cheap beer sitting above a substantial English language book store. Plants surrounding the terrace provided shade as well as insulation from the noisy Ammani traffic. Because the bar (the name escapes me right now) was so apt, Alex and I used it as a spring board for our assimilation process; frequenting the bar sometimes twice a week. During our visits, we began to notice a heightened level of friendliness about the place: young men struck up conversations easily and were quick to recognize our faces, and even the girls weren’t repulsed by the week old growth sprouting from my face and soiled travel attire. Eventually we disclosed our findings with some local Jordanians, I believe it was our landlord or his early-twenties son, when we received startling information. Our favorite bar was in fact Amman’s most renowned gay and lesbian bar. This news couldn’t have had less of an affect on us. After all, I grew up in Portland, Oregon and Alex, well, Alex really likes cold beer and has a lot of homosexual friends to boot (though I admit I was a little saddened to learn that all of those young women weren’t friendly to us because we are so handsome).
Before coming to Uganda I thought the Middle East was the most intolerant place in the world towards homosexuality. I now must admit Sub-Saharan Africa takes the cake. Offenders in Kenya may receive up to 14 years in prison for engaging in homosexual behavior, but may find no sanctuary in Tanzania, where the act is illegal as well. Burundi has banned homosexuality, and South Africa, in most matters the most Western African country, legal same-sex marriage has not prevented gangs from roaming the country and committing their own policy of “corrective” rape on female homosexuals. Uganda is not far behind them, and is in many ways is more radical; at the moment a piece of legislation called the Bahati Bill (after the MP who drafted it) has been presented to parliament that, if passed, would make Uganda the second country in Africa (after Nigeria) to implement capital punishment for homosexuals who commit serial offenses, or offenders who carry the AIDS virus. Indeed, if the bill passes, Uganda’s estimated 500,000 gay people may be found guilty of committing a homosexual act and given a sentence of life in prison. Even landlords can get jail time (up to seven years), or any other person who “helps, counsels, or encourages another person to engage in a homosexual act.”
The Bill will be discussed in Parliament early 2010.
Understandably, the proposal has elicited considerable international backlash, and Uganda’s outraged gay community has garnered much support in addition to its own voice. Sweden, which contributes $50 million annually in foreign aid to Uganda’s budget, says it would withdraw all foreign aid if the bill passes. Similar outcry has emanated from Washington. John Kerry admits the bill will seriously hurt US-Uganda relations. Russ Feingold, who is currently working on a measure to provide military aid to Museveni’s regime in order to help fight the Lord’s Resistance Army, declared passage would hinder the two countries working-relationship, especially in combating HIV/AIDS. (Uganda currently receives $285 million per year from the US for the AIDS fight.) The European Union has issued its version of a formal protest, known as a demarche, over the proposed legislation. The Bahati Bill, if passed, would essentially shoot Uganda in its own foot--drastically reducing foreign aid and political support from Western governments.
Proponents of the bill blame the West for Uganda’s homosexuality “problem,” arguing the phenomenon is foreign to Africa but that it has crept and encroached into their sphere of living, promoted by sinners and fueled by a strengthening trend of a-religious behavior.
President Yoweri Museveni and his party the National Resistance Movement have been strangely silent over the issue. International Human Rights Day was celebrated earlier this month by Ugandan’s without a single mention of the homosexuality issue in the government-run newspaper The New Vision. Moreover, the Uganda Human Rights Commission ignored the sensitive issue completely, delineating the social ills resulting from discriminatory behavior in a press conference, probably to avoid having to religious card dealt.
I find it ironic that the same countries which bore the missionaries that Christianized Africa hundreds of years ago are now lambasting such anti-homosexuality legislation as intolerant and homophobic. Nevertheless, we are in the 21st century. Sometimes a strong hand, and I think the removal of foreign aid will be very effective, is necessary to bring a country on the brink of barbarianism back to modernity. Nevertheless, I also think other measures should be explored by foreign policymakers, measures that neither encourage or discourage the practice: sensitization workshops, counseling services, Western backed anonymous HIV/AIDS treatment centers, etc.
I will keep you posted on the development of the Bahati Bill.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/8412962.stm
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/12/08/uganda-considering-death_n_384650.html
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