Remembering World AIDS Day 2015
UNAIDS Executive Director Michel Sidibé marked World AIDS Day in Zimbabwe with civil society members, people living with HIV, and other participants of the Community Village of the 18th International Conference on AIDS and STIs in Africa.
Speaking at the opening of the village, Sidibé noted: “Key populations are helping us to break the conspiracy of silence. I commend your courage and leadership for building an inclusive and effective response to HIV.”
Visit the UNAIDS World AIDS Day 2015 website for powerful educational graphics, social media messages, and campaign material. We have what it takes to break the AIDS epidemic. Read more via UNAIDS
Turkey: Gays seeking military exemption no longer need to provide visual proof of their homosexuality
Turkey makes it difficult for potential conscriptees to avoid the draft, generally making exceptions only for those who are sick, disabled or homosexual. To receive an exemption based on their sexuality, men must publicly declare they are gay — a declaration that ensures discrimination will follow them for the rest of their lives. It's either that, or they must successfully hide their gay identity for a year.
As if that isn't bad enough, until last week, to receive the exemption men also had to prove their homosexuality by undergoing nude examinations and submitting photos of themselves engaged in homosexual intercourse.
Last week, however, the military silently amended the most controversial provisions in the regulation. Doctors will now merely observe the behaviors homosexuals display and the verbal declarations they make. In other words, a homosexual can choose to disclose or not to disclose his identity. If he does, this declaration will constitute the sole basis for the doctor's decision. The change represents a major step toward aligning Turkey's military with the norms for basic human rights.
Serbia: Police helpline for LGBT people
The Police Department in Kragujevac is the first in Serbia to initiate a pilot project to support LGBT people and their families. THe program includes a hotline to which people can report hate crimes, violence and discrimination.
"These crimes are extremely important... because if we do not know what is happening and do not act in a timely manner, the victim suffers. LGBT people should be encouraged to report crimes because of our common goal of combating every form of discrimination." says Inspector John Jeremic.
It is estimated that 64% of these people have experienced some form of violence, while only 8% reported that discrimination. Victims will talk police officers who have undergone adequate training. The next step is to create a Facebook profile, also to communicate and help people of different sexual orientation.
Openly gay Imam creates online school for LGBTQ-friendly Islamic philosophy
13 years ago, Washington, DC-based Muslim religious leader Daayiee Abdullah was asked to conduct a funeral for a man who had died of AIDS. "Several imams had been approached about this but wouldn't do it," he said. "Since I believe everyone has the right to religious rites, I did not hesitate to officiate."
This seemingly benign act attracted enmity from critics worldwide, but Abdullah did not flinch. Instead, as the first openly gay imam in the US, he became even more outspoken, advocating not only religious access for people with HIV and AIDS, but also mixed-gender worship, support for reproductive justice, full acceptance of LGBTQ people in Muslim communities, LGBTQ inclusion in Muslim liturgy and solidarity with the Black Lives Matter movement. His positions, he says, are firmly rooted in the Quran, and he references the earliest Chinese and Arabic translations to support his assertions - books he's read in their original languages.
This stance - that the written word is open to interpretation and can be made relevant to contemporary life - has rankled many Muslim leaders. But their criticism has neither silenced him nor kept him from contesting homophobic, racist or sexist commentary. In fact, they've inspired him to establish the MECCA Institute, an online school and think tank that will, by the fall of 2016, offer classes in modern-day explication of Islamic philosophy and tenets. Read more via Truthout
Ireland: End exemptions to LGBT equality law for schools and hospitals
Fresh off of the country’s first same-sex weddings, Ireland’s government is pushing forward with more changes – amending LGBT equality law exemptions for schools and hospitals.
Aodhán Ó Ríordáin, the Minister of State for Equality, confirmed plans to push ahead with a bill this week that will alter the state’s Employment Equality Act. Section 37 of the existing law grants specific exemptions from sections protecting LGBT people to “religious, educational or medical institutions” – permitting them to discriminate “in order to maintain the religious ethos of the institution”.
However, the TD pledged: “As marriage equality becomes a reality today, on Wednesday we amend Section 37 to end LGBT & other discrimination in schools & hospitals.” He said: “Marriage equality was a wonderful achievement, and Ireland should be very proud of being the first country to bring in marriage equality by popular vote. But if you’re 13 years of age, and you’re just coming out and you’re nervous, marriage equality might feel a very long way away." Read more via PinkNews
African gays make simple request to pope: preach tolerance
African gays who often face persecution in the streets and sometimes prosecution in courts have a simple plea for Pope Francis ahead of his first visit to the continent: bring a message of tolerance even if you will not bless our sexuality.
Francis traveled to Kenya and Uganda, where many conservative Christians bristle at the idea of the West forcing its morality on them, especially when it comes to gays and lesbians. He also visited conflict-torn Central African Republic.
"I would like the Pope to at least make people know that being LGBT is not a curse," said Jackson Mukasa, 20, a Ugandan in Kampala who was imprisoned last year on suspicion of committing homosexual acts, before charges were dropped for lack of evidence. Read more via Reuters
Pakistan: Officially recognized but publicly shamed
One Friday night earlier this year, a nervous but meticulously made-up crowd of transgender women sat in the upper circle of the smart Al Hamra Arts complex in Lahore, Pakistan. Bored with waiting for the performance to begin, one and then all of them stood up to take in a better view of the surroundings. The rest of the audience gawked at the sight before them: Pakistani transgender women are ordinarily found dancing at tawdry wedding parties or turning tricks. Certainly never as patrons at an upscale theatre.
That night, however, they were to be centre stage, performing "Theesri Dhun" ("Third Tune"), a rare and unique dramatization of real-life transgender stories. With harrowing tales of rape, police brutality and social stigma, it made for sombre viewing.
It also shed a light on Pakistan's complicated and disturbing LGBT rights landscape, where trans people technically enjoy better rights than in many places around the world, but in practice face violence and stigma. Even so, they are worlds ahead of Pakistani gay men, who are outlawed, brutalized and even murdered with no recourse to protection.
While trans women are the success story amongst LGBT Pakistanis, their counterparts, transgender men — people born biologically female but who identify as male — barely register on the national conscience. Technically they should also be able to register as third gender but none has ever attempted it. Read more via Vice News
China: Transgender people forced to hide behind their secrets
At home her son still calls her daddy, at work she dresses in a masculine style, but this Chinese person has a “little secret” — she was born male, but is not any more. She had long identified as a woman, and suffered from depression after starting a family, opting in the end to have a surgical sex change.
“I had wanted to kill myself, but then I decided I should do something — if I die, I’d rather die on the operating table,” she added. Chinese society remains deeply traditional in many respects so in public she still has to hide her new identity and does not want her name or occupation revealed, for fear of any negative consequences. Now she tries to help others in her position, running an online network from her home to connect transgender individuals with each other and professionals such as doctors, psychiatrists and lawyers — who can help with divorces.
Sexually ambiguous characters have a long history in Chinese art and literature, but being transgender is still classified as a mental illness in the country —homosexuality was removed from the category in 2001 —although sex reassignment surgery is legal.
Transgender issues were given unusual prominence in China last year when the country’s most famous sexologist, Li Yinhe, announced she had been living for 17 years with a partner who was born female but identifies as a man, referring to him as her “husband” and stressing she sees herself as heterosexual. Read more via Japan Times
Nigeria: Gay people face beatings, harsh prison sentences, even death
Nigeria made same-sex marriage and gay rights activism illegal last January. Since then, gay Nigerians say abuse and extortion have become commonplace by state-sponsored vigilantes, police and public mobs. As part of a week-long series "Nigeria: Pain and Promise," special correspondent Nick Schifrin reports on the threats and violence that LGBT citizens face in that country. Watch the report
Iraq: 2 blindfolded men thrown off a roof in Fallujah for being gay
The Islamic State (Isis) terrorists have released a new photo report from the Iraqi city of Fallujah, showing the execution of two men, "punished" for being homosexuals. The photo report released on social media on Monday by Isis supporters shows two blindfolded men being thrown off a roof in Fallujah on charges of "sodomy."
The images shows an Isis Sharia judge reading out their crimes before a crowd of onlookers while the two gay men stand on the roof of a high-rise. After the reading out of the verdict, the Isis fighters throw down the two men, one by one as the crowd looks on in horror. Read more via International Business Times (disturbing images)
A Dutch ISIS Fighter Takes Questions on Tumblr
Usually, by the time the public learns the names and biographies of Islamic State militants, or radicals from other groups who attack civilians, they are already dead, and so unable to speak for themselves, except occasionally in the ritualized form of martyrdom videos or manifestoes posted online. This week, however, a Dutch citizen who says he is fighting on behalf of the Islamic State in Syria, and who documents his life in the self-proclaimed caliphate on Tumblr, has been taking questions from readers.
Israfil Yilmaz, who is of Turkish descent and who abandoned a career in the Royal Netherlands Army in 2013 to join Islamist rebels fighting to topple President Bashar al-Assad of Syria, has turned to Tumblr since his accounts on Instagram, Ask.fm and Twitter were suspended.
The exchanges reveal that the former soldier is well aware of his notoriety back home in the Netherlands. Asked his age recently, he referred his questioner to the Dutch government’s list of banned terrorists, to which his full name and details of his birth — Salih Yahya Gazali Yilmaz, born on Sept. 29, 1987, in Brunei — had been added just the week before.