Letter on Homosexuality

A letter sent to the editor of Minivan News by an anonymous reader, published on the paper's website on 26th Septemper 2009.
***

 
Dear Editor,

Whether we accept it or not, like any other country in the world, there are loads of gay people in the Maldives too. Being gay is not something you adopt or acquire, it is who you are and you are born with it. Anyone’s son or daughter can be gay or lesbian. They are referred as a taboo and have always been forced to live in the closet. But what we are forgetting here is that we actually deprive a gay person from his rights. His basic right to live, been accepted by the family and society, right to choose his sexual partner and love are all denied.


I think it is time the Maldivian government start thinking about gay rights. Maldivian gays are not going to go anywhere and they are never going to change into straight people. This is who they are and will always remain as gays. And always a new gay person would be born into the Maldives too.


Homosexuality is assuredly no disadvantage, it is nothing to be ashamed of, no vice, no degradation, it cannot be classified as an illness; it is considered to be a variation of the sexual function produced by a certain arrest of sexual development. Many highly respectable individuals of ancient and modern times have been homosexuals, several of the greatest men among them (Plato, Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci, Alexander the great etc.). It is a great injustice to persecute homosexuality as a crime, and cruel too.


Modern medical research has clearly proved that homosexuality is not a disease; it cannot be wiped off from a gay person. He or she will remain so in their sexual orientation and it is more genetic in evolution. So how on earth can we penalise someone for his sexual orientation?
If a man and woman have the right to practice their sexual desires freely between them, why can’t a gay couple do so? People blame that homosexual acts are against human nature, but what exactly does it mean by human nature? Gays have been here since human evolution, it’s just that they haven’t been more open before than now. So how can you say it is against human nature. Gays have always been forced to practice their sexuality in discreet, behind doors with fear.


Legally in 2003, Brazil introduced a UN draft resolution titled, "Human Rights and Sexual Orientation, "which addresses the topic of equal rights for gays and lesbians. It called upon all states to promote and protect the human rights of all persons regardless of their sexual orientation". Maldives has good record of following all UN resolutions, charters and accords but why is it then the Maldivian government doesn’t accept this resolution?


Another barrier hindering the acceptance of homosexuals in Maldives is the religion. Being a 100% Muslim country the Maldives believes that it is going to be against the religion to allow and give the homosexuals their rights. According to the International Lesbian and Gay Association ILGA there are at least seven Muslim countries today which still retain capital punishment for homosexuality. Maldives has also been found to give severe punishments which include long-term imprisonment and sometimes torture. Not to forget also the shame and belittlement a gay person faces from Maldivian society.


Do not forget there are Muslim countries which HAVE legalised homosexuality. They are Iraq, Jordan, Turkmenistan, Albania, Uzbekistan, Palestine, Indonesia, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Bosnia & Herzegovina, Turkey, Kosovo, Turkish Republic of Cyprus, Chad, Nigeria, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan.


It is time we need to know the rights of the homosexuals in our country because homosexuality is universal. They are everywhere in this world; rich and poor countries, Muslims, Christians, Jews, Hindus etc, whites and blacks, low and high class societies. They can be doctors, nurses, civil servants, engineers, singers or politicians. Gay Maldivians are also proud to be Muslims and Maldivians and will always remain so. Just Think!


Regards,
Anonymous

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Posted in: Letters

Is homophobia associated with homosexual arousal?

via Hilath.com



Department of Psychology, University of Georgia, Athens 30602-3013, USA.
(Original link here)

The authors investigated the role of homosexual arousal in exclusively heterosexual men who admitted negative affect toward homosexual individuals. Participants consisted of a group of homophobic men (n = 35) and a group of nonhomophobic men (n = 29); they were assigned to groups on the basis of their scores on the Index of Homophobia (W. W. Hudson & W. A. Ricketts, 1980). The men were exposed to sexually explicit erotic stimuli consisting of heterosexual, male homosexual, and lesbian videotapes, and changes in penile circumference were monitored. They also completed an Aggression Questionnaire (A. H. Buss & M. Perry, 1992). Both groups exhibited increases in penile circumference to the heterosexual and female homosexual videos. Only the homophobic men showed an increase in penile erection to male homosexual stimuli. The groups did not differ in aggression. Homophobia is apparently associated with homosexual arousal that the homophobic individual is either unaware of or denies.

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Posted in: Gossip,Society

Providing Support For The Maldives

Article posted on Tuesday, 25 August 2009, Sydney Star Observer

***

From his new home in New Zealand, Male-born Grant (name substituted) and his boyfriend recently formed the Maldives’ first gay rights lobby and support group.

We decided to found Rainbow Maldives as an online community that would support queer Maldivians and their allies, and help foster a sense of community, while maintaining enough anonymity to protect those who fear persecution or prosecution, Grant said.

Our group seeks to build and consolidate the Maldivian LGBTQ community, and increase queer visibility and awareness, with the eventual aim of making the Maldives a safer, more accepting place. The only platforms previously available online were focused solely on hooking up, so we’d like to move beyond that into slightly more productive areas.

For Grant, the online option was a second choice to a visible presence.

We tried to get to the heart of the queer community in the Maldives, before realising it couldn’t be done -” the community was just too fragmented, too underground. In an Islamic nation with an increasingly radicalised religious community, it can be too dangerous for most people to be out. The Maldives enforces Sharia law, where convicted homosexuals generally serve a prison term, he said.

Pedophilia is also rampant in the Maldives, although until very recently no one really talked about it because there’s a stigma attached to homosexuality. Victims of sexual abuse where the abuser was of the same gender are often reluctant to talk about it for fear of being labelled gay. I was subjected to sexual abuse from age five to 16.

In launching Rainbow Maldives, Grant hopes to capitalise on the current mood for change. In October 2008 the country saw the first-ever multi-party election, ousting Maumoon Abdul Gayoom from the presidency, which he had held since 1978.

During the lead-up to the election a desire for change swept the entire country, with widespread political agitation taking place. After the success of the election, people felt change was within their grasp, Grant told SSO.

The queer reform movement is inextricably linked to the legal reform movement in general. Currently no defendant can be certain whether the case will be decided according to its merits, or according to the whim of the judge. Equality before the law and consistent application of the law are noticeably absent in the Maldives and until this is corrected, any lobbying for sexual rights is likely to be ineffective at best.

Grant is heartened by the recent parliamentary elections where the conservative Adhaalath Party failed to secure any seats, demonstrating that Maldivians are potentially more moderate than previously thought.

Ultimately, Grant believes the first step to overcoming homophobia is education.

Ignorance is rampant in the Maldives. The queer community needs to become more visible, and to educate the population at large about what it means to be queer. We’re trying to create an environment in which such a lobby group could be taken seriously, he said.

We feel even if the nation isn’t ready for change at a statutory level, dispelling gross ignorance will go a long way towards establishing a more positive environment for the queer community.

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Posted in: Politics / Religion,Society,True Stories

150 Women Face Adultery Flogging on Maldives

By Andrew Buncombe, Asia Correspondent


Almost 150 women living in the Maldives face a public flogging for indulging in extra-marital sex after being convicted by the Muslim country's conservative courts. Around 50 men also face the punishment.

Earlier this month, an 18-year-old woman fainted after she was flogged 100 times having been found guilty of having sex with two different men. The woman, who was pregnant at the time of sentencing, had her punishment deferred until after the birth of her child and the court said the teenager's pregnancy was proof of her guilt. In contrast, the accused men were acquitted, with one of them escaping punishment simply because he denied the charge.

The head of the country's Criminal Court, Judge Abdulla Mohamed, told the island's Minivan News that flogging was a deterrent and not designed to cause injury and said the person carrying out the punishment was prohibited from raising his arm higher than his shoulder. "The public should know this lady or man have done these things and they will stay away from these things," he said. As to why fewer men were prosecuted, he said: "A man, after making this problem, will go away and maybe the woman will have relations with more than one man and won't know who was responsible. Or the man denies it."



But Amnesty International's Maldives specialist, Abbas Faiz, called flogging "a cruel, inhuman and degrading punishment which is banned by international human rights law. The practice is humiliating and leads to psychological as well as physical scars for those subjected to it for years. [It is] a form of torture." The most recent official statistics available to the group date from 2006 and show that a total of 184 people were sentenced to flogging for extra-marital sex under a penal code that includes elements of Sharia law. Of those 146 were women, with the majority of the punishments still to be carried out.

In the Maldives, an island nation made up of more than 1200 atolls, the issue of flogging has become a political battleground following the whipping of the teenager earlier this month outside a government building in the capital, Male. Reports said that the women required hospital treatment after she was flogged in front of a jeering crowd of men.

Since then there have been a number of demonstrations in favour of flogging and several articles published defending its use. Since the case was publicised there have been a number of demonstrations in support of flogging, some calling for the deportation of a British journalist, Maryam Omidi, who published reports of the incident in the local Minivan News. "It's hard to tell whether this is indicative of a wider feeling, because people are afraid to speak out," Omidi said. "But I had people calling me up to offer their support."

In its first free polls held last year, the Maldives elected as its president Mohammed Nasheed, a former prisoner of conscience. But campaigners say the liberally-inclined Mr Nasheed feels prevented from speaking because of his dependence on Islamist coalition allies and because of opponents who are using a debate over Sharia law as political lever.

The Islamist Adhaalath Party, which is a member of the coalition government, has denied organising these demonstrations.

Yet, some voices have spoken out. "We don't cut off the hands of all those who steal and we don't implement the death sentence so why do we continue with these very inhumane practices, especially when the statistics show that the victims are women," said MP Eva Abdulla.

Reports suggest that in recent years, many mosques in the Maldives have fallen under the influence of foreign, conservative imams. The previous president, Maumoon Abdul Gayoom, who had been Asia's longest-serving ruler and who positioned himself as the country's "defender of Islam", had sought to use the religion to bolster his dwindling. The government in turn said that more conservative forms of the religion had been able to spread as restrictions on freedom of expression were lifted.

For Mr Nasheed, a former political activist who served six terms in jail, the controversy is a severe test. While his inclinations may be of a moderniser, he remains dependent on the support of the conservative Adhaalath Party. Indeed, the party is said to have a grip on the ministry of Islamic Affairs which Mr Nasheed created last year, apparently a political reward for its support.

Last night, presidential spokesman Mohamed Zuhair told The Independent the government was committed to fulfilling its obligations to international treaties that prohibit torture. He added: "The president is holding meetings with all concerned parties to try and deal with this."


VIA The Independent

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Posted in: Society

Teacher arrested on charges of having homosexual relationship with student resumes teaching

Haveeru Daily, Jul 04, 2009, A male teacher from the Haa Alifu atoll Madhrasa who was arrested earlier on suspicion of having a homosexual relationship with a 14-year-old student in the school, has resumed teaching at the school after two weeks. 

The Deputy Principal of the School, Mohamed Mukhthar, confirmed the news on Wednesday, saying that the teacher had resumed his job after telling the school that the Maldives Police Service had dropped the charges against him due to lack of evidence. Mukhthar further said that the teacher had said he would submit the Police report about the incident to the school within two days or so. 

“We are not yet sure whether he was found guilty or not by the Police or whether they released him,” the Deputy Principal said. “Still, if he has been released from custody there’s no way we can keep him from resuming his job as a civil servant. We are investigating the case now.” 

Commenting on the incident, the Regional Commander for the North Region, Abdul Mannaanu Yoosuf, said that the Police would not make a ruling on any case and that they would leave it to the Courts. He further said that the teacher had been released because his part in the investigation had been completed and that until the trial was over there was no way that anyone could keep the teacher from resuming his previous job. 

A family had earlier told Haveeru, on the condition of anonymity, that the boy had said that his teacher molested him on four different occasions after inviting him to the teacher’s tuition centre. The family member further said that the boy had alleged his teacher had shown him pornographic videos before molesting him. Officials from the Island Office said earlier that the boy had spoken out about the events after a protest march against child abuse had been organized in the island by the residents a few days back.

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Posted in: News

Indian Muslim leaders rage against legalising homosexuality, say it is against Islamic law

After Deoband, other Muslim leaders condemn homosexuality
1 Jul 2009,PTI

NEW DELHI: Amid government moves for a re-look at criminalising homosexuality, several Muslim leaders have said any attempt to legally permit unnatural sex is an attack on religious and moral values.

“Legalisation of homosexuality is an attack on Indian religious and moral values,” over a dozen prominent Muslim religious leaders said in a statement.

The statement has been endorsed by Maulana Jalaluddin Omari, President of the Jamaat-e Islami Hind, Maulana Muhammad Salim Qasimi, Rector of Darul Uloom Waqf, Deoband, Maulana Mufti Mukarram Ahmad, Shahi Imam of Jama Masjid Fatehpuri, among others.

“We are shocked to see reports in the media that the Union government is considering the repeal of Section 377 of the IPC, which means making homosexuality legal,” the statement said on Tuesday.

It said that homosexuality is a sin and a social evil which will only lead to societal disintegration and break-up of the family.

Appealing to the government not to be influenced by the “decadent trends of the Western culture” and not to give in to the demands of a minuscule minority, the statement said the government should not test the patience of the silent vast majority of the country which abhors such behaviour.

A prominent body of Muslim community Jamiat Ulema-e-Hind had earlier hit out at the government’s proposed move, saying the repeal of the section would create “sexual anarchy” in the society.

“The section should stay as its repealing would result in sexual anarchy in the society. Those opposing the section are influenced by Western culture. Those who argue for independence do not realise that independence should have its limits,” Jamiat Ulema-e-Hind spokesperson Abdul Hameed Noamani said.

Leading Islamic seminary Darul Uloom Deoband had earlier also opposed the Centre’s move to repeal a controversial section, saying unnatural sex is against the tenets of Islam.

“Homosexuality is offence under Shariat Law and haram (prohibited) in Islam,” Deputy Vice Chancellor of the Darul Uloom Deoband Maulana Abdul Khalik Madrasi has said.

The reaction came after reports that Centre was likely to convene a meeting soon to evolve a consensus on repealing a controversial section of the Indian Penal Code which criminalises homosexuality.



Gay sex against tenets of Islam: Deoband
29 Jun 2009, 1353 hrs IST, PTI

MUZAFFARNAGAR, UP: A leading Islamic seminary on Monday opposed Centre’s move to repeal a controversial section of the penal law which criminalises homosexuality saying unnatural sex is against the tenets of Islam.

“Homosexuality is an offence under Shariat Law and haram (prohibited) in Islam,” deputy vice chancellor of the Darul Uloom Deoband Maulana Abdul Khalik Madrasi said.

Madrasi also asked the government not to repeal section 377 of IPC which criminalises homosexuality.

His objection came a day after law minister Veerappa Moily said a decision on repealing the section would be taken only after considering concerns of all sections of the society, including religious groups like the church.

Terming gay activities as crime, Maulana Salim Kasmi, vice-president of the All-India Muslim Personal Law Board (AIMPLB), said homosexuality is punishable under Islamic law and section 377 of IPC should not be tampered.

Maulana Mohd Sufiyan Kasmi, an AIMPLB member, and Mufti Zulfikar, president of Uttar Pradesh Imam Organisation have also expressed similar views on the issue.

Kasmi said it would be harmful for the society to legalise gay sex.

Buoyed by the news that the Centre is considering repealing the controversial section of the IPC, members of the gay community on Sunday held parades in several cities.


Ancient India didn’t think homosexuality was against nature
27 Jun 2009, 0018 hrs IST, Manoj Mitta, TNN

NEW DELHI: Was Indian society tolerant of homosexuality before the colonial administration proscribed it in 1860? The government has taken
conflicting positions on this within the country and outside.

On a petition pending before the Delhi high court seeking to decriminalize homosexuality, the government said in its counter affidavit that that there were “no convincing reports to indicate that homosexuality or other offences against the order of nature mentioned in Section 377 IPC were acceptable in the Indian society prior to colonial rule.”

But when it was being reviewed by the UN Human Rights Council last year for the first time ever, India distanced itself from that provision when Sweden, arguably the most gay-friendly country in the world, questioned its record in ensuring equality irrespective of a person’s sexual orientation.

This is how Goolam Vahanvati, who was then solicitor-general and is now attorney-general, tried to save India’s face before the council as part of its official delegation. “Around the early 19th Century, you probably know that in England they frowned on homosexuality, and therefore there are historical reports that various people came to India to take advantage of its more liberal atmosphere with regard to different kinds of sexual conduct.

“As a result, in 1860 when we got the Indian Penal Code, which was drafted by Lord Macaulay, they inserted Section 377 which brought in the concept of ‘sexual offences against the order of nature’.

Now in India we didn’t have this concept of something being ‘against the order of nature’. It was essentially a Western concept, which has remained over the years. Now homosexuality as such is not defined in the IPC, and it will be a matter of great argument whether it is ‘against the order of nature’.”

Vahanvati’s admission on the international forum that the ban on homosexuality was a western import and its relevance was debatable flies in the face of the government’s unabashed efforts before the Delhi high court to retain Section 377, complete with its colonial baggage and archaic notion of unnatural offences.

Whatever the politics behind this glaring contradiction, there is ample evidence placed before the high court by petitioner Naz Foundation substantiating in effect Vahanvati’s view that in the centuries prior to the enactment of section 377, India was rather accommodating of homosexuals.

While the penalty imposed by Section 377 goes up to life sentence, there is nothing close to it in Manusmriti, the most popular Hindu law book of medieval and ancient India. “If a man has shed his semen in non-human females, in a man, in a menstruating woman, in something other than a vagina, or in water, he should carry out the ‘painful heating’ vow.” Thus, this peculiar vow, involving application of cow’s urine and dung, was meant not only for homosexuals but also errant heterosexuals.

The penalty is even milder if the homosexual belongs to an upper caste. As Manusmriti puts it, “If a twice-born man unites sexually with a man or a woman in a cart pulled by a cow, or in water, or by day, he should bathe with his clothes on.’’

Since Manusmriti was written at a time when bath generally meant taking a dip in a river or a lake with other members of the same gender, the penalty of making a homosexual bathe without taking off his clothes was probably designed to avoid the embarrassment of his being sexually aroused in public.

In another indicator of the liberal Hindu heritage, Kama Sutra, a classic written in the first millennium by Sage Vatsyayana, devotes a whole chapter to homosexual sex saying “it is to be engaged in and enjoyed for its own sake as one of the arts.” Besides providing a detailed description of oral sex between men, Kama Sutra categorizes men who desire other men as “third nature” and refers to long-term unions between men.



This entry was posted on July 2, 2009 at 12:32 am and is filed under India, Indian Muslims, Islam, Islamofascism, Sharia. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.


via Islamic Terrorism in India

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Posted in: Politics / Religion

Police Arrest School Teacher For Homosexual Activities

Police has arrested a school teacher in Ha Huvarafushi under suspicion of engaging in homosexual relations with a student. 

The school teacher is identified by Police as Mohamed Idrees of Samaaraage / Huvarafishi. According to reports the illicit sexual relations was carried out by Idrees by taking the student to the school at odd hours on the pretext of giving extra tuition. 

“2 days before the arrest of the school teacher there was a march against sexual abuse of children , here on this island, after that the student told the story to his friends, the story slowly spread and finally it reached adults, this where the issue surfaced” an informer from the island told Miadhu Daily. 

The story is fast spreading on the island although there is no news from any official source, he said. The informer also said the accused school teacher has been taken to atoll capital, Dhihdhoo, for investigations. 

Via Miadhu News

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Posted in: News

Hoarafushi teacher arrested for sexually abusing student

Haveeru Daily, Jun 23, 2009, A teacher from the Haa Alifu atoll Hoarafushi School was arrested on charges of having a homosexual relationship with a male 14-year-old student. 

Officials from the Hoarafushi Island Office said that the Police had arrested the Mathematics teacher after the victim’s family had reported him to the Police. A reliable source from the island, who was in a position to know, told Haveeru that the underage boy had said the teacher molested him on four different occasions after bringing him to the teacher’s tuition centre. He further said that the boy had said that the teacher had shown him pornographic videos before molesting him. 

Officials from the Island Office said that the boy had spoken out about the events after a protest march against child abuse had been organized in the island by the residents a few days back. 

Police said that they were investigating the case. 

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Posted in: News