Do the math

[rm]

Yesterday afternoon the most visible gay-rights activist in Uganda was been beaten to death with a hammer. The government says the motive was robbery. Raise your hand if you believe that. Ugandan activists directly blame the climate fostered, in part, by religious activists from the US.

Among other things, this murder increases the urgency of Brenda Namigadde's fight against deportation to Uganda from the UK. She is scheduled to be deported tomorrow, but the UK has denied her asylum request because they say there's not enough evidence she's actually lesbian.

Meanwhile, many conservative groups, including the Family Research Council, Concerned Women for America, Liberty University, and the Heritage Foundation are boycotting this year's CPAC because one of the co-sponsors is LGBT Republican group, GOProud.

Accepting homophobia and other forms of bigotry because we don't want to step on other people's religious beliefs (and we love to do this in the US -- "We don't have to stick up for LGBT people, because that would offend people's faith!" Yet you can, obviously, be a Christian (or of any other faith) and support the intrinsic humanity and civil rights of LGBT people -- so why do we keep letting people use God to justify their hate? My theory? Because more often than not we are, as a group, lazy cowards.) is how people wind up dead, and when it's too hard to get away with advocating the murder and execution of LGBT people in the US (which many of these anti-gay activists do do, just often in places where you don't happen to hear them), they are perfectly happy to go to some other country and exploit its circumstances to do the same, simply because they know most people in the US simply don't care about what's going on in places that aren't white or rich.

You can't fight homophobia without also fighting racism. You can't fight homophobia without also fighting ableism. You can't fight homophobia without also fighting sexism. The lies we are prone, as humans, to tell about people who aren't exactly like us, are often rooted in (and sadly, not limited to at all) sex, gender, and sexuality.

All this shit goes together (also, all this shit is not all the same, but it connects a lot more often than I think is necessarily obvious). And it's far too easy to not look and not care because it's too much, too awful, too big, too challenging, too hard, too faraway, too uncomfortable to fucking deal with. I can be as guilty as anyone.

But we all need to know. And we all need to do the math. And we need to try. And we need to keep speaking out. Especially when it's probably never going to cost us what it cost David Kato.

Hate not solved, runs and will find a way to destroy someone, somewhere, whether you see it or not.

Comments

[xtricks.livejournal.com]

Worse, than the cops in Uganda are saying 'robbers' they're also saying their main suspect is the guy who was living with David Kato -- ie: possibly his lover. Considering the culture there, I fear they will frame the man, whether or not he was involved, simly because he's also gay and was Kato's lover.

[rm.livejournal.com]

Oh UGH. Your fears make a lot of sense.

[azn-jack-fiend.livejournal.com]

That's such a horrible story.

I recently found out about a fund that supports the LGBT-inclusive Unitarian church in Uganda, led by a Ugandan minister. It sounds like a great way to support the situation.

[rm.livejournal.com]

That's a fantastic link. Thank you.

[tree00faery.livejournal.com]

This. So much this, everything you said.

[podle.livejournal.com]

Thank you so much for what you have written here.

[dsmoen.livejournal.com]

I've been thinking about an LJ entry about not making religions exempt from certain taxes (like property tax, for example). Then I was thinking about working conditions, then I thought about discrimination.

Then my brain went thunk.

The reason religions are exempt from most working condition laws (for religious workers) is because they want to be bigoted and inhumane in ways we don't permit in the society as a whole.

My entire universe has been shaking all day from the reverberations of that realization. I haven't had enough time to coalesce it into a bigger post, so I'll just plop it here for the moment.

[hoyland54.livejournal.com]

The reason religions are exempt from most working condition laws (for religious workers) is because they want to be bigoted and inhumane in ways we don't permit in the society as a whole.

Can you elaborate? It strikes me as obvious that a church can't, say, guarantee a priest a 40-hour work week. Or vacation, for that matter, depending on where the church is. They ought to be able to guarantee the parish secretary and whoever else works in the office those things. But I can't draw the line from denying the parish secretary proper working conditions to bigotry.* On the other hand, it's pretty easy to draw that line when the Catholic Church tries to strong-arm their way to exemptions to non-discrimination laws (mainly by threatening to get out of the social service and particularly adoption/foster care business). I assume other churches try that all the time, but few of them have enough clout in the US. (I'm sure the Mormons can pull it off in Utah.) There's also the so-called 'ministerial exemption' to Title VII, but I think churches somehow got that for 'free'.

*I don't know anything about the working conditions of parish secretaries to be honest. I think you're really referencing that question on the income tax that asks if you were primarily employed by a church or as clergy. I think churches may not pay social security tax or something.

[dsmoen.livejournal.com]

In the US, parish secretaries would be covered by all nondiscrimination laws. In fact, a faith can't discriminate on the basis of religion for those positions. If I, as a Wiccan, wanted to work as a secretary for a Southern Baptist church, they couldn't say no because I was Wiccan, nor could they make me uncomfortable for my faith.

Wage laws don't require 40-hour weeks or even vacations (not in the US, anyway).

Anyhow, it's a long and I really want to go into it, but it does require reading up on a recent human trafficking case for a member of a religious order. Plus I'm at work now and I don't really want to get the anger machine engaged right this minute.

I was in the audience for this Human Trafficking (in Scientology's religious order) press conference:

http://www.xenutv.com/blog/?p=4317

[jinian.livejournal.com]

Screaming internally. Also donating to that link above. DAMN them.

[chuckro.livejournal.com]

The link about the boycott is broken.

Which is a shame, because I'm inappropriately excited by the possibility that the bigoted "Christian" wing of the Republicans might schism, even slightly, from the libertarian "zero taxes! small government!" wing. Life would be so much easier if they were seperate fringe groups that couldn't aggregate each others' votes.

On the good news front: I recently read about a survey that said if Americans over 60 controlled every vote, gay marriage would be illegal in every state, but if Americans under 30 controlled them all, it would be legal in 38 states. Time is, quite happily, on our side.

[rm.livejournal.com]

Link is fixed.

[dsmoen.livejournal.com]

We thought time was on our side (of civil liberties in general) in the 60s, but that only seems to be somewhat true. I grew up in a very liberal time (with really liberal parents) and the backlash I see amazes me.

[rm.livejournal.com]

I also don't feel like waiting 20 years (grim), for people to die (grim), for rights for LGBT people in 75% of the country (grim).

[dsmoen.livejournal.com]

That, too.

[meirion.livejournal.com]

Also, it doesn't work.

(Although I hesitate to mention the word "church" in a conversation about religious people, the following made no sense when stripped of its context, so by necessity I have to mention it. Please don't flame me for it).

My (high-church Anglican) church decided 15 years ago not to have a vote on any of the nasty Resolutions banning women priests, as the people who were most against them were getting old. However in actuality the most reactionary and obstinate people have outlived the more tolerant, which has meant that deferring a matter of conflict for 15 years to avoid a schism merely postponed the schism for 15 years. Meanwhile younger reactionaries have joined because the schism hasn't happened, and they are amongst the most active and energetic and involved people. So the situation is if anything worse than it would have been 15 years ago: much as I wish the young reactionaries would throw their hands up in disgust and join the Ordinariate, it's not going to happen; and those of us who aren't anti-{women priests} are more likely to be told to leave (there being several sort-of high church Anglican churches with women priests in the town now, although none of them feel at all like "home" to me; places with women priests in Oxford are considerably better).

We are, I suppose, in a stronger position than we could be as I run all the IT services, in a voluntary capacity, which would throw many spanners in the works if I left (leaving the country is one thing, as much can be done online; but were I to be told to find another church I would be less likely to strive to ensure continuity ...)

It's not even as if I particularly want a female Vicar; I couldn't care less if they were a Martian as long as they are sensible, level-headed and with good pastoral skills (Ood Sigma would make a good priest, I think ...)

[nancylebov.livejournal.com]

Clear enough to me. You're saying that there's a bias in favor of not troubling existing institutions which leads to a great deal of injustice.

I hope you get a few more data points about whether your ideas came across.

[dichroic.livejournal.com]

Makes sense to me. Maybe the thing to do in those cases is to bring up extreme examples, e.g Hamas, which has a military wing that does terrorist activities as well as a social welfare wing that supports hospitals and orphanages. As far as I can tell (that is, purely hearsay), it gets a lot of support from people who appreciate the latter without necessarily intending to condone the former.

[ladyofthelog.livejournal.com]

:/ :/ :/

Oh, how I do not have words.

that would offend people's faith
lol

[idunn.livejournal.com]

She is scheduled to be deported tomorrow, but the UK has denied her asylum request because they say there's not enough evidence she's actually lesbian.

WTFF, what does she have to do to prove it, eat another woman out for the audience?

[mirabehn.livejournal.com]

Thank you so much for this post. It's wonderful. (And horrible, but that's because what you're writing about is horrible.)

Hate not solved, runs and will find a way to destroy someone, somewhere, whether you see it or not.

Yes, yes, so much word to this.

[silmaril.livejournal.com]

the UK has denied her asylum request because they say there's not enough evidence she's actually lesbian.

...
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what is this i dont even

No seriously what does she need to do make out with a girl in front of the Houses of Parliament or what? What?

[sparkindarkness.livejournal.com]

This is actually sadly commonplace with GBL people seeking asylum - the Czech republic even had "arousal tests" and Canada sent a bisexual man back to Jamaica because he didn't convince them he was gay.

And if that fails they fall back on the "if you can hide it, you won't be killed" excuse

[sparkindarkness.livejournal.com]

Amen.

We need to connect the hate speech to the deaths. Stop letting those who peddle hatred and bigotry dodge from the pain they cause. They are guilty, they have blood on their hands

[rm.livejournal.com]

Good news: Brenda Namigadde's gotten a temporary stay of the deportation order. She's not on the plane. Just announced.

[sparkindarkness.livejournal.com]

Thank gods