Okay, so you're too lazy to click away and read. I get it, I am too. Basically, what's going down is a bunch of bullshit. And by bullshit, I mean evangelical Christians are going to various African countries (and have been for a while) and spreading the good word of the Americanized Bible (you know, the one that literally translates the Bible rather than contextually). Simultaneously, they are "helping" by pouring tons and tons of money into these countries to help them. But let's keep it real, isn't it really just to help themselves? You know, ease their hateful consciences? Oh, there I go inserting my opinion. They are seen as saviors, offering money and resources to these countries so that people in need (which is also debatable - isn't this just a new form of colonialism?) will "see the light" of their religion and follow it. Good on you, cause I know you think your religion is really great and all and you want everybody to know about it, but what happens when your religion preaches hate?
In this case, Uganda specifically, US evangelicals arrived last year to present a seminar on homosexuality. More specifically, as the NY Times reports, "the visitors discussed how to make gay people straight, how gay men often sodomized teenage boys and how “the gay movement is an evil institution” whose goal is “to defeat the marriage-based society and replace it with a culture of sexual promiscuity.” Look, I know I sodomize teenage boys on the regular, but I also know that not everybody does this. Fuck that! I am so tired of these worn-out stereotypes. Can't we get new ones? Can't they go into these countries and talk about how we're all going to make people start dressing better and decorating their homes and give them bad highlights and that all the female gays will start wanting national sports leagues for softball and basketball? Can't they say that we're going to open gayborhoods in their cities and that they should prepare for an onslaught of rainbow flags and really good stores and restaurants? No? We still get the society-destroyers and the pedophilia shit? Whatever.
And then, surprise, surprise, months later legislation was introduced that would make homosexuality punishable by death. And now the folks who gave the seminars and have been using their influence to spout this anti-gay rhetoric are acting all "ZOMG, how could that have happened? Did we do that? Oops! We had no idea! We love gay people! SMH" (Seriously: Don Schmeirer of Exodus International, a group that literally says it can cure your homosexuality through prayer and counseling, said "some of the nicest people I have ever met are gay people." How does that even make sense coming from a man whose job's sole purpose is to eliminate homosexuality? "Some of the nicest people I have ever met are gay people." Does that mean you don't want us to die, cause you didn't exactly come out explicitly and make that clear. Or that repressing all signs of our homosexuality is just a better, healthier, nicer option for us?
I will never pretend to even remotely understand evangelicals. In fact, sometimes, I feel like evangelicals hide behind the label of evangelical because it lets them get away with murder. In Uganda's case, literal murder, but in the United States, it's more of... well, craziness. You can basically spout whatever crap you want, speak in tongues, and "exorcise" whatever demons you want (see also: go buckwild on someone.) They can say whatever they want, proclaim whatever they want on behalf of their religion, act on those practices and it's okay because they're crazy. I mean, evangelical. Ultimately, I guess this is alright because we live in a free country and people should be able to practice their religions - just don't expect me to be fooled by your crazy asses and your Kool-Aid and your braided hair that goes halfway down your floor-length denim skirt.
That being said, it's difficult to try to put these mofo's on blast when I admittedly don't understand them. I've never understood being blinded by your religion so intensely that you fail to be a rational, decent human being. In fact, I was under the impression that religion guides you to being a rational, decent human being. I thought it was supposed to make you more compassionate. Silly me!
The idea of missionaries has always fucked me up, too. I've always seen it as a form of modern ethnocentric colonialism. Rather than assisting countries in ways that are conducive to the protection and encouragement of their culture, their values and their ways of life, it has always just sort of rubbed me as reckless and dangerous. At the very worst, I see it as a bunch of privileged white church folk heading off to the 'Exotic' for a vacation and hiding behind the religion to actually go somewhere exciting for once. Damn, I'm harsh. But I keeps it real. Admittedly, I've never done mission work and I've never actually seen it, so missionaries: correct me if I'm wrong.
Here is the huge problem amongst all the problems in this scary situation: that these people are claiming to have no idea how this could happen, and that they are not even remotely at fault for this. Which means one of two things:
- They are so sadly ill-equipped to be visiting other countries with very different cultures and spreading anti-gay rhetoric that they cannot even fathom how that creates an atmosphere of hatred. But of course they are! They are spreading hate without ever needing to say the word hate, which makes it an even more lethal kind of hate, the kind that is rooted in fear and that creeps up on you in a back ally when someone kills you in the name of "God." So, we'll call this ignorance. They were just too ignorant to realize how this could happen. Which means they lack the objectivity that is absolutely necessary before traveling to a foreign country and indocrinating it with Western "ideals." Verdict: Guilty on account of fucking sheer stupidity.
- They knew all along that something like this could very well happen - they just didn't think it would lead back to them. So now, they have to play ignorant. Verdict: Extra super guilty because now they're lying and they're just plain evil.
I think this particular brand of evangelicalism, because it is important to clarify I guess, is suddenly starting to realize that the wheels of progress have already started turning in America, however slowly. So now, they're getting scared, so they have to take their refined brand of hatred (Hatred: 2010) to other countries that have yet to be influenced by it.
Meanwhile, we're worried about getting married. I ain't trynna get all preachy here, and I want to get married just as much as the rest of my fellow gays, but let's keep it in perspective. Let's remember Iran, Yemen, Belize, Jamaica, Saudi Arabia, UAE, and all the other places in the world where it's illegal to even exist. I'm glad that news outlets like the NYT, NPR, and CNN have picked up this story and featured it, but I'm more pissed that this is even a story. That this is really happening.
One of my favorite sayings that I hear all the time in response to complaints about LGBT rights and how much needs to be done is "yeah, but we've come a long way." I always wonder who "we" is, because I know that if by "we," we meant the entire world... that colloquialism wouldn't hold much weight at all. The victories, however small and however often, are wonderful and should be celebrated, I suppose, but...
Personally, I find it more and more difficult to celebrate those victories knowing that LGBT people all over the world are still being murdered, beaten, outlawed, hated and spoken of in a way that promotes these forms of hatred towards them--
Oh, wait, I mean us.
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