World
Around the world, May 17 recognized as ‘gay day’
LGBT activists from Albania to Uganda prepare to mark day against bias
LGBT rights groups in Albania plan to commemorate IDAHO. (Photo courtesy of Amarildo Fecanji/PINK Embassy)
LGBT rights advocates in more than 100 countries around the world will commemorate the International Day Against Homophobia on May 17 with a series of marches, workshops, performances and other events.
Identoba, an LGBT advocacy group in Georgia, is planning a flash mob in front of the country’s old Parliament building in the country’s capital, Tbilisi, on May 17 during which participants will make a rainbow flag with their T-shirts. Botswanan playwright and activist Kalvin K. Kol-Kes is staging his play “BUTCHered” inspired by Mart Crowley’s “Boys in the Band” that focuses on a group of friends who are predominantly lesbian.
Cuba’s National Center for Sexual Education (CENESEX) has scheduled a series of events across Cuba to commemorate IDAHO. Nicaraguan advocacy groups will march through the streets of Managua, the country’s capital, on May 17 to demand respect and what organizers describe as “dignified treatment” for LGBT people.
Washington National Cathedral in D.C. on May 17 will host a screening of the film “God Loves Uganda” and a panel discussion on the state of LGBT rights in the East African country. Thousands of people are expected to take part in a march for LGBT rights in San Juan, Puerto Rico, on the same day.
Zaque, an LGBT youth group in the Australian city of Ballarat in the country’s Victoria state will hold a number of events to commemorate IDAHO. These include the launch of a new iPhone app.
“For the young people of Zaque, IDAHO is important because it is a day for them to stand up and be proud and say that homophobia is not OK,” Ballarat City Councilor Belinda Coates told the Washington Blade. “It’s a celebration of who they are and allows them to be leaders and educators within the community.”
The Albanian LGBT advocacy group PINK Embassy will hold its second annual diversity festival in Tirana, the country’s capital that will feature exhibits with messages and posters the group’s general manager, Amarildo Fecanji, described to the Blade as a “short resume of what has been achieved so far.”
Fecanji’s group will also host panels that will examine media coverage of LGBT-specific issues and how they factor into Albanian politics and gay youth. Pink Embassy and other human rights organizations will also stage a diversity fair in the center of Tirana.
“Slowly but steadily May 17 is coming to be recognized as the gay day,” Fecanji told the Blade when asked how he feels IDAHO bolsters his group’s advocacy efforts in the southeastern European country. “That for people is an opportunity for society to sort of come together.”
IDAHO first took place on May 17, 2005, to commemorate the World Health Organization’s decision to declassify homosexuality as a mental disorder. Organizers have subsequently added transphobia and biphobia to their mission.
This year’s IDAHO takes place against the backdrop of the recent extension of marriage rights to same-sex couples in France, New Zealand, Uruguay and several Brazilian states that include Rio de Janeiro. Gays and lesbians can also now legally tie the knot in nine U.S. states and D.C. and will soon be able to do so in Delaware and Rhode Island.
Canadian and Dutch lawmakers earlier this year approved a transgender rights bills, but anti-LGBT discrimination and violence remain pervasive throughout the world.
A report by the Latin American and Caribbean Network of Transgender Women (REDLACTRANS) released earlier this year notes 61 trans women in Colombia have been reported murdered between 2005-2011. Honduran advocate José Pepe Palacios told the Blade in February while he was in the United States that at least 89 LGBT people in the Central American country have been murdered since the 2009 coup that ousted José Manuel Zelaya.
The State Department in recent years has also spoken out against anti-LGBT violence in Jamaica, Uganda, Zimbabwe and other countries.
Identoba founder Irakli Vacharadze told the Blade violence against LGBT Georgians remains a serious concern. His group’s flash mob will last only 20 minutes because he said “it’s hard to guarantee” the security of those who will take part.
A group of men last week attacked a handful of people who protested the release of a video that showed men having sex with other men.
“This is the discourse in Georgia right now,” Vacharadze told the Blade from Tbilisi. “It’s so, so ugly that you can’t rationally, reasonably argue with that. It’s basically a fist coming in your face when you’re displaying your belongingness to the community.”
Vacharadze and other activists feel IDAHO only strengthens their advocacy efforts in spite of the threats they continue to face.
Kalvin K. Kol-Kes plans to stage a short play called “BUTCHered” to commemorate IDAHO in Botswana. (Photo courtesy of Kalvin K. Kol-Kes)
“I’m very happy with a day like May 17,” Kol-Kes told the Blade last Friday from the Botswanan capital of Gaborone. “It gives you a point when you can actively state something.”
Pedro Julio Serrano of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force noted the march in the Puerto Rican capital on May 17 will coincide with the debate over three bills that would extend adoption rights to gays and lesbians; add sexual orientation and gender identity and expression to the island’s domestic violence laws and ban anti-LGBT discrimination in employment, housing and public accommodations.
A hearing on the adoption bill is scheduled to take place in the Puerto Rico Senate hours before the march.
“We are in a historic moment and this day will help in the education of our people about the need achieve equality,” Serrano said.
Belarus
Belarusian lawmakers approve bill to crackdown on LGBTQ rights
Country’s president known as ‘Europe’s last dictator’
Lawmakers in Belarus on Thursday approved a bill that would allow the government to crack down on LGBTQ advocacy.
The Associated Press notes the bill would punish anyone found guilty of “propaganda of homosexual relations, gender change, refusal to have children, and pedophilia” with fines, community labor, and 15 days in jail.
The House of Representatives, the lower house of the Belarusian National Assembly, last month approved the bill. The Council of the Republic, which is the parliament’s upper chamber, passed it on Thursday.
President Alexander Lukashenko is expected to sign it.
Belarus borders Poland, Ukraine, Russia, Latvia, and Lithuania. Lukashenko — known as “Europe’s last dictator” is a close ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Kazakhstan is among the countries that have enacted Russian-style anti-LGBTQ propaganda laws in recent years.
Vika Biran, a Belarusian LGBTQ activist, is among those arrested during anti-Lukashenko protests that took place in 2020 after he declared victory in the country’s presidential election.
Kenya
Kenyan advocacy groups launch LGBTQ voter mobilization campaign
As Kenya prepares for next year’s August general election, local queer rights groups have joined Gen Zers in also mobilizing their members to register as voters.
The groups’ drive began ahead of the electoral commission’s official launch of a one-month nationwide mass voter registration on March 30, targeting 6.5 million new voters to bring the total to more than 28 million.
The groups — led by the Initiative for Equality and Non-Discrimination (INEND) and Galck+ — note that politics is not optional, but rather it is “our responsibility” to use the ballot to put an end to bad leadership and discriminatory laws against them.
“Voting is one of the most powerful ways we exercise our autonomy and remind the State that our human rights are not ‘Western imports’; our struggles for housing, employment, safety, and dignity are fundamentally Kenyan issues,” INEND states.
It reminds queer individuals that the nation entrusts them with an identity card at age 18 as a recognition of their ability to make decisions, follow laws, and take responsibility for the country’s future.
INEND also notes that despite this honor, LGBTQ people get kicked out of their homes due to homophobia, are discriminated against at work, and face violence in public places due to the punitive laws that the same State legislates.
“As queer Kenyans, our vote matters,” INEND states. “Our voice belongs in the democratic and governance conversations, and true democracy includes everyone.”
Some voter mobilization initiatives the queer lobby groups have been using include ‘Queering the Ballot’ Podcasts on civic participation, dubbed ‘Your Vote is Your Future’. The topics explored include how laws shape their lives, the relationship between lived experiences of common citizens, discrimination fatigue, distrust in government systems, and voter apathy.
The groups through the mobilization drive hope to create a queer voting bloc to actively participate in restructuring and reconstructing the existing governance system they argue has been a problem for them. They maintain the queer community navigates a system that was not built for them from its questioning of their right to exist, yet the Kenyan Constitution clearly states that no citizen should be discriminated against based on sexual orientation or gender identity.
The Court of Appeal next month will hear a case challenging the constitutionality of provisions in Kenya’s Penal Code that criminalize consensual same-sex relationships among adults. The appeals court postponed the case after adjourning on Feb. 4, its first substantive hearing since the High Court judgement in 2019.
“Change requires more than pointing fingers. It requires reflection, action, and showing up, especially at the ballot box as LGBTQ Kenyan citizens and declaring that this is our country, our business, and we can no longer watch from the sidelines,” INEND states.
The group notes that they want a governance system that embraces queer people as they go about their daily lives without any form of homophobic discrimination, harassment, or arrests. Queer people are therefore urged to pick the right leaders who listen to them in Kenya’s six elective positions, from the president down to the local government representatives, as their decisions while in power affect them.
“It is very irresponsible for any human being, even around the world, to assume that they don’t have political responsibility. It is easy and sounds fancy to say ‘I don’t like politics,’ but it does not make one good as it makes one abandon their political responsibility as a citizen,” INEND states.
The groups are also concerned with the existing homophobia among Kenyans, especially whenever they join them in street protests against the government’s punitive measures or advocating for change. However, they maintain that the LGBTQ community won’t be left behind despite being marginalized in society, yet they are the most affected group when the government raids people’s pockets for taxes.
“Now we are moving from the margins to the centre of this political conversation early enough to ensure that our community sees the sense because if we live in a country that doesn’t work, we will be the most affected,” INEND states.
INEND, with the National Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission and Galck+, last November launched the second Queering the Ballot Campaign and the 2024 Situation Report on queer participation in Kenya’s democracy.
The report surveyed 14 of the country’s 47 local governments, whose key findings affirm that queer Kenyans are not outsiders to democracy but its heartbeat.
“The title ‘Our Vote, Our Future: LGBTQ+ Inclusion in Democratic and Governance Processes’ in Kenya is an ode to the spirit of the queer movement in Kenya; unshaken in the face of adversity, determined in its pursuit of justice, and unrelenting in demand to be seen, heard and counted in democratic and political processes,” reads the report forwarded by former Chief Justice Willy Mutunga.
The report calls on Parliament, the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission, the County Assemblies, and every Kenyan to make inclusion not symbolic but systemic.
Vice President JD Vance and his wife, second lady Usha Vance, will visit Hungary next week.
An announcement the White House released on Thursday said the Vances will be in Budapest, the Hungarian capital, from April 7-8.
JD Vance “will hold bilateral meetings with” Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán. The announcement further indicates the vice president “will also deliver remarks on the rich partnership between the United States and Hungary.”
The Vances will travel to Hungary less than a week before the country’s parliamentary elections take place on April 12.
Orbán, who has been in office since 2010, and his Fidesz-KDNP coalition government have faced widespread criticism over its anti-LGBTQ crackdown.
The Associated Press notes polls indicate Orbán is trailing Péter Magyar and his center-right Tisza party.
Belarusian lawmakers approve bill to crackdown on LGBTQ rights
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