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Underground > Switchboard >

Cameroonian McCarthy style gay witch hunts

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16:58 / 06.02.06

A little feature in the Guardian today, which I found quite interesting, partly because I'd just watched 'Good Night and Good Luck' and was feeling all shocked that lessons in history haven't been learned. The gist of the story is that a list has been printed in a Cameroonian national paper outing several public figures as being homosexual - if found guilty they can face a minimum of six months in prison, and a fine, as same sex relationships are illegal, as they are in most of Africa (South Africa has recently made same sex marriages legal). The rhetoric of the paper was interestingly scaremonfering, telling of people becoming gay to further their careers, the permitation of a very white and western disease, etc. Anyone else read about this?

17:30 / 06.02.06

Becoming gay to further their careers?

???????????????????????????????????

17:56 / 06.02.06

gay is very very hip. except to tom cruise. it's almost like coming out isnt even a story anymore. i think if you're famous and you havent come out yet, you pretty much missed the boat. there was about 10 years there where coming out would really get you the headlines. now, not really, i dont think. i think for actors and musicians, it can further one's career because for them, it's all about headlines. but for politicians it's more iffy. it's hard to waffle on issues when you're so clearly one way or another. i'm surprised you dont see more completely sexually ambiguous politicians, they would appeal to a lot more people.

anyway, off to read that article. i think as long as there arent any pictures of homosexuals with bombs under their hats, everything should be Aok.

18:06 / 06.02.06

Their very stylish hats, I migh add.

What I want to know is how one becomes gay? I mean, these people actually think "gayness" is contagious or something?

It's the gay conspiracy theory all over again. I can accept (sort of) some people being helpless bigots, but can't they at least be original about it?

Our Lady Has Left the Building

18:08 / 06.02.06

ShadowSax i think as long as there arent any pictures of homosexuals with bombs under their hats, everything should be Aok.

Except for the six months in prison and huge fines of course.

18:22 / 06.02.06

i dont think you'd be hardpressed to find real live westerners who also believe that being gay is something you can catch.

18:23 / 06.02.06

No, I would not. Assholes are everywhere

18:25 / 06.02.06

heres a question: who's more homophobic, those accusing or those accused and filing lawsuits to deny?

18:49 / 06.02.06

Hey, if you're in a country that outlaws homosexuality, filing a suit denying you're one does not mean you're homophobic, just that you don't want to go to prision

18:51 / 06.02.06

ShadowSax, I don't think you thought that one through very much.

18:54 / 06.02.06

why start now?

18:59 / 06.02.06

anyway, i'm not sure what the threshold for proof is in cameroon, but i would imagine that you cant go to jail for being accused of being gay.

in the article itself, the concern seemed to be more about breaking up families than about jail time. rumors and all that stuff.

23:39 / 06.02.06

i think if you're famous and you havent come out yet, you pretty much missed the boat.

Tell that to anyone in a sport like soccer and football and you'll soon see just how far that is from the truth.

Name one 'A-list' hollywood actor still living and under the age of 50 who has come out?

23:42 / 06.02.06

Don1t mind SS too much. I got the feeling he's out for a post-fight today.

I ain't biting that bait, dude...

ONLY NICE THINGS

07:21 / 07.02.06

I have to ask - why, if you have no interest in current events, politics or activism, are you contributing to the Switchboard?

ONLY NICE THINGS

07:25 / 07.02.06

People, please read the wiki, read some other threads and try to understand that worthless contributions actually make it more difficult for contributions of worth to happen. If you can get ontopic, mazel tov. Otherwise, posts will start to be moved for deletion to try to give the thread a chance of life.

ONLY NICE THINGS

09:24 / 07.02.06

So, to try to drag us back onto topicality:

The article Benny the Ball describes is here. Obviously, there are a number of concerns with this kind of activity. At the top level, there's the issue of homosexuality being illegal at all in Cameroon, and therefore the likelihood that increased surveillance of those being "outed" here will lead to criminal charges and up to five years in jail. The next is that this is trial by media - a comparison that leaps immediately to mind in a UK context is Rebekah Wade's decision to "out" sex offenders. This led to violence against both property and people, and it's not unreasonable to expect that similar dangers exist in this case, with hysteria and violence filtering down from the unreachable celebrities and government ministers to the man in the street.

There's a broader issue here, about the use of homosexuality as a wedge issue between rich and poor countries. There is nothing about African society that means homosexuality _has_ to be criminalised - the example of South Africa is a salutary one, in terms of church and state. However, and this dovetails into the discussion of the reasons behind the timing of recent demonstrations against Denmark elsewhere, it's a very useful issue. Robert Mugabe has been known to use the idea of a gay white elite located inside and outside the country being the cause of Zimbabwe's problems. The complicity of the major churches - both Roman Catholic and Anglican - in many places in this dehumanising is shameful, and all the more shameful because it is in effect being tacitly supported by Canterbury and Rome.

So, you have a situation in which homophobia - by state, media and church - is being both fomented by and directed against western cultural influence. Which sounds pretty mad. But what measures is it reasonable for take on this. How much is it a human rights issue, and how much an issue of culture which should be left to individual nations to decide?

11:37 / 07.02.06

According to some traditional beliefs, homosexual people are said to be cursed or bewitched.

You know, "witch-hunt" was supposed to be just an expression. If people still hold to such a "dark age" belief-system, I find it hard to expect any sort of improvement any time soon

ONLY NICE THINGS

11:48 / 07.02.06

Really? As opposed to the civilised and sophisticated approach of, for example, the Roman Catholic church? The same Roman Catholic church whose representative is quoted in that article?

That's a problem with the position that these are uncivilised countries simple - that, as mentioned, these attitudes are informed and deformed by external pressures. Again we have cross-currents from the thread on blasphemy: poor, desperate people are easier to persuade to be resentful. And, once you've made them resentful, poor and desperate people are easier to find and hit. Hence this list is probably more of a problem for a gay man living in a small, ungated flat in a poor area than for the Home Secretary.

Another key factor is the role of the state. To look at Evil Scientist's point below, one way the state balances out claims of demonic influence is to say that, irrespective of one's religious beliefs, the individual in question is due the protection of the state as its citizen. Clearly, the Cameroonian constitution is _not_ doing that, which creates a culture of enablement, for want of a less buzzwordy term. The Home Secretary's claim that this is a matter for people's home life is clearly not true if it is also a matter for the criminal justice system.

11:49 / 07.02.06

If people still hold to such a "dark age" belief-system, I find it hard to expect any sort of improvement any time soon

Depends really. There are plenty of Christian schools of thought in places like the US and UK who believe homosexuality to be due to direct influence from an evil spirit (The Devil). Yet those countries are slowly turning things around.

12:14 / 07.02.06

the fool,

List

off the top of my head, i would say ellen degeneres and rosie o'donnell pop into my head. also, yeah, sports figures, male sports figures to be precise, are more closeted. but i think of billy bean, who is a widely respected baseball executive with the angels. david geffen...

on the other hand, female sports figures being gay isnt considered that big a deal.

well, you said name one, so i named more.

12:25 / 07.02.06

Really? As opposed to the civilised and sophisticated approach of, for example, the Roman Catholic church? The same Roman Catholic church whose representative is quoted in that article?

No, the Catholic Church is screw up in such matters as well. Never forget, the "Dark Ages" were the time when they were in charge...

Doesn't matter if you're pagan, christian or whatever. if you think different sexualities are causes by "evil spirits", you have problems. Bigotry and paranoia are much more likely to be the result of "demon's influence" than homosexuality, but that's a theory more fitting to the Temple forum,I suppose

16:22 / 07.02.06

ellen degeneres and rosie o'donnell

A-list? When's the last (or first) time they opened a film?

16:28 / 07.02.06

Rosie o'Donell was Betty Rubble in the Flintstones movies... again hardly leading lady status

ONLY NICE THINGS

17:04 / 07.02.06

Likewise, sports stars (male or female, really - Martina only came out at the end of her carers) who play the sport, rather than sitting on the board. Dennis Rodman is the closest comparison I can think of offhand...

17:08 / 07.02.06

to be clear, are we on topic now? i had been ignoring your posts, haus, and then when i stopped doing that i saw that you very rightly tried to bring the thread back to point. now, maybe, i'm not sure. i didnt want to respond to these last few posts, even tho they were directed at something i said, because i didnt want to contribute to the thread going off topic. so now i'm not sure. please advise.

17:17 / 07.02.06

Concede Fool's point, ShadowSax, and the thread can get back on topic. Easy.

17:21 / 07.02.06

gotcha. so i can bring up something offtopic as long as i'm wrong?

tell ya what, keep trying to get me to "concede". lets see how that improves the thread.

ONLY NICE THINGS

17:22 / 07.02.06

Well, at present we are addressing your contention that coming out in the west is something contraindicated primarily by its quality of being over, which is a useful, IMHO, tool for relating back to attitudes to homosexuality in the west and in Africa, how the cultures differ and how that cultural divide (or more precisely those cultural divides) can be addressed or exploited by different elements.

So, is it directly a discussion of the publication of the names of 50 men in Cameroon? No, but it is, in my opinion, useful backup to that, as it helps both to illuminate and to evidence the sort of attitudes to homosexuality that exist in a continuum with the attitudes in Cameroon, and who espouses them.

In this case, for example, you, a Westerner, have assumed that there is no stigma attached to homosexuality in the West whatsoever, and specifically that it is advantageous for actors and musicians to come out as gay. This has been challenged as a cultural misunderstanding, and evidence provided. So, what Ganesh said, really, but it does, I think, have a use as a parallel topic.

ONLY NICE THINGS

17:24 / 07.02.06

Or you could stink the place up with your persecution complex and, eventually, get dealt with for trolling. That works too.

God, and you think feminists paint themselves as victims...

21:21 / 07.02.06

gotcha. so i can bring up something offtopic as long as i'm wrong?

tell ya what, keep trying to get me to "concede". lets see how that improves the thread.

It'd improve the thread - several threads - if, just sometimes, you were able to tone down the bullishness with which you advance/defend a point you cannot properly evidence.

In this case, I agree that it's important to question the contention that being gay in the West can only advance one's (acting) career, because headlines = good. This isn't fully borne out: as the Fool points out, the real Hollywood A-listers tend to remain in the closet. Gay roles appear to be becoming more acceptable - although they're still viewed as risky or 'brave' in terms of an actor's bankability - and perhaps this will eventually translate into more 'out' gay actors.

I also think this isn't wholly off-topic, but part of a greater whole ie. the stigmatisation of homosexuality across cultures. I'm aware that, in some parts of (Christian?) Africa, at least (and as I've touched on in this rather tentative Head Shop thread), homosexuality is frequently framed as a 'white man's disease' and cited as evidence of Western weakness/decadence. I'm not sure if that's the case in the Cameroonian example.

In comparing and contrasting Western and African homophobia, there may also be an overlap with this thread. In voting to deny UN consultative status to two LGBT organisations, Cameroon and the US are actually in agreement - so, when it comes to governmental attitudes to homosexuality, perhaps the cultural gap isn't quite such a vast gulf after all.

13:25 / 12.02.06

Prominent gay actor points out how hard it still is for film actors, particularly American film actors, to admit to being gay, to find work in Hollywood.... interestingly he suggests that it is even harder for lesbians in Hollywood...

13:52 / 12.02.06

Sir Ian is a guy who I utterly admire (He's Gandalf AND Magneto, for pity's sake). I see him as an asset to the thespian craft, the British noble class, the gay movment, and humanity at large.

Guess this backward vision of Hollywood execs comes from thefact that most money they makes comes from movies directed, at least in theory, to a teenage audience, who they think would not identify to a leadman or leadwoman who's openly homosexual. Or so I suppose

14:00 / 12.02.06

Although Sir Ian McKellan's success in leading roles in teen-orientated movies would seem to give lie to that...

STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK

14:04 / 12.02.06

Exception that proves the rule, maybe?

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