Category — International LGBT News
One Day One struggle www.jismi.net
About Jismi.net
This website is dedicated to the annual “One Day, One Struggle” campaign, a unique effort to underscore the joint struggle against the violation of sexual and bodily rights in Muslim societies, which takes place on November 9. (The Arabic word “Jismi” means “My Body” in English.)
This year, the Lebanon-based groups Nasawiya, Helem and Meem developed an online video campaign focusing on bodily autonomy and sexual rights of individuals.
The videos feature people of different ages, gender expressions, religious affiliations and professional fields talking about the various experiences they were subjected to in terms of sexual and bodily oppression and the ways they were able to overcome these imposed restrictions to achieve complete autonomy and independence in their sexual and bodily choices.
The campaign aims to fill the gap created in dealing with issues related to the body and sexuality, as they are always considered private matters and taboos that shouldn’t be discussed. In addition to them being an integral part of human rights, sexual and bodily rights are a political matter regulated by legislations, rules, institutions and the state, as well as inherited social and cultural restrictions which affect the individual’s relationship with their body and sexuality and reshapes it using oppressive measures, stripping the individual of their autonomy.
Last year, groups held a panel on sexuality at the American University of Beirut (AUB).
Activities around the World
This year, 12 countries across Middle East, North Africa, South and Southeast Asia, are taking part in the campaign. With diverse, groundbreaking actions and events, almost 50 participating human rights organizations, universities and municipalities will simultaneously call for public attention to issues like: Right to Information, Sexuality Education, Sexual Health, Bodily Autonomy and Sexual Rights of Individuals, LGBTTQ Rights, Sexual Diversity and Islam, Sexuality and Shari’a as well as the struggle to stop sexual rights violations ranging from Polygamy to killings of women, gay people and transsexuals.
Hundreds will gather at panels, workshops, video and film screenings, theater performances, photo exhibitions and press release hearings in Bangladesh, Egypt, Ghana, Indonesia, Iran, Lebanon, Malaysia, Pakistan, Palestine, Sudan, Tunisia and Turkey to assert that sexual and reproductive rights are universal human rights based on the inherent freedom, dignity and equality of all human beings.
Why Launch the “One Day, One Struggle” Campaign
Human rights, including sexual and bodily rights and freedoms continue to be under fierce attack in Muslim societies. Rising conservatism fueled by militarism, increasing inequalities, the politicization of religion and Islamophobia have strengthened patriarchal and extremist religious ideologies that use sexuality as a tool of oppression. This has manifested itself in various forms over the last year, be it as the revocation of the permit for the regional Asia Conference of the International Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender and Intersex Association (ILGA) by the police in Indonesia, or the harassment of conference participants by radical Islamist groups, or political pressure on a women’s group promoting women’s rights in Islam in Malaysia, or women like Sakineh Ashtiani being sentenced to death by stoning in Iran, or killings of hundreds of women and transsexuals in Turkey under the pretext of honor and morality.
Despite the differences among Muslim societies in terms of the progress made or the backlash encountered regarding sexual and bodily rights at the national levels, in the post 9/11 social and political context, religion is misused as a powerful instrument of control and sexual oppression with the goal of legitimizing human rights violations in the domain of sexuality. This indicates that sexuality is not a private issue but rather a site of political, social, and economic struggles for equality, human rights, democracy and peace at the national and international levels.
“One Day, One Struggle” was conceptualized by the Coalition for Sexual and Bodily Rights in Muslim Societies (CSBR) in response to this context and launched on November 9, 2009. Over 20 non-governmental organizations (NGOs) successfully staged bold actions in 11 countries to promote sexual and reproductive rights in the scope of the 1st international campaign organized by the Coalition for Sexual and Bodily Rights in Muslim Societies (CSBR). The 1st succeeded in stirring international public attention and was very positively reviewed by national and international media and organizations who defined it as a historical and timely event. The ongoing human rights violations, as well as the international public appraisal of the 2009 campaign, have encouraged CSBR to continue this initiative and organize the 2nd “One Day, One Struggle” on November 9, 2010.
About the CSBR
CSBR is a globally renowned solidarity network of progressive NGOs and premier academic institutions in the Middle East, North Africa, South and Southeast Asia, working to promote sexual and bodily rights as human rights in Muslim societies.
November 9, 2010 No Comments
We cant ALL be anti-semites, can we?
By Elle Flanders
May 11, 2010
Since this article was written, the federal government has cancelled $397,500 in support for Pride Toronto.
The hysteria created around the inclusion of a group called Queers Against Israeli Apartheid (QuAIA) in the Toronto Pride Parade this year can be justly attributed to the ongoing Brand Israel campaign backed by Israel’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and most recently by Irwin Cotler’s Canadian Parliamentary Coalition to Combat Antisemitism.
The CPCCA and the Israel lobby groups that surround it have taken the charge of anti-semitism to new and exaggerated heights, inventing what has been termed: “the new anti-semitism.” Aside from the fact that it sounds like a new and better hair product, its roots can be located in the Brand Israel campaign launched by the Israeli government’s Hasbara department, that is, the foreign ministry’s public diplomacy department.
to continue reading this article, follow the link below:
http://rabble.ca/news/2010/05/we-cant-all-be-antisemites-can-we
May 13, 2010 No Comments
Kenya chiefs block Mombasa gay wedding
Local chiefs and Kenyan officials have prevented a planned gay wedding in Kenya – where such unions are illegal.
The marriage had been due to take place in a private villa near the resort of Mombasa but chiefs took action after it was reported in the local press.
“I was shocked… I won’t allow it,” Chief Hussein Swaleh told the BBC.
Homosexuality has become a hot topic in Africa after a Ugandan MP last year proposed a bill which includes the death penalty for some homosexual acts.
A couple were arrested in Malawi in January after holding an “engagement party”.
Homosexual acts are illegal in most Africa countries and only South Africa allows gay weddings.
Councillors in the Mnarani area near Mombasa planned protests against the union and wanted to evict the two men from their houses.
“We had planned with our area chiefs to give them notices… and tell these people to move from our area,” said councillor Esther Kache.
The BBC’s Odhiambo Joseph says the wedding party left the area in three minibuses before the marriage could go ahead.
February 12, 2010 No Comments
Cross about cross-dressing: Is it a wicked Western habit that should be stopped?
Jan 28th 2010
| DOHA |
From The Economist print edition
CROSS-DRESSING is on the rise among young Qataris. The local press says that more tradition-minded locals are upset by the growing number of young women affecting a masculine style of dress, baggy trousers, short hair and deep voices. These women, who call themselves boyat, which translates as both tomboy and transsexual (and is derived from the English word boy), are being seen in schools and on university campuses where some are said to harass their straiter-laced sisters. In an episode of a talk show on Qatari television, called Lakom al Karar (The Decision is Yours), a leading academic said that the “manly women” phenomenon was part of a “foreign trend” brought into Qatar and the Gulf by globalisation. Foreign teachers, the internet and satellite television have been blamed. So have foreign housemaids, for badly influencing children in their care. The studio audience was divided over how to respond. Some called for the death penalty for cross-dressers, while others favoured medical treatment. A rehabilitation centre for Qatari boyat has been set up, but a local report says that as many as 70% of them refuse to give up their “abnormal behaviour”. It is not just Qataris who are rattled. A year ago the ministry of social affairs in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) launched a campaign against “masculine women”. The project, entitled “Excuse me, I’m a girl”, involved workshops, lectures and television programmes, stressing the virtues of femininity and raising awareness of the presumed dangers of women looking like men. An emirates’ foundation is helping to fund a research project on “gender identity disorder among Emirati youth”. One official describes the “deviant behaviour” of the boyat as a “menace” to society. But others sound less fazed. An American university lecturer in the region says the short hair and gym shoes worn by these young women would look perfectly normal on an American campus. That is just what unnerves the traditionalists.
http://www.economist.com/world/middleeast-africa/displaystory.cfm?story_id=15403091
February 1, 2010 No Comments
Bareed Mista3jil: Pressed to Express: By Alexis Pauline Gumbs
Pressed to Express
By Alexis Pauline Gumbs
Published on: October 01, 2009
BAREED MISTA3JIL: TRUE STORIES
BY MEEM
bareedmista3jil.com, 2009
Bareed Mista3jil—roughly translated as “Express Mail”—is the perfect name for this collection of 41 personal stories by “lesbians, bisexuals, queer and questioning women, and transgender persons from all over Lebanon.” I waited by the door for my copy to reach me, with its urgent evidence and affirmation of affectionately-dubbed “Lesbanese” lives in process.
The collection is as groundbreaking in its process as in its subject matter. Taking seriously the task of breaking a dominant silence in Lebanon, the LBTQ group Meem (founded in 2007) operated with hopscotch precision, making a road to walk with rapid, successive leaps of faith. The creators of Bareed take a culturally specific and accountable approach, buying into neither the story that queer sexualities are imported from the West, nor the narrative about the progression of the backwards East into the enlightened Western embrace of sexual diversity. Meem also challenges the value placed on emigration by emphasizing the desire and right to find community and safety at home. They share this stance in common with Aswat, a Palestinian LGBTQI group that has published two anthologies of their own [see Reviews, LT #32].
The stories here are published anonymously. While many echo a wider discourse about struggling with relationships, identity and acceptance, the editors place these stories in their specific context. “Lebanese family norms are especially important because people rely on them for all kinds of services and support, mostly due to the absence of the public sector, which makes it even harder for Lebanese to distance themselves from their families or risk rejection.” The editors’ approach combats stereotypes of irrational tradition by reminding the reader of the practical economic concerns that make challenging family norms a very risky thing to do.
While this collection has lessons to teach a North American reader (challenging their own narrow views of the world), the book was not made to export Lebanese stories westward. It was produced in order to create and affirm and transform a Lebanese community to which the editors remain committed and accountable. Releasing the book in both Arabic and English versions, Meem was intentional in its choices about navigating language—mixing classical Arabic, regional dialects, and slang internal to their communities, and with many things immediately translated. They chose to create the text in multiple languages to reach a wider audience, within their targets of heterosexual and homophobic Lebanese as well as Lebanese young people who are questioning sexual norms.
The struggle with choosing language(s) strikes me as a poetic struggle. No normative language is rich enough to describe the culturally nuanced and experimental relationship to sexuality Meem is documenting and experiencing. Like so many of us who are committed to radical transformation, they struggle to make the concepts they are passionate about understandable to the people they want to be in conversation with. By refusing to give up on this task, Meem contributes to the production of new visionary language for expression and exploration.
Recognizing that the stories’ various themes are interconnected, Meem chose not to divide them into sections. Instead, with a shout-out to the importance of online community, Meem chose to tag the pieces like blog entries, highlighting which 2 or 4 or 11 themes are addressed in each story. While this makes it harder to find specific stories to use for a syllabus or workshop, it also keeps the reader from pigeonholing them. Instead, we’re encouraged to see them all as part of a multiple and evolving story—with episodes as varied as “My Forgotten Penis,” “The Hunt for a Gay Husband,” and “That One Love that Breaks You.”
In “The Motorcycle Gender,” the author describes how her use of a motorcycle allows her access to a certain type of masculine mystique—while her parents use their disapproval of her motorcycling to express their deeper disdain for her transgression of gender norms. She refuses to shape her thick eyebrows or shave her armpits—a major problem for her family—it makes her feel “nonconformist and sexy.” Unfortunately, “in a blink of a second all that can disappear. I can get into an elevator with women with high heels and botox and, suddenly, I can feel like shit again.”
Creating community
“My Hijab and I” tells the story of a woman who is committed to wearing hijab, but struggles with the fact that it seems to make her “dykeness” invisible to women she is trying to attract. She ultimately affirms her choice to keep wearing hijab as she moves and grooves—she feels that it keeps women from objectifying her, and keeps people focused on what she has to say, which is a lot!
Not all of the stories have happy endings in which the speaker emerges from a closet with identity and self-esteem intact. Some of the stories end with questions. Some end in despair and frustration. And while the introduction is very intentional, critical and self-critical, the stories are not so careful—the tellers are free to speak their personal truths and opinions. We understand that speaking for themselves is enough of a victory, without the burden of having to speak for everyone whose sexual and gendered lives challenge the norm.
Though not every storyteller has found the nurturing community they want or need, this book is able to exist only due to the community created by the members of Meem—along with their comrades in the LGBT organization Helem (founded in 2004). On February 22 of this year, Helem led their first public sit-in in Beirut, with 200 people protesting violence against “homosexuals, women, children, domestic and foreign workers, and others.” On May 30, 400 people attended Meem’s Beirut launch event for Bareed Mista3jil.
This book is poetic evidence of a group of people finding language and space for the expression of their complicated journeys to love themselves and the people around them. Mail a copy to someone you love today.
—Alexis Pauline Gumbs
January 23, 2010 1 Comment
