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Showing posts with label LGBT. Show all posts
Showing posts with label LGBT. Show all posts

Tuesday, March 18, 2014

The lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) debate in The Bahamas

The LGBT debate: A historic perspective


Nassau, The Bahamas


Although Foreign Affairs Minister Fred Mitchell has come under fire over comments he made in support of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) people, The Bahamas has a long history of legislatively supporting all people, regardless of race, creed or sexual orientation.

Mitchell recently told a group of university students in Trinidad that his political career suffers because he supports the rights of LGBT people.

Bahamas Faith Ministries International President Dr. Myles Munroe has accused Mitchell of having convictions that are not shared by the majority of Bahamians and has called for his removal.

However, as Mitchell has said, his views are nothing new.

In fact, many politicians have spoken in support of the rights of LGBT people in The Bahamas from as far back as 1989.

During the last term of the Pindling administration, the government brought two amendments to the Sexual Offences and Domestic Violence Act, the first in 1989 and the latter in 1991.

Both amendments dealt with a wide range of matters, including the controversial issue of homosexuality and sparked debate in the House of Assembly and the country.

1989

In October 1989, the government made amendments to the Sexual Offences and Domestic Violence Act that, among other things, made buggery and “unnatural connection” with any animal an offense with a prison term of 20 years. The amendment also made sex between two women an offense that also carried a 20-year penalty.

It should be noted that buggery was a crime in the country long before the 1989 amendment.

At the time, National Security Minister Paul Adderley said the bill sought to “limit people’s choice in the matter of sexual preference”.

Even then, MPs were outspoken against policing the “bedroom business of Bahamians”.

Bamboo Town MP Tennyson Wells said the government “had no right to legislate the private lives of individuals”.

While he described homosexuality and lesbianism as unnatural, Wells said if the bill was passed, it could never be fully enforced, unless the country became a police state.

Ann’s Town MP A.D. Hanna, who spoke out against the bill, said the issue was a question of morality.

“And as we are tidying up…go all the way, like true PLPs, and spell out what adultery is permitted and what adultery is not permitted in the law,” he said.

Hanna said the government should think twice before making homosexuality a crime without investigating it.

He said he did not think gays and lesbians were a scourge on society or that homosexuality was practiced widely in the country.

Hubert Ingraham, who at the time was the MP for Cooper’s Town, retorted that Hanna was wrong and that “even Parliament is not excluded from having its per centum of gays”.

House Speaker Sir Clifford Darling said that was news to him.

“I didn’t know parliamentarians were gay,” he said.

The amendments were later passed.

1991

In 1991, the government made further amendments to the Sexual Offences Act.

Section 16 of the bill made it an offense for someone to have sex with a member of the same sex, with or without the consent of that other person, in a public place or with a minor.

The amended law removed the criminalization of buggery and lesbianism in private. But that was not how the bill entered Parliament.

According to previous Nassau Guardian stories at the time, the government’s first draft seems not to have included the phrase, in a public place.

Many MPs voiced opposition to legislating morality.

Marathon MP Algernon Allen asked, “Is homosexuality so heinous and offensive a form of social conduct that we ought to imprison persons for that conduct?”

He said Parliament is “really the worst judge of morality”.

Rolleville MP George Smith said while he does not support unnatural sexual acts, he had to temper his views. He said the government should be careful that the bill does not result in a police force conducting witch-hunts for homosexuals.

Saint Barnabas MP Matthew Rose said it was nobody’s business if someone wants to engage in homosexual acts.

At the time, he said the government should address the topic of homosexuality instead of trying to send homosexuals to prison.

Opposition Leader Hubert Ingraham said he had never seen so many MPs better prepared for a debate nor had he seen them do so much research for one either.

“Hopefully these tongues are not only going to be loosened when they are talking about homosexuality and lesbians,” he said at the time.

The bill was later amended and passed.


1998

On February 3, 1998, members of the Bahamas Christian Council along with at least 100 supporters protested on Bay Street against a gay cruise ship that was scheduled to visit the Berry Islands. The ship reportedly had 900 openly gay visitors.

Christian Council Vice President Simeon Hall said while the group had no quarrel with lesbian and gay people, it did not want the promotion of homosexuality on Bahamian shores.

In March of that year, the Save The Bahamas group, made up of church leaders, led hundreds of people in a protest on Bay Street against a Holland American cruise ship, that was allegedly carrying gay passengers.

Pastor Mario Moxey, president of the group, called on the government to acknowledge that Bahamians were outraged by gay cruises visits.

A day before the protest, Prime Minister Hubert Ingraham said the country would not turn away any tourists who classified themselves as gay.

On March 8, Ingraham released the government’s official position on gay cruises.

He said he was “chilled by the vehemence of expressions” against gay and lesbian people by the public.

Ingraham added that the future of the country would not be placed in “danger because chartered cruises by gay persons is permitted to continue to call at Bahamian ports”.

A cruise ship carrying 800 lesbians in April faced similar anti-gay protestors. Confronted by hundreds of angry protestors and anti-gay placards, passengers of the Seabreeze reportedly vowed never to return to The Bahamas.

Amid the controversy, National Security Minister Frank Watson affirmed the government’s position of gay and lesbians serving in the country’s armed forces.

He said the government will not discriminate against homosexuals in the police force, Defence Force and officers serving at the prison.

“What consenting adults do between themselves in the privacy of their home is nobody’s business,” he said.

This was a far cry from the 1989 amendments that criminalized sexual intercourse between homosexuals.

2004

In 2004, gay and lesbian passengers on the Norwegian Dawn that docked in Nassau were greeted by hundreds of angry protestors from Save The Bahamas.

Protestors were yelling anti-gay chants, “Gay ways are not God’s ways”.

R. Family Vacations, a company created by openly gay American TV talk show host Rosie O’Donnell and her wife Kelli, organized the cruise.

Members of The Bahamas Rainbow Alliance, a now defunct pro LGBT group, also greeted the passengers.

It was unclear if Prime Minister Perry Christie offered any position on the matter.

2005

In September 2005, Miss Teen Bahamas Gari McDonald, 18, was stripped of her crown a week after she publicly admitted that she was a lesbian.

McDonald alleged that the she was given an ultimatum by the beauty pageant’s committee of “gracefully stepping down or having to deal with the embarrassment of being stripped” on the basis of an accusation of harassment and her sexuality.

McDonald said prior to entering the pageant, the question of sexuality never arose. She was crowned on November 4, 2004.

Miss Teen Bahamas Director Richa Sands said McDonald “put to the media and the world at large her sexual orientation as a teenager”.

“For us that is a major problem because we don’t stand for that,” she said.

Sands said moving forward, the committee would have to deal with the matter and ensure that something similar never happens again.

2006

In 2006, the Bahamas Plays and Films Control Board banned the movie Brokeback Mountain because it featured “extreme homosexuality, nudity and profanity”.

The Rainbow Alliance called it “a farce” that a small group of people should try to “provide the moral compass for the entire country”.

2011

In 2011, Foreign Affairs Minister Brent Symonette said the government supported a United Nations Human Rights Council resolution that affirmed equal rights for LGBT people.

The resolution, which was introduced by South Africa, expressed grave concern about the discrimination of gays throughout the world and affirmed that freedom to choose sexuality is a human right.

It was the first ever UN resolution on the human rights of LGBT people.

While The Bahamas did not have a seat on the council, Symonette said the government is in favor of the resolution.

“Our record is clear, we continue to support freedom of expression and the right for people to express their opinions,” he said in June 2011.

Later that month at a press conference, Opposition Leader Perry Christie said the Progressive Liberal Party (PLP) supported the resolution. He said the PLP has “always been committed to progressive policies - policies that emphasize our commitment to human rights”.

2014

The LGBT debate has once again hit the public consciousness with Dr. Myles Munroe and the foreign minister, Mitchell, being embroiled in a nasty public spat.

Speaking recently on the popular Love 97 FM talk show, Jones and Co., former Parliamentarian Algernon Allen said his Christianity is not confined, but all encompassing.

Allen spoke of tolerance and said the government has to pursue certain objectives for the good of the state.

Former parliamentarian George Smith told The Guardian recently that human rights transcends whether a person is gay or straight.

‘We have to hold up the rights of all human beings,” he said.

March 17, 2014

thenassauguardian

Friday, March 7, 2014

Dr. Myles Munroe's ignorance, arrogance, prejudice and bigotry toward lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) rights

Dr. Myles Munroe’s uncharitable arrogance and bigotry


By frontporchguardian
Nassau, The Bahamas


In response to comments made by Pope Francis last August concerning judgmentalism towards gays and lesbians, and recent remarks by Foreign Affairs Minister Fred Mitchell in Trinidad and Tobago on LGBT rights, Bahamas Faith Ministries (BFM) Pastor Dr. Myles Munroe has appeared bigoted, ignorant and prejudiced. And, arrogant.

In contrast to Pope Francis, Anglican Bishop Laish Boyd and other Christian leaders, Munroe appears uncharitable, not disposed to mercy, unwilling to support efforts to stem discrimination and violence against gays and lesbians.

While many church leaders do not support state-recognized same-sex marriages, they are challenging the dehumanization and demonization of gays and lesbians. Munroe’s remarks may give comfort to the demonizers.

For the sake of Christian love and charity Munroe must state whether he sides with those who would do violence towards his gay brothers and sisters in the name of God or whether he stands with the likes of former Prime Minister Hubert Ingraham, U.S. President Barack Obama, Pope Francis, Mitchell and countless others who are seeking to confront violence against those of God’s children who happen to be gay.

In his various remarks, Munroe has also displayed a curious ignorance, in two senses: He seems uninformed of certain facts and information, and lacking in a basic understanding of whatever information he may have reviewed.

Either he is intellectually unable to grasp certain matters or he is being purposefully misleading, or some combination of these, none of which suggests acuity and credibility on these issues.

In criticizing Pope Francis, Munroe demonstrated stunning ignorance of and a poor ability to grasp basic elements of theology and ecclesiology in the Roman Catholic tradition.

He was factually wrong in the assertion that the pope was expressing his own opinion. He was also factually wrong in his assertion that the pope was contradicting his predecessor and the position of the Catholic Church.

Doctorate

Roman Catholic Archbishop Patrick Pinder, who has an earned doctorate in theology from the prestigious Catholic University of America, but who chooses not to be referred to as Dr. Pinder, noted in a Guardian story that those who asserted that Pope Francis was breaking with Roman Catholic teachings in his remarks about gays and lesbians were incorrect in their assertion.

Munroe’s criticism of Mitchell’s Trinidad and Tobago remarks was curious and baffling, as the minister’s remarks in question were limited and generally measured. Mitchell broke no new substantive ground in terms of the policies of successive Bahamian governments.

Essentially, the foreign minister was calling for protection of gays and lesbians from discrimination. Sadly, in the minds of some, efforts to stem discrimination and violence against gays and lesbians, providing them with the security of basic human rights, are unacceptable and egregious. The name for this is bigotry.

Munroe stands in a succession of religious leaders who, over the millennia, seem more seized by the strictures of the Hebrew Scriptures than they are by the example, ministry and teachings of Jesus Christ as exemplified in the Gospels.

There are no warrants for racism, sexism or homophobia in the New Testament. But bigots have for centuries engaged in all manner of proof-texting of the Hebrew Scriptures to bolster and promote their ancient prejudices and hatreds.

White racist pastors used the Hebrew texts for centuries as a basis for slavery, colonialism and the degradation of black people. Gracefully, abolitionists religious leaders found in the ministry of Jesus the moral power to confront slavery and the slave trade.

For millennia and still, many found in the Hebrew Scriptures a warrant for their misogyny and bigotry towards women. The respect for the dignity of women by Jesus in the Gospels was in various ways a radical break from the culture into which he was born. His was a liberating message of equality.

In the Sermon on the Mount Jesus speaks of mercy, of not judging others, of eschewing revenge, of giving to the needy. He also speaks of adultery. Sadly, for contemporary bigots, there is no mention of homosexuality.

According to a recent Nassau Guardian story Munroe noted: “‘He [Mitchell] seems to have an agenda that may disqualify him from serving in the position as minister of foreign affairs, because there is a great possibility that he may be more inclined to present his own views than those of the people of The Bahamas.

“‘Therefore, I am recommending that the prime minister reconsider him from being minister of foreign affairs because his personal opinions may interfere with his objectivity in the carrying out of his duties.’”

There is an agenda and a lack of objectivity. But it is by Munroe.

Resolution

Mitchell’s remarks on non-discrimination against gays and lesbians were in keeping with the views of successive governments, including the Ingraham administration which supported “a U.N. Human Rights Council resolution promoting equal rights for all, regardless of sexual orientation”.

Is Munroe wilfully ignorant or being purposefully misleading? Prejudice and bigotry tend to induce jaundiced thinking.

The Guardian story quoted Munroe as saying: “‘I have nothing personal against Minister Mitchell.

“‘I think he is an excellent politician and man, like I am. It is nothing personal. It is more of a deep concern of his representation of our country in his position as minister...’”

The story continued: “Let me state for the record publically, [sic] Mr. Foreign Minister, I have no interest in your private life,” said Munroe in the sermon.

“Personally, I really don’t care about your private life. But when you step in our house that we are paying you to represent us in, you keep your private life in your closet and you deal with our public business in our interest.”

There is a well-known rhetorical device and political trick of suggesting no interest in a certain matter. But by raising the matter whether obliquely or not one is clearly seeking to make a point.

By employing the language he did, Munroe used his position to hurl an innuendo against another. It was unbecoming of him as a Christian and as a fellow-citizen. It was mean-spirited and uncharitable. It is a low moment in his ministry. If he has policy disagreements with the minister, fine. But to reference another’s personal life is contemptuous.

Munroe’s views on gambling are well-known. Tourism Minister Obie Wilchcombe has spoken at home and abroad of making The Bahamas a gambling mecca. Wilchcombe continues to press the idea of regulating the numbers houses, something Munroe opposes.

Unacceptable

But in opposing Wilchcombe’s policy views Munroe would not stoop so low as to raise his private life. Indeed, he would not likely to do so of any minister. What Munroe said in reference to Mitchell is unacceptable and unworthy of anyone who purports to have moral authority.

Recall that Munroe labelled Pope Francis as “reckless” pertaining to his comments on being judgmental toward gays and lesbians. Francis was reckless with love. Munroe was reckless in the manner in which he contemptuously referenced Mitchell, while feigning respect.

Munroe also impugned Pope Francis’ motives as a bid to revive Roman Catholicism. The suggestion was that the pope was engaging in marketing and public relations, rather than motivated by love. One imagines that Munroe knows quite a bit about marketing and public relations.

The Guardian story noted Munroe as stating that, “He [Fred Mitchell] began to intellectually try to [discombobulate us]’ ...” As suggested previously, Munroe seems easily intellectually discombobulated, as Mitchell’s comments were clear and easily understandable.

The story further noted that, “Munroe said he has travelled to 138 countries, something he said Mitchell has not done.

“‘So I’ve been to more countries representing this country than anyone else in this government,’ he said.”

What was his point in making such as statement, which came across to many as arrogant and self-aggrandizing?

No matter how many countries Munroe has travelled to he is not the moral ambassador of The Bahamas. Indeed in his bigotry toward gays and lesbians he does not represent many Bahamians or the future, nor does he seem to be able to represent clearly our laws regarding non-discrimination.

We have a foreign minister. Though he will rightly be criticized for various policies, he has represented clearly, articulately and intelligently, the policies of successive administrations in terms of non-discrimination toward gays and lesbians. It is more than can be said for Munroe.

 • frontporchguardian@gmail.com, www.bahamapundit.com.

March 06, 2014

thenassauguardian

Thursday, April 25, 2013

...The Bahamas offers no protection against discrimination for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) persons

Report Highlights Gay Man's Murder



By RUPERT MISSICK Jr
 
 
 
A NEW human rights report prepared by the US State Department sites the unsolved 2011 murder of a gay man while pointing out that the Bahamas offers no protection against discrimination for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) persons.
 
According to the report, members of the Bahamian LGBT community believe that the June 2011 murder of photographer Sharvado Simmons occurred at the hands of a group of men seeking retribution for a previous incident where Simmons solicited and deceived one of the men while dressed “in drag.”
 
The report further stated that societal discrimination against gay men and lesbians occurred, with some persons reporting job and housing discrimination based upon sexual orientation.
 
Although same-sex sexual activity between consenting adults is legal, no domestic legislation addresses the human rights concerns of lesbian, LGBT persons and the 2006 Constitutional Review Commission found that sexual orientation did not deserve protection against discrimination.
 
The report did admit however, that LGBT NGOs operated openly in the country.
 
April 25, 2013