Very Gay, Very Iranian |

Contents:

• GAY IRANIAN, 20, 'BEHEAD BY HIS BROTHER AND S AFTER THEY DISVERED HIS SEXUALY'
• WHAT 'S LIKE TO BE GAY IRAN
• GAY IRANIAN MAN ALLEGEDLY KILLED BY FAY DAYS BEFORE SEEKG ASYLUM
• GAY IRANIAN MAN AD ALLEGED 'HONOR KILLG,' RIGHTS GROUP SAYS
• IRANIAN GAY MAN, 20, MURRED AND BEHEAD BY HIS FAY
• IRAN EXECUT TEENAGE BOY FOR BEG GAY
• IRANIAN, GAY & SEEKG ASYLUM
• Y, THERE ARE GAY PEOPLE IRAN
• GAY VISORS NOT WELE IRAN - IRAN FOM
• ALIREZA FAZELI MONFARED WANTED TO LIVE AS A EE GAY MAN THE WT. HIS FAY IRAN BEHEAD HIM DAYS BEFORE HIS DREAM ME TE, SAY ACTIVISTS.

GAY IRANIAN, 20, 'BEHEAD BY HIS BROTHER AND S AFTER THEY DISVERED HIS SEXUALY'

A gay Iranian man has been reportedly behead by his brother and two s after they disvered he had been exempted om ary service due to his sexualy. Alireza had applied for an exceptn om the pulsory Iranian ary service for beg gay so that he uld leave the untry and move to Turkey to live wh his partner Aghil Abyat, acrdg to 6Rang, the Iranian Lbian and Transgenr Network.

Alireza had applied for an exceptn om the pulsory Iranian ary service for beg gay so that he uld leave the untry and move to Turkey to live wh his partner Aghil Abyat'Alireza's killg as a rult of his sexual orientatn beg stated on his ary service [exemptn] rd has once aga provid proof for our warng several years ago about the risks ed by the ary service exemptn procs for gay Iranian men and unrl the need for legislatn to prevent the safety risks, ' the NGO 6 Rang said a statement.

WHAT 'S LIKE TO BE GAY IRAN

The group had prevly warned 2016 that the exemptn procs allows police, tnal stutns, employers and relativ to 'intify gay men wh only one glance at the ary service exemptn rd'. 'The spible murr of Alireza Fazeli Mondared, 20, Iran - reportedly for his sexual orientatn - is the rult of the Iranian ernment ntug to perpetuate falsi about homosexualy, ' the NGO said a statement. A 2020 6Rang report found that six 10 gay people Iran have been asslted by members of their fay, while almost 50 per cent have been publicly sexually asslted.

NAIROBI, Kenya (AP) — Iran’s print on a rare vis to Ai on Wednday sharply cricized Wtern natns’ support for homosexualy as one of the “dirtit” episos of human history. Print Ebrahim Raisi spoke Uganda, which recently passed anti-gay legislatn prcribg the ath penalty for “aggravated homosexualy, ” to wispread ternatnal nmnatn. “The Wtern untri try to intify homosexualy as an x of civilizatn, while this is one of the dirtit thgs which have been done human history, ” Raisi said.

Durg his one-day vis to Uganda this week, Raisi, speakg through an terpreter, scribed homosexualy as an attack agast the tablishment of the fay and herance — an area, he said, which Uganda and Iran n operate. Mugisha said that sce the anti-LGBTQ law was enacted, members of the gay muny have experienced multiple vlatns agast them by landlords and lol uncils.

GAY IRANIAN MAN ALLEGEDLY KILLED BY FAY DAYS BEFORE SEEKG ASYLUM

Sexual teractn between two women is punishable by vast majory of media reports about homosexualy Iran are based on acunts of torment and opprsn om gays and lbians who have fled the untry.

And while their experienc are reprentative for some of Iran's homosexuals, they are hugely different om those of the people who choose to stay the untry, or don't have the opportuny to om lower class and ral areas, where stigmatizatn is often most severe, rarely have the abily to move out of the hoe before marriage, let alone leave the untry. There is generally ltle acceptance of homosexualy, but some middle- and upper-class Iranians have the means to create parallel liv, out of sight of their relativ or iends.

GAY IRANIAN MAN AD ALLEGED 'HONOR KILLG,' RIGHTS GROUP SAYS

"Nety-five percent of gays Iran will never e out, " Saeed says over pasta at one of northern Tehran's ffee shops, where the atmosphere is relatively permissive.

| (VOCATIV/SUNE ENGEL RASMUSSEN)"The number one threat to gays and lbians Iran is the fay, " agre Hosse Alizah of the Internatnal Gay & Lbian Human Rights Commissn (IGLHRC), and himself an Iranian. "The Iranian thori ually turn a bld eye to the gay muny's pas, but much like the telligence servic the former Soviet Unn, Iranian telligence is believed to pile large fil on many cizens, which they n e to build a legal se agast people who might be ught engagg polil activi.

IRANIAN GAY MAN, 20, MURRED AND BEHEAD BY HIS FAY

The park is also one of the most popular pickup spots for Tehran's gay dk, Maseratis, BMWs and the ocsnal Porsche circle the park; you don't have to wa long to spot one of them slow to a halt and pick up a sgle man cisg the g.

IRAN EXECUT TEENAGE BOY FOR BEG GAY

It also provis a temptg e, for gays and straights alike, an enomy bet by flatn and though the typ of -person enunters are a way to elu virtual spi, they are still ght wh risk.

He was jt strangled to ath, " says Saeed, who has bee more ut about meetg up wh strangers bee of siar 's parks are always crowd, and particularly around dk, many of them bee popular cisg spots for gay men. | (VOCATIV/JANUS ENGEL RASMUSSEN)So naturally, when Naeem* met Behram* four years ago on gay datg se Manjan, which is also monored, he was ially hant. Seven months later, they rented an apartment wtern Tehran; they both still live at home and when Naeem here, he tells his parents he is gog out of town wh challenge of fdg a steady partner weighs heavily on Iranian gays; many speak of prsn, lonels and paranoia as almost permanent mental stat.

(In a male-domated society like Iran, homosexual women have even ls privacy than men, and often risk beg shunned by neighbors if they rent an apartment whout a hband.

IRANIAN, GAY & SEEKG ASYLUM

"I thk she tri to not watch the clip so she always chang the channel or pretends that she don't watch the TV, " he of the stigma agast homosexuals is trsic to the Persian language, which has two different words for homosexualy.

"Yet the problem for men like Naeem and Behram is there's no real outlet to bate semantics: Although homosexualy n be punished, 's not somethg that is officially regnized.

Y, THERE ARE GAY PEOPLE IRAN

While the new centrist ernment unr Print Hassan Rouhani matas a siar rea as s precsor, foreign-based media outlets like BBC Persian, Rad Zaman and Voice of Ameri e non-rogatory language about homosexuals, and is slowly tricklg down to reformist outlets si the untry, and to young Iranians, says spe s often venomo rhetoric, the Iranian regime silently accepts that gays do exist, and tak a few pragmatic steps to acunt for that Quran, the foundatn of Iranian law, explicly bans homosexualy.

If a man n get a doctor to ttify he is gay, he will be exempt om ary, the small ncsns hardly amount to any sort of tangible eedom for Iran's gays, many of whom ntue to fight their own sexualy. Alireza Monfared, a 20-year-old who was gay, was allegedly killed by fay members, jt days before he uld leave Iran to seek asylum, acrdg to multiple of his early May ath ma headl the U.

GAY VISORS NOT WELE IRAN - IRAN FOM

"I believe the exact term for this horrendo murr is gay-killg rather than the general term of honor-killg, " Ma Khani, an Iranian LGBTQ and women's rights activist based Germany, told ABC News. "Of urse the motive of such murrs by fay members is to fend the 'honor' of the tribe or fay, but we should never fet the social stigma and hatred nstantly reproduced by the social and legal nstcts agast LGBTQ members, " she this area of the world face enormo dangers for beg openly gay.

Acrdg to Human Rights Watch, nearly 15 untri the Middle East and Northern Ai crimalize homosexualy, leadg to punishments that clu prison, lash and even the ath penalty.

Iranian law stat that men over the age of 18 need to serve the ary before they may leave the untry, but homosexualy is classified unr "psychologil disorrs, " which n lead to an exemptn om service. We are still aaid of the regime makg a database of gay and transgenr people and puttg them unr prsure whenever they want, " Shadi Am, an LGBTQ activist based Germany, told ABC ia of receivg an exemptn rd is leavg many gay and trans Iranians worried they'd be brand and vulnerable to harassment and discrimatn.

ALIREZA FAZELI MONFARED WANTED TO LIVE AS A EE GAY MAN THE WT. HIS FAY IRAN BEHEAD HIM DAYS BEFORE HIS DREAM ME TE, SAY ACTIVISTS.

"People hold banners prottg agast discrimatn and persecutn agast homosexuals Iran, July 28, 2007, ont of the Eiffel tower Meda/AFP via Getty Imag, File Mahdi, a 36-year-old Iranian gay man who did not want to e his full name over safety ncerns, told ABC News that hearg the news of Monfared's murr broke his heart. "Bis the immediate threat that many gay exempts face now, such way of verage and the prsure om outsi of the untry is not likely to have any impact on the illogil and nservative officials Iran, " he said.

She's currently on the on the Wt Hollywood Bs License Commissn and was prevly a member of the cy's Lbian and Gay Advisory other new member is John Erickson, a gay man who at 35 will be the youngt person on the uncil, the Los Angel Tim reports. Shyne received the most vot last week's electn, 7, 850, while Erickson was send place wh 7, 118, so they won the two seats that were up for a vote this bted two cumbents, both gay men: John Heilman, who'd been on the uncil, except for a three-month hiat, ever sce Wt Hollywood rporated as a cy 1984, and John Duran, a uncil member sce 2001, who had been acced of sexual harassment.