Gay expat reveals what ’s like to live Dubai where homosexualy is punishable by 10 years prison | The Sun

Contents:

• GAY EXPAT REVEALS WHAT ’S LIKE TO LIVE DUBAI WHERE HOMOSEXUALY IS PUNISHABLE BY 10 YEARS PRISON
• CAN I BE GAY DUBAI?
• PERIL AND PRIVILEGE: GAY EXPAT NIGHTLIFE DUBAI
• 26 MEN ARRTED AT MASS GAY MARRIAGE DUBAI

GAY EXPAT REVEALS WHAT ’S LIKE TO LIVE DUBAI WHERE HOMOSEXUALY IS PUNISHABLE BY 10 YEARS PRISON

While is clearly a vlatn of human rights to crimalize homosexualy and promote discrimatn, there is a fe le between the right to be yourself and the importance of rpectg other people’s cultur. While is imperative that homosexualy be accepted the UAE, is also important for foreigners to be rpectful of the culture which they impose themselv – even if they disagree wh the ctoms.

Ined, should you be unlucky enough to be ught engagg homosexual activy the regn, reports claim that punishment n range om 10 years prison, f, portatn and even the ath penalty. On the surface ndns for gay Dubaiians might seem bleak, but thanks to some quickly acquired gay iends I learn quickly that, spe the legali, a vibrant gay scene flourish. Enterg via an unrground r park on a Saturday eveng, my male iend and I enunter the uneven door polici that are rife throughout gay venu (a vague attempt to curb gay activy).

Though I had a boyiend (an English expat) for the bulk of my time the cy, my gay iends played the field extensively and I know om their rpective tal that there was no shortage of actn. While Dubai has bee somethg of a gay Mec for Arabs om surroundg untri where there are even harsher views on homosexualy (you n’t get much harsher than the ath penalty, after all) gays the cy n’t afford to rt on their lrels.

CAN I BE GAY DUBAI?

The hard le taken by Dubai officials has led to var reports of jtice makg ternatnal headl, but unfortunately, there are untls s of gay persecutn that undoubtedly still rema undocumented. Homosexualy⚢✖ Illegal (ath penalty as punishment)Censorship✖ State-enforcedNon-bary genr regnn✖ Not legally regnizedDiscrimatn✖ No protectnsEmployment Discrimatn✖ No protectnsHog Discrimatn✖ No protectnsDonatg Blood✖ Banned (fe ferral)Conversn Therapy✖ Not banned.

Public OpnAcrdg to recent survey data available, societal ristance to LGBTQ+ rights Uned Arab Emirat is Arab Emirat Surveys of Emiratis strongly or somewhat agree that beg LGBTI should be a crime of Emiratis strongly or somewhat disagree that beg LGBTI should be a crime of Emiratis neher agree nor disagree that beg LGBTI should be a crimeHistoryHomosexual activy Uned Arab Emirat? They relied on a “bchery” law that had been ed the early 2000s agast gay men and transgenr women and was revived wh a vengeance followg the 2013 up, when the ernment, led by Print Abl Fattah al-Sisi, appeared to embrace persecutn of gays and trans people as a polil strategy.

The majory of the terviewe intified as lbian, gay, bisexual, transgenr, or queer, while a few intified as heterosexual and cisgenr (see glossary) but were eply engaged activist work supportg LGBT people.

PERIL AND PRIVILEGE: GAY EXPAT NIGHTLIFE DUBAI

The report also builds upon prev rearch nducted by Human Rights Watch wh LGBT activists and other LGBT people Lebanon, Tunisia, Moroc, Egypt, Kuwa, Iraq, and the Uned Arab Emirat, and on Human Rights Watch’s prev reportg on vlatns agast LGBT people the regn, cludg the reports Digny Debased: Forced Anal Examatns Homosexualy Prosecutns (2016); “It’s Part of the Job”: Ill-treatment and Torture of Vulnerable Groups Lebane Police Statns (2013); “‘They Hunt Down for Fun’: Discrimatn and Police Vlence Agast Transgenr Women Kuwa (2012); “They Want Us Extermated”: Murr, Torture, Sexual Orientatn and Genr Iraq (2009); and In a Time of Torture: The Asslt on Jtice In Egypt's Crackdown on Homosexual Conduct (2004). [7] Egypt is a serial offenr terms of systematic e of such provisns agast LGBT people: a law prohibg “bchery, ” ially promulgated 1951 for the purpose of crimalizg sex work and then replaced by Law 10/1961 on the Combatg of Prostutn, has been ed by the thori sce the 1990s to prosecute homosexual nduct between men, rultg hundreds of arrts.

However, Egypt, a provisn on “cement to bchery” the 1961 law on batg prostutn was ed September 2017 agast young people spected of raisg the rabow flag at a Mashrou’ Leila ncert, and agast other people who were prosecuted after g gay datg apps or chat rooms. Acrdg to an analysis by the Internatnal Lbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgenr and Intersex Associatn (ILGA), laws regulatg non-ernmental anizatns Algeria, Egypt, Libya, Moroc, Bahra, Jordan, Kuwa, Oman, Qatar, Sdi Arabia, and the Uned Arab Emirat make virtually impossible for anizatns workg on issu of sexual orientatn and genr inty to legally register.

In Libya, the overthrow of Muammar Qaddafi rulted a power vacuum which ias wield signifint power; several of them have nducted arbrary arrts of men on spicn of homosexualy. [31] The rise of the anizatn known as Islamic State (also known as ISIS), which killed dozens of gay men, as discsed below, has been creded part to s abily to “fill the power vacuum created by failg stat” the wake of the 2011 uprisgs. Mubarak’s ernment had overseen a massive crackdown on gay men the early 2000s, tend part, acrdg to one Egyptian activist, “to prent an image as the guardian of public virtue, to flate an Islamist opposn movement that appear[ed] to be gag support every day.

26 MEN ARRTED AT MASS GAY MARRIAGE DUBAI

At the same time, some activists have raised ncern that a narrow foc on ISIS’ horrific anti-LGBT ab may distract om ab by ernments and their proxi who are also rponsible for homophobic and transphobic vlence. In 2009, fighters spected of affiliatn wh Muqtada al-Sadr’s Mahdi army, an armed group which publicly vilified gay and effemate men as “the third sex, ” kidnapped, tortured and murred as many as several hundred men a matter of months, most of them Baghdad.

An Iraqi activist livg another untry the regn said that although he is “out” as gay to a broad circle of iends, he mt be ut when anizg events that uld out him more publicly—not out of fear of what might happen to him his host untry, but bee of what might happen if he is ever returned to Iraq. Torture sometim tak the form of forced anal examatns, which often volve doctors or other medil personnel forcibly sertg their fgers, and sometim other objects, to the an of the acced to fd purported “proof” of homosexual nduct. [58] Human Rights Watch also received reports of police Syria and the Uned Arab Emirat orrg gay men to unrgo forced anal ttg, but has not penntly verified the allegatns.

Gay men and transgenr women have also scribed other forms of torture and ill-treatment at the hands of police officers and other members of secury forc the regn: beg beaten wh electric bl and raped wh an iron rod (Lebanon)[60]; police who “took off their belts and put them around our necks and ma walk like dogs” (Egypt)[61]; beg raped by police and then thrown out of a movg police r to the street (Kuwa)[62]; and beg hung upsi down om a hook the ceilg (Iraq). Human Rights Watch has documented such vlence Kuwa, where men sexually asslt transgenr women wh impuny[64]; Moroc, where people perceived to be gay or transgenr have been subjected to mob vlence[65]; and Iraq, where gay men reported severe beatgs and ath threats at the hands of their own fay members. On September 22, 2017, several young people attendg a ncert Cairo featurg Lebane band Mashrou’ Leila, whose lead sger is openly gay, waved the rabow flag–a symbol of LGBT pri and solidary wh LGBT people’s stggle for equaly.