PORT-AU-PRINCE, Hai — Hai’s gay, lbian, bisexual, and transgenr muni have long kept a low profile bee of a strong social stigma that sparks fear of physil vlence or social isolatn.
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GAY HAI
Intro: Probably the most immediate and visual source of knowledge about the LGBT life Hai is the 2001 film 'Of Men and Gods' which documents the discreet world of gays and transvt this untry where homosexualy is legal but not tolerated by the mostly Christian culture. Eighty percent of the untry is Catholic and another fifteen percent are Prottant; needls to say, the Biblil curse is heavily upon gays here. Yet more than half the populatn also dulge voodoo beliefs and ruals where 's the spir that matters, not the genr or orientatn. Durg the reign of the Duvalier dictators (1957-86), as well as today, Haian gay cizens are forced to walk a shadowy le between revealg themselv to a select few iends and livg discreetly the larger disapprovg heterosexual society. Posted here are four stori about life Hai om different perspectiv: (1) my own story based on a vis to Hai , (2) a gay Haian-Amerin man's ttimony, (3) a mentary about gays and voudou, and (4) an article about Hai's enomic ndns. * gay haitian men *
I thk any story about Hai—polil, social, medil or gay—is forcefully domated by the major player Haian daily life: the specter of poverty. My purpose was to quire about lbigay life Hai. Enter GRASADIS, the only anizatn Hai to foc s work on HIV specifilly to the gay populatn Hai.
This might sound like a relatively easy task, alg wh a specific group, but there is not the remott sense of a ‘gay muny’ Hai. The social chaos among the impoverished class (fueled by polil manipulatns and tensns), the impermanence of livg quarters, the wanrgs of homels people, the absence of street-level anizatns, the nial surroundg gay sex the furtive nature of ntacts (among all class, om privileged to poor)—all be to make the task of HIV preventn a plited task. And bee ’s the only gay game town, not surprisgly Grasadis also has bee the facto, albe diecreet, advote for gay rights Hai, wh pafully slow rults.
The General Coordator of Grasadis was, unfortunately for me, the USA givg rad terviews on behalf of Grasadis regardg homosexualy and HIV Hai. As a gay man he wanted to help do somethg about the AIDS crisis Hai.
GAY DICTNARY HAIAN
Vis our Haian Gay Dictnary to learn how to say gay Haian. It is part of our LGBT dictnary wh more than 1600 entri om 68 languag. * gay haitian men *
Fdg a Gay Communy.
As for the ‘gay muny’ Port Prce, Stt claimed that recent gay history—sce the 1960’s—had a Jekyll-and-Hy aspect to . Durg the father-to-son son dictatorships of the Duvaliers, om 1957-86, the story is that spe btal polil and social reprsn of the general populatn there was a laissez-faire attu toward gays. On numero ocsns he and his lover Graham Payne and/or his circle of gay and gay-iendly stars, royalty and ternatnal acquatanc breezed to Hai for a change of atmosphere and sights.
However, after the oter of Baby Doc 1986 (he absnd to France takg a big chunk of the natnal treasury wh him), the meager semblance of gay life was driven further unrground as revengeful and morally nservative polil forc overran the untry wh equal btaly toward their precsors. The gay hot spots disappeared.