The official fictn, Brian Whaker explas, is that gay people don’t exist the Middle East. They do – and for many of them, attus of fay and society are a bigger problem than fear of beg persecuted
Contents:
- CAN A MLIM BE GAY?
- EVERYTHG YOU NEED TO KNOW ABOUT BEG GAY MLIM UNTRI
- WHAT DO ISLAM SAY ABOUT BEG GAY?
- LONDON'S LANDMARK BUILDG DOTTED WH STRIP CLUBS, GAY VENU TO TURN TO MOSQUE
CAN A MLIM BE GAY?
Beg lbian, gay, bisexual, transgenr, or any other sexual orientatn or genr inty is difficult enough on s own, but beg Mlim as well n e one to stggle wh rencilg their inty wh Islam and Allah. However,... * can i be muslim and gay *
The Orlando shootg was a hate crime agast gay people – even if, once emerged that the attacker had been a Mlim, many people claimed this as a terrorist attack rather than a hate crime. Sce the massacre there has been a lot of speculatn about Islam and homosexualy and there are fears that one man’s spible act of terrorism uld fan the flam of Islamophobia and other forms of social excln, leadg to disrd and unrt an era of elevated Islamophobia.
It is difficult to fe the “Islamic posn” on homosexualy, as a monolhic phenomenon, simply bee Islam is a very diverse fah group wh some 1. They tend to draw on the story of Lot the Koran (also the Old Ttament) which reunts the stctn of the tribe of Lot allegedly due to their engagement homosexual acts as “evince” for God’s nmnatn of homosexualy. Theologil and legal nmnatns of homosexualy n engenr perceptns at a social level that homosexualy is wrong and that should not be permted.
EVERYTHG YOU NEED TO KNOW ABOUT BEG GAY MLIM UNTRI
* can i be muslim and gay *
In my rearch to attus ncerng homosexualy among sampl of first and send-generatn Brish Mlims of Pakistani scent, I found that attus tend to be largely negative.
Although rearch to attus towards homosexualy the general populatn pots to mographic variabl, such as age and level of tn, as key termants of the nature of attus, this has not been the se my own work wh Brish Mlims. Mlims of var ag, tn levels and soc-enomic backgrounds have participated my studi and generally perceive homosexualy negative terms.
Moreover, there was a fundamental rejectn of sentialist arguments ncerng the origs of sexual orientatn – that people are born gay and that they do not “choose” to be gay – and terviewe often argued that people had “chosen” to be gay. Ined, prev rearch has shown that believg the sentialist argument regardg homosexualy is rrelated wh ls discrimatn and greater acceptance.
WHAT DO ISLAM SAY ABOUT BEG GAY?
Although many Brish Mlims may disapprove of the ncept of homosexualy, several dividuals reported posive first-hand experienc of ntact wh LGBT people.
Some people spoke fondly of their LGBT iends, neighbours and acquatanc, suggtg that first-hand ntact may challenge homophobia which exists at an abstract, nceptual level.
In view of the generally negative attus towards homosexualy Mlim muni and the silence that n surround discsns of sexualy, most of my Mlim gay terviewe have manifted a poor self-image and low psychologil well-beg. Those gay Mlims who nceptualise their sexualy as immoral and wrong n unrstandably stggle to rive self-teem, which is key to well-beg.
LONDON'S LANDMARK BUILDG DOTTED WH STRIP CLUBS, GAY VENU TO TURN TO MOSQUE
It is easy to see how belief the negativy of homosexualy om the perspective of one’s fah (which, untls studi has emerged as an important inty among Brish Asian Mlims) uld e some gay Mlims to velop ternalised homophobia and, some s, to doubt the thenticy of their Mlim inty. Ccially, makg sense of the “” unrlyg their sexual orientatn, some gay Mlims were of the view that they had “bee” gay as a rult of their social environment and nsequently blamed Brish society:. I’m gay bee I was brought up here [ Bra] but I reckon if I’d been brought up Pakistan then I would have turned out straight bee this don’t happen that much there.
So there needs to be much more discsn of homosexualy Mlim muni – which will admtedly be difficult given the cultural taboo around sexualy. As I’ve wrten elsewhere, the Eastenrs storyle ncerng Syed Mehmood, a gay Mlim character who stggl to e out to his parents, generated some discsn the Brish Mlim muny and led some dividuals to acknowledge the existence of homosexualy wh their muny. In addn to improvg relatns between groups, is likely that this exercise will have posive out for well-beg among those dividuals who self-intify as Mlim and gay.
Growg up an environment which you are led to believe that your sexual orientatn is wrong, sful or symptomatic of mental illns n lead to profound social and psychologil challeng, cludg ternalised homophobia, low self-teem, prsn and, some s, suicidal thoughts.