Archbishop Stanley Ntagali of the Anglican Church of Uganda called last month’s Supreme Court’s decision on marriage an “immoral virus.” The president of Zimbabwe, Robert Mugabe, called American leaders “perverted Satan-worshipers.” Kenya’s deputy president, William Ruto, reportedly promised to defend his country from “dirty things.”…. These comments — all delivered in the wake of the court’s landmark ruling on Obergefell v. Hodges, which legalized same-sex marriage throughout the United States — illustrate a dynamic that has been worrying the international LGBT community for years now: As American evangelicals lose traction at home, they are increasingly finding receptive audiences abroad. Advocates on both sides of the aisle predict the Supreme Court’s ruling will bolster evangelicals’ efforts against LGBT rights overseas.
As those of us who value equality and believe all humans should be treated with dignity and respect revel in the victory that is Obergefell v. Hodges, it might be helpful to remember that spiking the football may be a bit premature. Yes, marriage equality is the law of the land here in the USofA, but beyond our borders, being LGBT can still be a dicey proposition depending on where one might travel. Being LGBT in many parts of Africa, f’rinstance, is something that could prove hazardous to one’s health and well-being. Uganda is well known for attempting to pass a “Kill the Gays” bill last year that would have made homosexuality a crime punishable by death. they’re hardly alone in their refusal to consider homosexuals as anything but abominations before God and, therefore, worthy only of death.
Yeah, not exactly tailoring their market efforts to attract LGBT customers, are they??
Part of the reason for the continued vitriol and abject hatred of homosexuals and homosexuality is because of the effort of American evangelicals. Shut out here at home, many have found fertile ground for their hatred and hyper-religiosity in Africa (It’s what Jesus would do, don’tchaknow??), where education may be hard to come by, but hatred and fear are easy to spread. Because they’re doing it so far away from home, evangelicals don’t have to worry about being noticed or attracting media attention. In fact, they’re generally welcomed with open arms.
“If you live in the United States, it’s easy to be lulled into thinking that the battle for broader civil rights for gay people is nearly over,” Rev. Dr. Kapya Kaoma, a researcher with Political Research Associates, a think tank focused on the American conservative movement, wrote in an op-ed last year.
“But not only is that far from true here, in many other parts of the world the culture wars have only just begun as the most ardent U.S. culture warrior’s vitriol is finding a far more receptive audience abroad,” Kaoma, who is also the author of American Culture Warriors in Africa, continued.
The battle for civil rights is a battle that predated, and will outlive, us all….because if there’s one thing in this world that has staying power, it’s hate. Perhaps it’s because it’s SO much easier to hate than love, to destroy rather than embrace. To love takes strength, but any fool and weakling can hate.
This phenomenon is not confined to African countries. On Friday, a group of advocates and researchers from around the world came together for a panel discussion at Netroots Nation about how American anti-LGBT activists are contributing to the globalization of homophobia. These evangelicals have helped build support for anti-gay laws not only in Africa but also in Russia, Eastern Europe, the Caribbean and South America, the panelists said.
While Christian conservatives are positioning themselves in the United States as a persecuted minority that deserves the right to refrain from participating in same-sex weddings, they are taking a different approach abroad.
“In the United States, as they’ve lost public opinion and now the marriage battle, they’re sort of saying ‘all we want is to live and let live,’” said Peter Montgomery, the senior fellow at progressive advocacy group People For the American Way who organized the panel.
“But they don’t want live and let live,” he continued. “Around the world they’re supporting laws that make LGBT people criminals and in some cases even supporting laws that make LGBT advocacy illegal.”
It seems counterintuitive to think that people who profess to have accepted Jesus Christ as their Savior would hate and in some cases even be willing to kill those who choose to think, believe, live, and/or love differently. How one could reconcile the teachings of the Gospel with such virulent, bloodthirsty hatred defies rational understanding. These folks couldn’t lead Christ-like lives if you handed them a guidebook, a flashlight, and a Sherpa.
Jesus Christ (yeah, I know…the one I don’t believe in, but work with me here) preached love, tolerance, acceptance, and inclusion- not word this crop of “Christians” possess in their vocabularies. Then again, it’s less about Christian love for these folks than it is about authoritarianism and social control…and perhaps even some deeply closeted homosexual tendencies of their own. How else might one explain such rampant, irrational hatred camouflaged with a bastardized version of Christianity?
