How do we treat homosexual men with AIDS in Arab cultures?
A few months ago, Baraka TV posted a very moving video which I think deserves to be republished. It’s about a homosexual man who is mistreated and partly disowned by his family/society simply because of his sexual orientation/preference. It’s Shem el Nessim. The son wants to come home. Because of his sickness, he knows he won’t live for long. He just wants to come home in order to see his family one last time. Watch the family’s’ reactions to his visit, and how he’s been treated throughout his life.
Note: The setting is Egypt.
Homosexuals everywhere within the Arab and Muslim world continue to suffer, sometimes physically, because of their sexual orientation. Gay rights activists and campaigns are dismissed as “Westernized” and “heretic.”
So what are we, non-homosexual Arabs and Muslims, doing to support this minority? Should we forget them, just because we disagree with their lifestyles, and leave this struggle for them to fight for fear of being labeled or stigmatized?
Baraka TV has more videos about HIV/AIDS in the Arab world, as well as some videos about drugs and their use in our cultures. I strongly recommend it as it seems to be one of the few networks here targeting taboos.
I think I’m going to cry.
There are honor crimes that take place against homosexuals too. I am not sure how people have the heart and mind to do this to their own flesh and blood.
No matter who they are or how they choose their lives… they’re family. Nothing can or should change that.
There needs to be educational programs and localized AIDS-awareness campaigns here. I wonder what happened with this initiative that was supposed to go public a year ago?
- Source
What happened? Am I looking in the wrong places or does this campaign not exist?
There are some small ones in Kuwait, the trouble is with the lack of funding and general support of such groups. As far as I know there aren’t enough reliable statistics on how many patients suffer from the disease, so people tend not to take it seriously, thinking it can’t be a big risk. But there’s definitely an active gay sub-culture here, and I’m far from an expert but I do think if we ignore HIV/AIDS any longer it’s bound to become a bigger problem.
This is a TIMES article written last November:
So, what to do now?
People will learn about AIDS when our societies allow them to. Right now it’s very hush-hush and AIDS victims are treated with isolation and disrespect. Our biggest dangers aren’t things like politics and war anymore. It’s taboos that the mainstream never wishes to tackle: Sex, trafficking, homosexuality, STDs, AIDS. All hidden factors of reality.
It’s a real problem and I pray that one day there will be some cure for the inocent people that suffer from HIV/AIDS.
However, and this is probably not a popular view, why do homosexuals practice when they are in a society that is so hostile to this? It seems to be more dangerous than it is worth. To experience a few minutes of sensation and to suffer a lifetime of discrimination and abuse seems mad to me!
Hi Sobhia,
This is why most homosexuals never admit it. Many marry and have children so that others regard them as “normal” when in fact they are unhappy and wish to live a loving, real life with a partner of the same sex.
But living life the way you wish to, no matter what the consequences are, is always more worthwhile than living a lie just to please those around you. I admire and respect everyone who gains the courage to fight for such rights.
If you have HIV/AIDS, in most cases, you brought it upon yourself. They have to learn to live with the decisions they made. People need to take responsibility for their own actions.
Practice? It’s not few minutes of sensation. It’s who they are. Feelings exist till the day they die… not few minutes.
You are so ignorant if you believe this. What about babies that are born with it from their mothers? Or people who get it from infected blood through transfusions? Or even people who have sex with people who don’t admit to having it? I could go on…
Although when it comes to public health issues, personal responsibility isn’t so easy to demand. Many people around the world who suffer from HIV/AIDS do so from lack of education about how it is spread, cultural and religious taboos against using condoms, lack of access to preventive health care, and other reasons that are far too numerous to mention here. And they’re not the only ones who have to live with the decisions they make. AIDS has created a lot of orphans. Be kind to others, Jina.
Why?
You need to learn how to read… a class in reading comprehension is what you need to take.
And this is another ad-hom… another violation of the terms of this website.
I’m going to answer your question with a question …
If I said, “be kind to others,” to the following people, which one do you think would be most inclined to ask why?
A) Jesus
B) Buddha
C) Mohammed
D) Moses
E) Hitler
Obviously Hitler, what’s your point?
I think this is the point:
Jina:
tecknicalities…
Spam
I can read and comprehend perfectly fine thank you Jina. As for my apparent violation.. I find it offensive for someone to be so crass about an issue that is so widespread and so final. And like PeacefulVanguard said, a great deal of the time (in Africa for instance) it is an issue of lack of education and does not deserve blame.
No you can’t. Otherwise you would not have made the comment you made and continue to make a fool of yourself.
PV, Arabs were on must kill list for Nasiz… Jews kill Arabs… Nazis = Jew. Your logic is as retarded as this one…
Get a fucking clue…stop making a fool out of yourself.
This is exactly the opposite of what this post is about. Only he/she who suffers this fate may fully understand. If you have not experienced this fate you should be kinder and more willing to understand the problem so that we can help those who suffer.
Shem el Nessim is an Egyptian holiday dating back to Pharanoic times. It is celebrated by Egyptian Christians, Muslims, atheists, and Jews. It is not a “Muslim” celebration.
I’m pretty sure I said Eid.
Which, yes, is a Muslim celebration.
In Iran we can’t even talk seriously about a man or a woman being a homosexual. I know that the society is home to many, even the ones who are not homosexual to begin with, those who have taken an interest into the same sex as for not the opposite sex being available. They are denied and discriminated and threatened even by harsh laws that would even mean them being executed.
It is as if any thing even a bit not parallel to their line of thinking is doomed to perish. The only thing I think I can do is to educate my own kids in a way to respect all other people the way they would like to be respected, respect and love. I remember few years back in Mumbai I saw a wonderful gentelman who was an Indian muslim and said he was proud of being a muslim homosexual. He said Islam was his faith but this was his orientation. My only reaction was, oy, plz don’t say it like that in public, I get so scared, some one could harm you. We have no yet accepted the fact that has always be there, for thousands of years, generations after generation, we haven’t even tried to change our points of view. As an outcome, when a president of a Middle Eastern country is asked how you treat the homosexuals he amazingly answers: We Don’t Have Them!
but it’s not Eid, the movie says it’s Shem el Nessim
That was my bad, then. I edited the post.
In the introduction Esra said
Then Salama said
Male homosexuality is not a “lifestyle choice”. There is an approximate 10-13 percent constant rate of male homosexuality throughout all peoples of the world. Just as there is an approximate 10-13 percent of left handedness throughout all peoples. There are suggestions among some researchers that rate of male homosexuality increases in societies under stress through warfare, due to incomplete conversion of the foetus to masculinity, as a result of hormonal disturbance.
I think somewhere I already went into a hideous amount of detail on what I meant by lifestyle, just go to the “homosexuality” category to find my post about homosexual activism in the Arab and Muslim world.
Female homosexuality is no different. I don’t know why people exclude lesbians from these things.