Senegalese Wrestlers (Dennis Rouvre)
One of the issues that has come up during talks with my psychologist is my hidden desires. We agreed that it was time I explored some of them. As I found myself caught in a wrestler’s sleeper hold a few days later, feeling dizzy but tapping away frantically on the floor, I doubted this was what either of us had in mind. Read the rest of this entry »
I don’t know who edited this picture but they did a good job
The ink isn’t even dry on the paper yet and the Nigerian Police Force have started rounding up suspected gay men. Allegedly some members of the police have signed up to some gay dating websites and begun luring men to meet up with them. When these men appear, the officers arrest force them to reveal names and numbers of other gay men in the area. Many people have been arrested and some are asked to pay bribes or risk being outed. In the North, 12 men were arrested according to the BBC and one of them was sentenced to receive 20 lashes and pay a fine in accordance with Muslim Sharia law. The lashes were meted out in a packed court room. A Christian who was also arrested will be handed over to the regular courts. Gay men in Nigeria have been warned to stay off the sites and not to meet any new people. Read the rest of this entry »
The United Nations General Assembly finally passed a resolution condemning extra-judicial, summary or arbitrary executions including those carried out on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity. The UAE and Singapore were among the 44 countries that attempted to strip away this new clause but this time their proposed amendment was not supported by the majority. Ultimately only one country voted against resolution (Iran) but a number of African countries (including Ghana) abstained. I wonder how the delegates reached that decision. It will be interesting also to see how people react to this (assuming it is covered at all by the local media).
Read more on this on the IGLHRC website here
There has been a bit of an interesting buzz caused by a Nigerian actor who was convicted for having “unnatural carnal relations” (in other words sex with a man) whilst both were under the influence. He pled guilty and is to serve three months in jail. I shudder to think of what life will be like for him when he gets out. However the bright spark of hope in all this is that fact that there was no unanimous homophobic celebration of the verdict. Apparently even the media weren’t crazy about it and a lot of people have publicly commented that the trial was a waste of time and resources. People’s minds are changing for the better and that is always a good thing, in my book anyway.
Read the full article here
We all like to find explanations for ideas and behaviour we cannot understand or at least find someone who does. If we’re lucky we are educated by the people who actually know what they are talking about. Sometimes the people who are the most knowledgeable are unwilling to release their information (and with good reason!) It then falls on the rest of the people to come up with explanations to satisfy their unfulfilled curiosity. Occasionally these “observed phenomena” and attendant explanations are so bizarre that they are more entertaining than (mis)educative but some of them can be frankly insulting, especially when it comes to gay people. Unfortunately there are so few people who are out in our system (Narnia is a favourite travel destination among Africa’s gays) therefore there are lot of stories swirling around concerning gay people.
Here are the most interesting I’ve heard as well as my take on each one: Read the rest of this entry »
Purple Gloves 