God Loves Uganda
Offline So me and a friend were watching BBC Newsnight about 5 years ago, and we caught the tail-end of a news item about Uganda.
Apparently there were quite a lot of American missionaries there, spending a lot of money, talking to a lot of politicians..
A face in a crowd of happily chatting politicians and preachers caught my attention. I knew that face. I'd seen it on the cover of a book used by an ex-gay therapist.
"This is bad", I told my friend, "This is really really bad.."
"Don't be such an attention-seeking gay drama-queen", my friend told me, "Nothing's going to happen"
Then this :
http://uk.reuters.com/article/2012/11/13/uk-uganda-homosexuality-idUKBRE8AC0VC20121113
Charming christian woman, that Rebecca Kadaga. Got blessed by the pope recently.
Anyway, it wasn't a "christmas gift", but in February of this year, it may still pass in some form.
Nobody's going to give a damn if it does, but in Sundance this year, there's at least a documentary that tries to focus on the situation.
You think "Jesus Camp" was scary and depressing ? Imagine those people getting their hands on a whole country.
The documentary is called "God Loves Uganda".
Here's the trailer :
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=cy_HRqCo4pY
And here are some quotes from the Director's statement :
I began meeting in Uganda – and in America – some of the missionaries who have helped create Uganda’s evangelical movement. They were often large hearted. They were passionate and committed. Many of them were kids from America’s heartland.And they were, I began to discover, part of a larger Christian evangelical movement that believed that Biblical law should reign supreme – not just in people’s hearts – but in the halls of government.
This movement, fueled by American money and idealism, had produced a noxious flower – Uganda’s Anti-Homosexuality Bill, which made death as one of the penalties for homosexuality.
Committed to the idea that God wanted all forms of “sexual immorality” eliminated from the earth,” it was the reason why Uganda had dismantled its successful AIDS program in favor of an abstinence-only policy.
I thought about following the activists-brave and admirable men and women-who were fighting against these policies.
But I was more curious about the people who, in effect, wanted to kill me. (According to the provisions of the Anti-Homosexuality Bill, I could be put to death or imprisoned.)
Notably, almost every evangelical I met – American or Ugandan – was polite, agreeable, even charming.
Yet I knew that if the bill passed, there would be blood on the streets of Kampala.
What explains that contradiction? What explains the murderous rage and ecstatic transcendence?
In the well-known trope about Africa, a white man journeys into the heart of darkness and finds the mystery of Africa and its unknowable otherness.
I, a black man, made that journey and found – America.
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http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/nov/26/uganda-anti-homosexuality-bill
One of the worst aspects of the bill is in clause five, which effectively allows "victims" to kill anyone they claim has committed a homosexual offense against them.
A victim of homosexuality shall not be penalized for any crime committed as a direct result of his or her involvement in homosexuality.
The violence has already begun as LGBTI (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and intersex) and those perceived as being LGBTI have been arrested and harassed. Once the law is in place the potential for acts of physical violence against LGBTI people is very real. We should not forget the murder of David Kato in January 2011. Under the anti-homosexuality bill his murderer would be free today. This clause is an open invitation to lynch LGBTI people so in reality the death penalty remains.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Fellowship_(Christian_organization)#The_Fellowship_and_Uganda
The Fellowship, through Representative Joe Pitts (R.-Pa.), redirected millions in US aid to Uganda from sex education programs to abstinence programs, thereby causing an evangelical revival, which included condom burnings.
In a November 2009 NPR interview, Sharlet alleged that Ugandan Fellowship associates David Bahati and Nsaba Buturo were behind the recent proposed bill in Uganda that called for the death penalty for gays. Bahati cited a conversation with Fellowship members in 2008 as having inspired the legislation.
Sharlet reveals that David Bahati, the Uganda legislator backing the bill, reportedly first floated the idea of executing gays during The Family's Uganda National Prayer Breakfast in 2008. Sharlet described Bahati as a "rising star" in the Fellowship who has attended the National Prayer Breakfast in the United States and, until the news over the gay execution law broke, was scheduled to attend the 2010 U.S. National Prayer Breakfast.
Holy fucking crap.
This is even worse than paragraph 175.
I suppose that's the kind of legislation you get in a true "christian nation".
fuckin' africa...
pardon me all to hell if that sounds prejudiced but...fuckin' africa...
No, it's fuckin' america. They successfully infected Uganda with their specific brand of religious fundamentalism. They're even training the politicians now. You should hear how they talk. It's like watching fox.
This law is simply the kind of thing that happens when they're practically unopposed.
It's something to think about, if anyone here ever wonders if atheist activism is worth the effort.
It's also something to think about for all those american christians who like to play at being persecuted.
We have some christians still on the board, right ?
Where are they ?
Hiding in the bible and philosophy threads ?
Fucking cowards.
They must have a really tough job, but there is a pleasing optimism in this story:
http://freethoughtkampala.wordpress.com/2013/01/21/lindsey-becoming-an-atheist-in-uganda/
This is a curious take on the bill:
http://freethoughtkampala.wordpress.com/2013/01/19/martin-ssempa-james-onen-andrew-mwenda-debate-homosexuality-on-kingdom-fm/
So guess what… I actually now WANT this bill to pass. You know why? Because I can’t wait to see the confused looks on people’s faces as they realise that not a damn thing has changed. Meanwhile, gay activists like Pepe and Frank Mugisha are going to be swimming in gay rights activism money from overseas thanks to all the sympathy that has been generated by the actions of local hate mobs here. Pretty soon people will stop caring (and many already have), and this will become a long-forgotten issue. People will eventually just get on with their lives to focus on more important things. Gay people will simply continue to exist, as they always have since time immemorial. Nothing will have changed, except that now homosexuality will have been completely demystified, thanks to all the free ‘promotion’ the anti-gay crusaders gave it.
If ever there was a worse case of people shooting themselves in the foot, I am yet to hear of it.
Not just Uganda of course:
http://freethoughtkampala.wordpress.com/2010/03/22/witchcraft-in-nigeria-related-to-evangelical-christianity/
http://www.aljazeera.com/programmes/insidestoryus2012/2012/07/201272792948296720.html
This chap has analysed the role of US evangelicals in the African anti-gay movements and published a report:
http://prospect.org/article/exporting-anti-gay-movement
And for something impressive, juicy and substantial, here's a Somalian atheist site:
http://somaliatheism.blogspot.com.au/2010/01/land-of-gods-brief-study-of-somali.html