A couple in Malawi were today found guilty of gay sex, a crime under laws dating from the colonial era, in a judgment that campaigners warn could set back human rights across Africa.
Steven Monjeza, 26, and 20-year-old Tiwonge Chimbalanga were convicted of unnatural acts and gross indecency, prompting anger and condemnation from activists in Malawi and around the world. The couple, who will learn their sentence on Thursday, could be jailed for up to 14 years with hard labour.
Monjeza and Chimbalanga became Malawi’s first same-sex couple to commit publicly to marriage at a symbolic ceremony last December. They were arrested two days later and detained in harsh conditions. Homosexuality in Malawi is outlawed and remains deeply taboo.
… complete with racist NASCAR sleeveless t-shirt, cheap beer and cozy. You just know this dumbshit wears that shirt with pride.
In light of the anti-gay gay George Alan Rekers’ RentBoys.com kerfuffle, Michelle Goldberg at The Daily Beast cites a study which supports what many of us know already, those most hostile to gay people are often driven by terror and shame about their own desires.
Goldberg cites a 1996 study by researchers from the University of Georgia published a study in the Journal of Abnormal Psychology about the links between homophobia and homosexual arousal.
The authors, Henry E. Adams, Lester W. Wright, Jr., and Bethany A. Lohr, started with 35 straight men identified as homophobic and 29 straight men that were not. Both groups were shown heterosexual, lesbian and gay male porn while their erectile responses were measured. “Only the homophobic men showed an increase in penile erection to male homosexual stimuli,” reported the researchers.
Does being anti-gay mean one is gay? Of course not. We are talking about folks who are passionately anti-gay.
Goldberg concludes her piece by saying,
Satisfying as it is to see such a man unmasked, Rekers deserves a measure of pity as well as scorn. If he portrayed homosexuality as a life-destroying temptation that only the strictest of measures could contain, that’s because, for him, it was. /* My emphasis */ He seems like he’s devoted his life to a hysterical battle to preserve his own threatened sense of masculinity, and now he stands defeated and exposed.
BOYS BEWARE! One never knows when the homosexual is about. He may appear normal.
A Cardiff University study suggests that human beings are heterotic, that is from outbreeding, also known as hybrid vigor. This seems to be something of common sense when thinking about the fitness of of inbred and outbred people I have known and know of.
The Cardiff University study involved rating 1,205 black, white, and mixed-race faces.
Each face was judged on its attractiveness, with mixed-race faces generally perceived as more attractive.
Author of the study, Dr Michael Lewis, also suggested mixed-race people were disproportionately successful in many professions.
The study based its hypothesis on Darwin’s notion of heterosis, the biological phenomenon that predicts that cross-breeding leads to offspring that are genetically fitter than their parents.
Dr Lewis said the phenomenon was mirrored in the results of his study.
“The results appear to confirm that people whose genetic backgrounds are more diverse are, on average, perceived as more attractive,” Dr Lewis said.
Yet there is reason to believe that mixed-race people may not just be more attractive, but more successful.
Dr Lewis said: “There is evidence, albeit anecdotal, that the impact of heterosis goes beyond just attractiveness.
“This comes from the observation that, although mixed-race people make up a small proportion of the population, they are over-represented at the top level of a number of meritocratic professions like acting with Halle Berry, Formula 1 racing with Lewis Hamilton – and, of course, politics with Barack Obama.”
Dr Lewis will present his findings to the British Psychological Society’s annual meeting on Wednesday.
This is natural selection at work. A more diverse gene pool results in fitter (in a Darwinian sense) human beings. This sure tosses the whole idea of racial purity out of the window. I’m sure the haters would love that.
You know those scary lesbians, how dare they want to go to the prom just being themselves. Well that’s how a Louisiana school feels after they canceled the senior prom because student Constance McMillen threatened to wear a tuxedo and bring a girl as her date. The horrors!
A generous New Orleans hotelier Sean Cummings has come to save the day. Outraged by these dopey reactionary school administrators, Cummings has offered to bus the kids to the Big Easy and host the prom at one of his hotels. I bet these kids will have one hell of a night to remember and I’m sure this will beat the school-sponsored prom they would have had. McMillen, first reviled by her classmates for provoking the cancellation, will now be a hero. Funny how things work out sometimes.
In another sign that times are changing and changing fast, a new Washington Post-ABC News poll shows 75% of Americans support allowing gays and lesbians to serve openly in the military.
The percentage of Americans who say they support gays openly serving is the same as a Post-ABC News poll found in July 2008; both are far above the 44 percent who said so in May 1993. In the new poll, majorities across party lines favor such a policy, with support among Democrats (82 percent) and independents (77 percent) higher than among Republicans (64 percent).
The poll also reveals several sharp demographic divides. Men (65 percent) and seniors (69 percent) are far less likely than are women (84 percent) and young adults (81 percent under age 30) /* indicative of the future of this cultural tide */ to say that gays should be allowed to serve if they have disclosed their sexual orientation. Knowing a gay person makes a big difference: Among those who say they have a gay friend or family member, 81 percent support allowing gay people to serve openly, compared with 66 percent who say they do not know someone who is gay. /* Yup! We would almost eradicate homophobia is all gays and lesbians came out. Suddenly everyone would have a gay friend or family member. I have seen how this forces people to re-evaluate their positions. */
On Monday, the Boy Scouts of America celebrated their 100th anniversary. Dave Banks on on his Geek Dad blog at Wired, asks “After 100 years, are the Boy Scouts still relevant?” It is an interesting piece.
Congress should pull the BSA’s charter until they eliminate discrimination against LGBT boys and families. There is an organization called Scouting for All who is lobbying Congress to do just this thing. It’s is offensive to have a Congress representative of all Americans to 0fficially sanction an organization that has an explicitly discriminatory policy. Please visit and support Scouting for all.
Harry Knox, who serves on President Obama’s faith-based advisory council, was called a “Catholic bigot” by John Boehner this week for saying that Pope Benedict XVI is is “hurting people in the name of Jesus.” This phrase “Catholic bigot” has been gaining currency in right-wing Catholic blogs and is applied to anyone who criticizes the Pope, the church or Catholics in general. Much of this whining has been coming from a Thomas Peters who runs the American Papist blog.
While bigotry can be defined as intolerance toward ideas not one’s own, it’s semantic space also implies an irrational devotion to one’s group, extending not only to religion, but to ethnicity, race, national identity, etc. I suppose if one dismisses insanity as a valid base of argumentation, the insane ones will can view the dismissal as bigoted. Knox’s comments were sparked by the Pope’s visit to Africa last year where Benedict condemned the use of condoms and extolled abstinence as a way to deal with sub-Sahara Africa’s crippling HIV problem. This is a valid criticism of the Catholic Church and the Pope given the grave implications to Africa. To reduce this to name-calling and a feeling of Catholic victimhood is absurd and evasive.
The persecution mentality will live on in the minds of these folks. I have no sympathy. Knox was asked about his comments this week by CNSNews, one of these pitiful right-wing online rags, and he stood by his comments. Good for you Mr. Knox.
The Fifteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution was passed on February 3, 1870 which protected the right of African-Americans to vote.
It reads,
Section 1. The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude.
Section 2. The Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.
Of course this wasn’t the end of discriminatory disenfranchisement practices which went on for another century in this country with acts of violence and intimidation, the Jim Crowe laws, literacy tests, etc. These efforts at going around the Fifteenth Amendment were addressed by the Voting Rights Act passed in 1965 during the height of the Civil Rights Movement.
