A college psychology professor's observations about public policy, mental health, sexual identity, and religious issues
Recent report from Voice of America TV2Africa on the Anti-Homosexuality Bill in the context of the African Anglican Bishops’ meeting in Entebbe.
Note the interview with David Bahati, regarding the reason for the bill. He wants to define homosexuality in more specific terms in order to make the penalties clear. Also, you see a brief appearance by Martin Ssempa.
NPR’s Fresh Air raised the Uganda story to a higher level of interest in late 2009 when Terry Gross interviewed Jeff Sharlet. Today, another segment of Fresh Air revisits the issue by again interviewing Jeff Sharlet, this time about Sharlet’s article in Harper’s about his Uganda trip (a portion of the Harper’s article is at the link). Recently, I noted Bahati’s appeal to Leviticus as a public policy and here again he describes his intent to Sharlet:
Sharlet recently traveled to Uganda to speak with Bahati, the bill’s author, which he writes about in a September 2010 Harper’s Magazine magazine piece entitled “Straight Man’s Burden.” He describes how gay Ugandans are struggling to survive — and recounts his meetings with Bahati — in a conversation with Terry Gross on Fresh Air.
“Bahati said ‘If you come here, you’ll see homosexuals from Europe and America are luring our children into homosexuality by distributing cell phones and iPods and things like this,'” Sharlet recounts. “And he said, ‘And I can explain to you what I really want to do.'”
Sharlet accompanied Bahati to a restaurant, and later to his home, where Bahati told Sharlet that he wanted “to kill every last gay person.”
“It was a very chilling moment because I’m sitting there with this man who’s talking about his plans for genocide and has demonstrated over the period of my relationship with him that he’s not some back bender — he’s a real rising star in the movement,” Sharlet says. “This was something that I hadn’t understood before I went to Uganda, that this was a guy with real potential and real sway and increasingly a following in Uganda.”
Sharlet also explores Bahati’s involvement in the Fellowship prayer groups in Uganda:
And he has connections to American leaders. Sharlet explains that Bahati is one of the Uganda leaders of an American Evangelical movement called the Fellowship, or the Family. The secretive fellowship of powerful Christian politicians who wield considerable political influence, both in Washington and abroad.
“I discovered, thinking that there was a more distance change of relationship [between Bahati and the Fellowship,] that there was this very direct relationship,” Sharlet says. “And [the Fellowship members] are emphatic and saying ‘We haven’t killed any gay people in Uganda. This isn’t what we had in mind. We didn’t pull the trigger.’ And that’s true. They didn’t pull the trigger. But there’s a sense in which they built the gun, which was this institutional idea of government being decided by small groups of elite leaders like Bahati, getting together and trying to conform government to their idea of Biblical la(w). And this is what their American benefactors wanted them to do.”
“David Bahati has been over to the United States to study the Christian leadership principles of the Family — or the principles of Jesus, as they call them. And he was upset [when I visited,] because he had gotten into a sort of schism with the group. [Because] when the [anti-homosexuality] bill became publicized, the American Family — which organizes something called the National Prayer Breakfast — really tried to distance themselves from Bahati.”
The audio will be available after 5pm.
In June, Canyon Ridge Christian Church ended the silence regarding their mission partner, Martin Ssempa, saying that the church leaders met with the chief pastoral supporter of Uganda’s Anti-Homosexuality Bill in March. Church leaders said they regarded some of Ssempa’s methods to be “offensive” but continued to support him. Pastor Kevin Odor said the church hoped to maintain a relationship which would allow CRCC to influence their Ugandan mission partner.
However, Pastor Odor misrepresented the Anti-Homosexuality Bill by saying the bill was designed to close gaps in Ugandan law by providing penalties for child molesters and those who intentional spread HIV. In fact, the bill provides life in prison for those convicted of homosexual intimacy and death for “repeat offenders” or those who engage in consensual relationships while HIV positive. The bill also provides criminal penalties for those who know someone who is gay but do not report this to police.
In the sermon where Pastor Odor described the church’s response to Pastor Ssempa, he reminded the congregation that they walked in the local AIDS Walk as an illustration of the church’s commitment to helping those suffering with AIDS. That local AIDS group is Aid for AIDS Nevada (AFAN).
On April 25, AFAN hosted the AIDS Walk with numerous community groups and individuals participating. Canyon Ridge organized a team which is listed on the AFAN website and is open to public members. According to a walker who declined to be named, a group of church folks wore t-shirts displaying the church name and marched in the April event. The church team raised $1385 for AFAN.
I contacted AFAN before I found this information on their website. When I did, one staffer I spoke with declined to comment but forwarded my request to the director, Jennifer Morss. I then wrote Ms. Morss two additional emails asking for comment on the relationship with Canyon Ridge and the recent action of Southern Nevada Health to sever ties with the church.
To date, I have gotten no answer. Last week, I went on the Facebook group for AFAN and left a comment on their wall asking for a PR person from AFAN to contact me. Initially, that comment was answered with a recommendation that I contact Terri Maruca, Vice President at Kirvin Doak Communications. When I contacted Ms. Maruca, she replied that someone from the staff would contact me next (now this) week. In the mean time, Michael Bussee also left a request for public comment on the AFAN Facebook group wall. Sometime in mid-week last week, both of those comments were removed by the owner of the AFAN group. Currently, Mr. Bussee has another request for public comment on the AFAN wall.
This silence is puzzling. The partnership is minimal but real. All such partnerships provide benefit to both groups. AFAN gets donations and connections to diverse constituents and CRCC gets a reputation for community involvement and concern for those with HIV. Furthermore, I do not mean to diminish this, those who walk and donate are probably motivated by a sincere desire to help.
However, the dissonance is jarring. CRCC seems to be involved in commendable activities but in this case has partnered with Martin Ssempa to mislead many people about the real nature of the Ugandan bill. Just over the weekend, the Ugandan Daily Monitor made it crystal clear what Anti-Homosexuality Bill author, David Bahati, believes about how the state should react to homosexuals:
Bahati accuses the rich for trying to influence the world with their homosexuality agenda, which he calls a great threat to society and the future generation.
“This habit is learned and can be unlearned,” he adds, quoting the Bible: “Homosexuality is an abomination punishable by death.” When I asked him how, as a Christian, he can advocate for a death penalty, he replied, “It is in Leviticus. Go and read – the penalty for homosexuality is death.”
I suspect it would be quite offensive to many walking in the AIDS walk to know that a church that provides cover for the AHB campaign is a recognized partner of the group hosting the event. Such an event could not happen in Uganda if the bill passes.
From the beginning of this story, I have been interested in how Americans respond to the AHB. Thus far, I cannot discern the stance of AFAN since they have been silent. While I don’t believe AFAN supports the AHB or even CRCC in any direct manner, the silence and removal of comments is surprising.
UPDATE: Mr. Bussee’s most recent comment was deleted.
In the current issue of Harpers, Jeff Sharlet provides glimpses of his trip to Uganda, reporting there in April and May. It has been out to subscribers for a week or so but here is a very brief part of the introduction provided by Harpers in conjunction with The Investigative Fund. I have seen the entire piece and it is a vivid description of time spent with several of the main movers of the Anti-Homosexuality Bill. If you have access to Harpers, read it. It begins:
A young man who called himself Blessed had agreed to meet me in front of the Speke Hotel, the oldest in Kampala, Uganda’s capital, but he wsa late, very late, adn I had no way to contact him. Emailing me from a café, he’s said he didn’t have a phone; calling from a pay phone, he’d said he didn’t have a watch. The friends who’d put me in touch with him said he didn’t have an address. I’d see a picture of him: he had a long neck, a narrow face, and a broad smile that made him look both kind and a little sly. I wanted to talk to him precisely because he was hard to find, because he was gay, and because he was on the run.
On October 14, 2009, a Ugandan member of parliament named David Bahati introduced legislation called the Anti-Homosexuality Bill. Among its provisions: up to three years in prison for failure to report a homosexual; seven years for “promotion”; life imprisonment for a single homosexual act; and for “aggravated homosexuality” (which includes gay sex while HIV-positive, gay sex with a disabled person, or, if you’re a recidivist, gay sex with anyone — marking the criminal as a “serial offender”), death. As of this writing the bill has yet to pass, despite near unanimous support in Parliament. But the violence has been building, a crackling fury not yet quite a fire: beatings, disappearances, “corrective” rapes of lesbians, blacklists in a national tabloid, vigilante squads and church crusades, preachers calling out “homos” in their own pews.
It was Blessed’s pastor, a celebrity with an American following who had outed him. “Am being hunted by my family at the moment,” he’d written in an email apologizing for his inability to commit to dinner plans. “Am moving place to place now.” Then, in case I didn’t understand: “They want to kill me.”
To read the complete article, pick up the September 2010 issue of Harper’s.
Sunday, the Uganda Observer published an article on July 22 titled, “Inside the world of sexual minorities.” The article quotes local physicians with an informative article regarding various terms for sexual minorities. The article seems to make an effort at balance and information rather than opinion and moralizations.
Well, that did not sit well with Martin Ssempa who wrote a letter to the editor published today:
Wednesday, 04 August 2010 17:50
I am responding to the story ‘Inside the world of sexual minorities’ (The Observer, July 22-24, 2010). I view the two pages of extensive research you presented in such a national newspaper as any outcry of sympathy and acceptance of homosexuality and the people involved in the evil practice. It is a betrayal of readers’ loyalty and the family values in Uganda.
Your stories created the impression that:
•Homosexuals are a minority group, which should be accepted in society.
•Families can still survive even after one spouse turns gay, probably with the other spouse getting another lover too and ‘they live happily ever after.’
•The definitions given of the various forms of homosexuality are meant to encourage the young minds to explore the vice.
•The pictures that ran with the story give an impression of happy, blossoming relationships, which is not the actual case with homosexuality.
•It is okay for children to turn to homosexuality and that their parents can just seek counselling and everything will be fine.
On the other hand, the stories missed out the following facts:
•Homosexuals are 100% more likely to contract HIV/AIDS compared to normal heterosexual couples.
•Homosexuality has a negative impact on the body’s external organs and is a health hazard.
•Homosexuals are very depressed people who face gender identity disorders.
Besides, homosexuality is already illegal in Uganda. Therefore, unless you are promoting a crime, I do not see why you presented homosexuality as a scientific normality.
As loyal readers of The Observer and parents, we demand an apology and counter coverage on the pro-family issues.
Dr. Martin Ssempa,
Kampala.
Who knows where Rev. Ssempa gets his statistics. I am not sure what external organs he is referring to but I am sure many readers will take issue with his “facts” as I do. He is however, welcome to provide supporting documentation here if he would like to.
I may be missing some of the article given what Ssempa refers to in his letter. If anyone has a more complete version, if it exists, please let me know.