Anti-gay bigots in Uganda rallied today in support of the country’s draconic anti-gay laws (which punish “sodomy” with life imprisonment), carrying signs saying charming things like “Arrest all homos.”
They also howled for the firing of a reporter who dared to write an objective story about the experiences of gay people in Uganda, calling her a “homo propagandist.”
One of the head haters had this to say:
“We are fighting against the fresh campaign for homosexuality and lesbianism in this country,” said organiser and pastor Martin Sempa. “Homosexuality and lesbianism break three laws; the laws in the Bible and the Koran, the laws of nature and the laws of the land, the Ugandan Constitution.”
Apparently this particular genius either can’t count any higher than three, or thinks that the Bible and the Koran are somehow indistinguishable as texts. Either way he’s not exactly bright enough to read by.
And it’s bad enough when hate groups try to disguise their prejudice as piety, but there’s certainly no reason for the media to help them do it. For example, this story’s lead says:
Christian groups in Uganda held a protest rally on Tuesday against what they called an orchestrated promotion of gays and lesbians in the country.
It’s always frustrating when news stories refer to homophobes as “Christian groups” — both in the US and elsewhere — as if they were somehow representative of all Christians. Call them fundamentalists, call them religious conservatives (or better yet religious extremists), but don’t slander all Christians by uncritically passing along the false idea that these people are somehow being true to the teachings of Jesus, because they’re not — they’re just using the Bible as camouflage for their own hatred. (If they really cared about the Bible, they might pay better attention to certain passages about not casting stones and judging not lest ye be judged.)
As if the people of Uganda didn’t have enough to bedevil them. Many many decades ago when a young man of my acquiantance spent a summer in a rural district of Uganda, life was simple i(though constant hard work), but it was not terrible at all. And some Christian groups, at least the Anglicans I heard about, ran schools and helped out. I’m very sorry to hear this news though grateful to you, Dave, as always, for noticing and reporting.
I’ve been meaning for a while to thank you for your weekly roundups. They’re great for someone like me, who tries to survey the world (I’m a librarian! I’m an info spreader!) but get scattered by trying to keep up. I can settle down and read more novels, while trusting you to catch me up weekly. Thank you. I wish I could give up the paper newpaper addiction, but it’s in the blood, and the generation. Did I say thank you? And did I say that today in an opening faculty meeting, full of far too much information, I thought — “Too much light makes the baby go blind!”?
Thanks, Jane! I’m very glad to hear that you like the roundups — they’re fairly time-consuming to produce, and I sometimes wonder how much the OcPot’s readers enjoy them versus the freestanding “feature” posts. So it’s good to know that they’re being read and enjoyed.