I hope people aren’t missing the point of Uganda’s Anti-Homosexuality Bill, which is back before that country’s Parliament. The debate in America has focused on the bill’s death penalty provision, which is, by any measure, a horrifying use of naked governmental power in the 21st Century.
But does that imply that replacing death with some lesser punishment would make the bill better? I’m afraid this report from the indispensable Jim Burroway, leaves that impression.
It is not the death penalty that makes this bill intolerable. It is the bill’s entire premise. Its title is “The Anti-Homosexuality Bill.” Its purpose is to use the force of government to prohibit “. . . any form of sexual relations between persons of the same sex; and [ ] the promotion or recognition of such sexual relations in public institutions and other places.”
Whatever your thoughts about the proper role of government, this aggressive, punitive and ignorant bill is a corruption and an abuse. Even with no death penalty, the bill sends the same message: lesbians and gay men are not only anathema, they must be removed from the body politic. They are not to be tolerated.
We shouldn’t let the presence of the death penalty in the bill blind us to that far more important fact. Otherwise, our arguments against the bill could turn against us, and we could wind up with an amended version intended to satisfy our expressed concern. There is no version of this bill that is acceptable.
6 Comments for “The Death Penalty In The Uganda Anti-Homosexuality Bill Is Not Its Problem”
posted by Tom on
Yes, it is an aggressive, punitive and ignorant bill. Yes, it is an abuse. Yes, the world community should be fighting measures like this tooth and nail, and that includes all of us on this list, both political parties, and the United States government, acting in unity.
But I think that it is also important to keep in mind that anti-gay forces in our own country echo, if in less vibrant colors and often piecemeal, most of the measures in Uganda’s bill.
A few examples:
I could go on. I won’t. But read the Uganda bill, looking at each provision. With the exception of the death penalty for “aggravated homosexuality”, you’ll find a counterpart to just about every provision in the anti-gay agenda in this country.
That’s not surprising, given that the architects of the Uganda bill were conservative Christians, including several prominent in the anti-gay movement in the United States, who have been working hand-in-hand with their counterparts in Uganda for years.
What you see in Uganda we could get, piecemeal, in our own country, if the far-right conservative Christians get their way. The anti-gay agenda is not confined to Africa.
If I may paraphrase you, David, “We shouldn’t let the sweeping nature of the Uganda bill blind us to that important fact.”
We need to fight in our own country as well as in Africa.
posted by Doug on
And don’t forget that the ‘C’ Street crowd in Congress was heavily involved in this too.
posted by Tom on
The beauty of Uganda for the American hard core social conservatives — religious and political — was that Uganda was essentially a blank slate legally in this respect, so they didn’t have to work to overlay a patchwork of existing laws and constitutional decisions. Instead, they were able to develop model legislation, from their point of view.
posted by Houndentenor on
Let’s not forget that in dozens of states gay sex was illegal until 2003 when the Supreme Court reversed Bowers in the Lawrence decision. It did this over the objection of the Bush administration and most of the GOP. Plenty of conservatives have never stopped bitching and moaning about the “unelected judges” doing this.
posted by Jorge on
But I think that it is also important to keep in mind that anti-gay forces in our own country echo, if in less vibrant colors and often piecemeal, most of the measures in Uganda’s bill.
No doubt we have a duty to push American values higher than they currently are or recently have been.
Doing the same in Uganda strikes me as tricky. The coalition to remove the bill for the reasons you state will not be as strong as the coalition to remove the bill because of the death penalty. It could be a better result to have a strong coalition fall apart later than to never build one now. This is not something I feel very strongly about.
posted by h8 str8s on
That isn’t litterally true. If your thoughts about the proper role of government is that governments are there to chose the one true religion and enforce it, then this law would seem quite correct and proper. I don’t happen to believe that is the proper role of government, I’m just saying is all…