Soulforce Responds to the American Psychological Association Report

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American Psychological Association Mental health professionals should avoid telling clients they can change their sexual orientation Today the American Psychological Association (APA) issued a report stating that there is insufficient evidence that sexual orientation change efforts work and that mental health professionals should avoid telling clients they can change from gay to straight through therapy or other treatments. Upon completing a careful scientific review of the published literature on conversion therapy, and having undergone a rigorous American Psychological Association peer review process, the Task Force on Appropriate Therapeutic Response to Sexual Orientation concluded that sexual orientation is unlikely to change due to "therapeutic" efforts designed for this purpose. The full APA press release can be read at http://www.apa.org/releases/therapeutic.html. "In accepting the findings of its Task Force, I believe the APA has done the public a great service in warning against the overstated claims of conversion therapy 'successes'," said Jack Drescher, M.D.* Dr. Drescher will be one of three distinguished keynote speakers at the Anti-Heterosexism Conference in West Palm Beach, Florida, November 20-22, 2009. This international conference will counter the anti-gay misinformation of NARTH (the National Association for Research & Therapy of Homosexuality) scheduled to meet the same weekend and in the same city. The 2009 Anti-Heterosexism Conference will address the harm of sexual conversion therapies to people and their families as well as the the underlying problem of heterosexism (the cultural assumption that opposite sex attractions and relationships are preferable and superior to those of the same sex). Attendees will co-create ways to help survivors repair the damage caused by their experiences in sexual conversion therapies, and create social change that values. loves, and celebrates all people regardless of sexual orientation or gender-identity. Early registration for the 2009 Anti-Heterosexism Conference begins August 20, 2009. Workshop proposals are being accepted until August 29 and potential presenters can apply by going to http://www.soulforce.org/anti-heterosexism and downloading the PDF application form. *Jack Drescher, M.D., is a New York City psychiatrist and Distinguished Fellow of the American Psychiatric Association. He is a member of the DSM-V Workgroup on Sexual and Gender Identity Disorders. Dr. Drescher is President-Elect of the Group for Advancement of Psychiatry, Clinical Associate Professor of Psychiatry & Behavioral Sciences at New York Medical College, and Adjunct Clinical Assistant Professor at New York University's Postdoctoral Program in Psychotherapy and Psychoanalysis. He is Author of Psychoanalytic Therapy and the Gay Man, Emeritus Editor of the Journal of Gay and Lesbian Mental Health, and has edited 20 books, including Sexual Conversion Therapy: Ethical, Clinical and Research Perspectives and Ex-Gay Research: Analyzing the Spitzer Study and Its Relation to Science, Religion, Politics and Culture. Send this Soulforce email alert to a friend The goal of Soulforce is freedom for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people from religious and political oppression through the practice of relentless nonviolent resistance. Thank you for your continued interest in the important work that Soulforce is doing. You received this email at alam.faisal@gmail.com because you are subscribed to the Soulforce Email List. To read past Soulforce email alerts go to www.soulforce.org/email. To modify your account details, please click here. To unsubscribe please click here or simply reply to this email with the word REMOVE in the subject line. If you received this email from a friend, you can sign up for the Soulforce email list by going to www.soulforce.org/subscribe. To donate to the ongoing work of Soulforce please go to www.soulforce.org/donate. Soulforce, Inc., P.O. Box 3195, Lynchburg, VA 24503

Militias Target Some Iraqis for Being Gay

Hussam Abdullah, in his Baghdad tea shop, told his gay customers to go elsewhere because of threats from militant groups. From USA Today - July 29, 2009

 

Militias target some Iraqis for being gay

By Paul Wiseman and Nadeem Majeed, USA TODAY

BAGHDAD — The young man turns to the camera and pleads with his tormentors.

 

"I'm not a terrorist," he tells the Iraqi police who surround him. "I want you to know I am different. But I am not a terrorist."

 

To some fundamentalist Iraqi Muslims, Ahmed Sadoun Saleh was worse than a terrorist.

 

He was gay. He wore his hair long and took female hormones to grow breasts. Amused by his appearance, Iraqi police officers stopped him in December at a checkpoint in a southern Baghdad neighborhood dominated by radical Shiite militias. They groped Saleh and ridiculed him.

 

The assault was captured on video and circulated on cellphones throughout Baghdad, says Ali Hili, founder of London-based Iraqi LGBT, a group dedicated to protecting Iraq's gays and lesbians. Shortly after the video was made public, Hili says Saleh contacted him, fearing for his life, and asked for his help to flee Iraq.

 

"Unfortunately, it was too late," Hili says. Saleh turned up dead two months later, he says.

 

At least 82 gay men have been killed in Iraq since December, according to Iraqi LGBT. The violence has raised questions about the Iraqi government's ability to protect a diverse range of vulnerable minority groups that also includes Christians and Kurds, especially following the withdrawal of U.S. combat troops from Iraqi cities last month.

 

Mithal al-Alusi, a secular, liberal Sunni legislator, is among those who blame the killings on armed militant groups such as al-Qaeda and the Mahdi Army militia.

 

By targeting one of the most vulnerable groups in a conservative Muslim society — people whose sexual orientation is banned by Iraqi law — the militias essentially are serving notice that they remain powerful despite the U.S. and Iraqi militaries' efforts to curtail them, al-Alusi says.

 

The militants "want to educate the society to accept killers on the street," al-Alusi says in an interview. "Why did Hitler start with gays? They are weak. They have no political cover. They have no legal cover."

 

The attacks have terrified a gay community that, for a brief time after the U.S. troop surge in 2007-08, tentatively enjoyed greater freedom and security.

 

"I am worried about my life," says a middle-age gay man in Baghdad who asked to be identified by the pseudonym Hassan. He declined to be identified by his real name because the recent violence has made him fear for his life. "I don't know what to do," he says.

 

Hili and other gay rights activists believe the killers operate with the complicity and sometimes the direct involvement of Iraqi security forces.

 

As part of a drive to stop the sectarian violence that peaked in Iraq in 2006-07, those forces have taken into their ranks numerous former militia members from the Mahdi Army (loyal to radical cleric Muqtada al-Sadr) and the pro-Iranian Badr Brigade.

 

"The Ministry of Interior in Iraq is behind this campaign of terror," Hili says in an e-mail.He says witnesses have told him that police harass and beat suspected gays at checkpoints and sometimes turn them over to militias for execution.

 

Interior Ministry spokesman Maj. Gen. Abdul Karim Khalaf disputes such allegations. He says the ministry has assigned a special bureau to investigate the killings of gays; he says he knows of six gays who had been executed as of May.

 

Homosexuality, Khalaf says, is against the law and "is rejected by the customs of our society." He adds, however, that offenders should be handled by the courts, not dispatched by vigilante groups.

 

The killers aren't just executing their gay victims. They are "mutilating their bodies and torturing them," says fundamentalist Sunni cleric Sheik Mohammed al-Ghreri, who has criticized the violence.

 

Hili says the militias have come up with a particularly cruel way to inflict pain: sealing victims' anuses with glue, then force-feeding them laxatives. Hili says he has spoken to several victims who survived the ordeal.

 

'You can just be crushed'

 

Besides targeting gays, Sadr City militias also are harassing and sometimes killing straight young men who violate fundamentalist fashion and decorum by wearing low-riding pants and other Western-style clothing, slicking back their hair or making it spiky, hanging out in cafes or pool halls or flirting with girls, says human rights activist Mohammed Jasim, 28.

 

"The campaign is against gays and anybody who looks gay" in the eyes of militiamen indoctrinated to believe immodest dress is an affront to God, Jasim says.

 

"Young people felt their city had been liberated," says Jasim's friend Wisam Mizban, 32.

 

"They thought they could wear what they wanted. The militias felt threatened and started killing them. They are doing their crimes under the cover of the government. … Most young people want a civilized life. The militias and the government are putting pressure on them again."

 

The campaign has had a chilling effect on Baghdad's nightlife.

 

Entrepreneur Ali al-Ali opened the Shisha coffee shop in an upstairs storefront overlooking a bustling street in the upscale Karrada neighborhood. The place quickly became a hangout for young gay men, who'd sit and talk and drink lattes, and smoke flavored tobacco from the water pipes that gave the cafe its name.

 

But as the militias started killing gay men, Ali discouraged gays from congregating at his cafe. "If (militias) see gays coming here, maybe they will target me outside Karrada," al-Ali says.

 

His sentiments were echoed by Hussam Abdullah, whose tea shop also used to be a hangout for gay men — until militias warned Abdullah there would be trouble if he didn't send them away. So he did.

 

The militias usually send out warnings before they attack. Posters go up in Sadr City listing the offenders — gay and flashy straight men — by name and neighborhood. "If you don't give up what you are doing," said a recent one seen by a USA TODAY reporter, "death will be your fate. And this warning will come true, and the punishment will be worse and worse."

 

The poster referred to the offenders as "puppies," the fundamentalist epithet for gays here. "In Arabic culture, if you want to insult someone you call them a dog," human rights activist Yanar Mohammed says. "If you're a small dog, you can just be crushed."

 

Among those listed was a young man named Allawi Hawar, a local soccer star who incurred the wrath of the militias by wearing his hair long and partying with his friends in Sadr City cafes.

 

Hawar was playing pool one day last month when two masked men drove up on a motor scooter. One climbed off and made his way inside the cafe, clutching a pistol.

 

"We have something to deal with," he announced to startled patrons, according to witness Emad Saad, 25.

 

The gunman grabbed Hawar and dragged him outside. Then he shot the young athlete in the leg. After Hawar crumpled to the ground, bleeding, the gunman shot him again and killed him, Saad says.

 

The militiamen pick their targets by entering cafes and looking for men who appear feminine or too showy, Saad says. Then they ask around to get the offenders' names, and later put them on the death lists distributed around town.

 

Saad himself likes to wear Western jeans and slicked-back hair. He has taken to carrying a Glock pistol, awaiting his showdown with the militias.

 

"Some people are afraid, but I am not," he says. "I have done nothing wrong."

 

The Sadr City warning posters do not appear to be the work of educated theologians. A recent one was filled with Arabic misspellings, including a faulty rendering of "compassionate" — part of one of the 99 names for God.

 

But Ali Hili, the London activist, and others believe high-level clerics have ordered the killings. Iraq's Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani several years ago decreed that the punishment for homosexuality is death "if it is proven before the religious judge."

 

An Iraqi TV channel, Alsumaria, reported that Sunni cleric al-Ghreri has called for the execution of gays. Al-Ghreri denies issuing such a statement, but concedes that some "stubborn" clerics might support the death penalty for gays.

 

He says homosexuality is "abnormal" and that gays should know that "freedom has limits." First, he says, gays should be warned to change their offensive behavior.

 

If that fails, he says, they should be jailed. If detentions don't work, they should endure 100 lashes for engaging in gay sex. And if four separate lashings fail and if witnesses testify against the suspects, he says, then they should be executed.

 

Exactly what unleashed the recent wave of violence is unclear.

 

Some — including Hassan, the middle-age gay man — trace the terror to a birthday party around New Year's at a cafe on Palestine Street in eastern Baghdad.

 

The party attracted about 20 gay men who cut loose on the dance floor, celebrating what they thought was their freedom in a more peaceful, stable Iraq. A video of the revelry was entitled Gay Scandal and distributed around the city.

 

"This was the start of it," Hassan says. "It made the ministry people crazy."

 

In London, activist Hili calls the party "a foolish action from members of our community who let their guard down."

 

However, he doesn't believe the party "was the spark that ignited all the flames."

 

Hili says the violence started earlier, with clerical fatwas against gays and police raids in December in Najaf, Karbala and Kut.

 

The search for safety

 

Unable to trust the authorities — and in some cases shunned by their own families — many Iraqi gays have gone into hiding. Hassan and some gay friends say they had found refuge in a house in Karrada. But as the threat against them increased, they became afraid the police would find them. So they scattered.

 

Hassan says he sometimes stays at home with his brothers — their parents are dead — but he's afraid even of them, afraid they will kill him because he has brought shame to the family.

 

He says he wanted to move in with his sister, who lives in Abu Dhabi. She turned him away, saying she didn't want her children to know they have a gay uncle.

 

Unwilling to trust the police, Iraqi LGBT has set up its own safe houses for gays in Iraq. The group has struggled to raise money and had to close three safe houses in the past couple of months, leaving just one open.

 

Hili says five safe houses are needed, each of them housing 10 to 12 gay refugees. Rent for a 2,150-square-foot safe house is usually $600 a month. Yet other expenses pile up: security guards, food, fuel, medical bills, pots and pans, bedding.

 

"We desperately need to add more because we have so many urgent cases," Hili says. "We receive requests for shelter every day, but are not able to help."

 

Things were better for gays, Hassan says, under the dictatorial rule of Saddam Hussein.

 

"In the Saddam era, it wasn't like this," he says. Saddam's security forces, offended by Hassan's openly gay lifestyle, once arrested him and hauled him to court. The judge let him go, ruling that he had done nothing wrong.

 

"Now, you don't know who to be afraid of," he says. "Forget about freedom or democracy. We just want our safety."

The women who clear Sudan's minefields

In baking heat, the women wear bomb-proof clothing and cannot drink water

Full Article from the BBC.

Muslim Women Call for Change; Reinterpretation of Islamic Teachings

Muslim women call for change

Rasha Elass

Last Updated: July 18. 2009 12:54PM UAE / July 18. 2009 8:54AM GMT

KUALA LUMPUR // More than 200 female Muslim scholars and community
leaders from around the world have gathered in the Malaysian capital
this weekend to launch an ambitious initiative to reinterpret Islamic
teachings, in the hope of improving the lot of Muslim women around the
world.

They will establish a shura council as well as a fund to support local
initiatives and a website. Daisy Khan, one of the organisers, said the
conference was an "historic moment for Muslim women's activism and an
opportunity to build on the change President Obama highlighted in his
speech in Cairo.

"We're thrilled to build upon the collective experiences of Muslim
women from around the world and establish a true global support
network of Muslim women working for social change at the dawning of
this new political era."

The 15-member shura council will operate this year under an umbrella
campaign called Jihad Against Violence, which will tackle issues from
female circumcision to domestic violence and terrorism.

Yesterday's bombings at two Jakarta hotels provided added urgency to
its first official statement: "It is time for peace. We, the Muslim
women's shura council, stand for non-violent and peaceful means alone
to create change. In the wake of yesterday's tragic incidents in
Indonesia, we unconditionally denounce violence, regardless of who
perpetrates it and for whatever objectives. We urge all to join our
global Jihad Against Violence."

Supreme Court of Pakistan Directs Govt to Help Eunuchs Live with Dignity

SC directs govt to help eunuchs live with dignity

Wednesday, July 15, 2009 By By our correspondent

ISLAMABAD: The Supreme Court on Tuesday directed the government to provide financial support as well as protection to eunuchs so that they could lead a respectable life in society. A three-member bench of the Supreme Court, comprising Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry, Justice Sair Ali and Justice Jawwad S Khawaja, was hearing a petition of Dr Muhammad Aslam Khaki. The court directed the government to provide financial support to the transgender individuals from Baitul Maal or the Benazir Income Support Programme. The court also directed the Interior Ministry to issue instructions to the law-enforcement agencies to provide protection to eunuchs from 'Ghunda' elements. Dr Aslam Khaki, while appearing before the court, submitted that eunuchs were deprived of their basic rights as citizens of Pakistan and were facing humiliation in society. He said the parents expelled them from homes due to their feminine characteristics like dancing and wearing feminine dresses. He said they could opt for a specific sex through surgery. Dr Khaki further stated that there was no column in identity card to specify sex of the transgender individuals. Dr Khaki provided the court with an identity card on which the photograph tended to be that of a female while in the respective column gender of the bearer of the card was listed as male. He further said eunuchs were not owned by their parents and were deprived of their share in property. At this, the chief justice observed that it was the responsibility of the parents and State to support and protect them. The chief justice said the government could support eunuchs by providing them respectable jobs or financial support through the Income Support Programme or Baitul Maal, while the NGOs should also come forward. He also directed the secretary social welfare to come up with projects for the social uplift of transgender individuals. The provincial departments of social welfare were also directed to provide lists of the registered eunuchs in the next hearing of the case. Shazia, an educated eunuch, informed the court that transgender individuals born in well-off families were accepted, and added, "They get education and do jobs but those belonging to poor families resort to dancing etc for earning bread." She said they faced humiliation in society and torture at the hands of their gurus and other miscreants while the police too registered false cases against them. She said her father and brothers were not allowing her to enter home. The court adjourned the hearing till third week of August

Pakistan Supreme Court Orders Federal and Provincial Governments to Provide Financial Support to Transvestites

State responsible for rights of eunuchs: CJ

Updated at: 1730 PST, Tuesday, July 14, 2009

ISLAMABAD: The Supreme Court directed the government to give financial assistance to eunuchs for adopting respectable profession, holding them a common citizen entitled to all civic rights in Pakistan. A bench headed by Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammed Chaudhry heard the Khawja Sara registration case. The CJ said in his remarks that Khawja Sara are Pakistani citizens and the state is fully responsible for their rights protection, directing the police high-ups to listen to the their complaints and take action against police personnel who do wrongs against them (eunuchs). The Chief Justice directed the federal and provincial governments to offer small loans from Benazir Income Support Program or Baitul Maal for honourable profession. The court adjourned the hearing till third week of August. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- From the Pakistan Observer - July 15, 2009 CJP directs govt to help eunuchs Tanvir Siddiqi Islamabad—The Supreme Court on Tuesday directed the government to give financial assistance to eunuchs for adopting respectable profession, saying they are entitled to all civic rights. A bench headed by Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammed Chaudhry heard the Khawjasara registration case and remarked that "Khawjasara are citizens of Pakistan and the state is fully responsible for their rights' protection." He directed the police high-ups to listen to their complaints and take action against police personnel who do wrong against them. The Chief Justice directed the federal and provincial governments to offer small loans to eunuchs from Benazir Income Support Programme or Baitul Maal for taking up honourable processions. The court adjourned the hearing till third week of August.

Pakistan to Recognise Eunuchs

Bronwyn Curran, Foreign Correspondent

June 30. 2009 5:50PM GMT

Bobby, 43, a Pakistani eunuch and president of the She Male Rights Association at her home in Rawalpindi, Pakistan.
Katherine Kiviat for The National

RAWALPINDI, PAKISTAN // After decades of ignominy and exploitation as painted dancers, singers and beggars, Pakistan's "third sex" is to be officially surveyed and registered under the direction of the Supreme Court.

Iftikhar Chaudhry, the liberal-minded chief justice, ordered the establishment of a commission to conduct the survey after a prominent jurist filed a petition drawing attention to the plight of Pakistan's several hundred thousand eunuchs.

Until the registration takes place, the number of eunuchs is unknown. Community leaders estimate it is at least 400,000.

Full Article from The Nation - June 30, 2009

Pakistan's Supreme Court Orders Equal Benefits for Transvestites

SC orders equal benefits for transvestites

By Nasir Iqbal
Wednesday, 15 Jul, 2009 | 09:00 AM PST |

 

Transvestites Roop and Shazia come out of the Supreme Court after the decision is taken in their favour in Islamabad. –Dawn

ISLAMABAD: The Supreme Court has ordered that transvestites, being equal citizens of Pakistan, should also benefit from the federal and provincial governments' financial support schemes such as the Benazir Income Support Programme (BISP).

Full Article from DAWN - July 15, 2009

Trikone Hails Pakistan Supreme Court's Verdict on Equal Benefits for Transgender Pakistanis

Historic Decision:
Trikone Hails Pakistan Supreme Court's Verdict on Equal Benefits for Transgender Pakistanis

For Immediate Release
July 15, 2009
 
For more information contact:
Rakesh Modi, Co-Chair, rakesh@trikone.org, (510) 757-5726
Priti Narayanan, Co-Chair, priti@trikone.org

 

Islamabad, Pakistan – In an unprecedented decision, the Supreme Court of Pakistan, led by Pakistani grassroots hero Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry, reiterated equal rights for Pakistan's transgender community by declaring that they must receive equal benefits from government agencies.  Their decision came on the heels of an equally ground-breaking verdict in which the Court ordered Pakistan's government to develop programs for the empowerment of transgender Pakistanis. Both of these are remarkable decisions by a just court.
 
The Supreme Court's verdicts relied on Islamic jurisprudence as well as Pakistan's constitution to strengthen equal rights for the transgender community, which is among the most repressed minorities across South Asia. Their decision is a victory for all who desire equality under the law.
 
Dr. Khaki, the lead petitioner in the case, is a respected Pakistani Islamic scholar.  His detailed petition and the Supreme Court's subsequent decision deserve great praise.  Even more impressive was the bravery of transgender citizens and their allies, who despite facing death threats appeared before the Court to bear witness to the violence and repression their community faces.  We applaud them for their courage, as we do for the entire community and allies who fight daily for transgender equality in Pakistan.
 
The Supreme Court's verdicts will have very real results. The judges directed that the government provide transgender Pakistanis not only equal protections as guaranteed to them under the constitution, but also equal government benefits.  They directed that government agencies develop effective programs to survey and rehabilitate transgender citizens.   They have also ruled that Dr. Khaki work with specific NGOs who are already working hard for the same goals. We hope this is just the beginning of better lives for all transgender Pakistanis.

For more information please visit: http://www.dawn.com/wps/wcm/connect/dawn-content-library/dawn/news/pakistan/metropolitan/14-sc-orders-equal-benefits-for-transvestites-zj-02

 
Trikone is a registered 501 © (3) non-profit support and advocacy group for Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender South Asians.  Based in the San Francisco Bay Area, Trikone is the oldest LGBT South Asian group in the world.  Visit us at www.trikone.org
 
For more information, including NGO names and contacts, on helping Pakistani transgender communities, please contact Ms. Narayanan or Mr. Modi.

No Man's Land: Gay Iranian Refugees Caught Between Persecution and Alienation

No Man's Land

Gay Iranian refugees are caught between persecution at home and alienation abroad. Out's exclusive expose.

By Tim Murphy

"In Iran, we don't have homosexuals, like in your country...we do not have this phenomenon. I don't know who's told you that we have it."
-- Remarks by Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in a speech at Columbia University, September 24, 2007

Full Article from Out Magazine - July 2009.