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Sodomy Laws Are Rooted in British Colonialism
By Nergui Manalsuren, IPS News
In many countries, conservatives claim homosexuality came from the colonizing West. In fact, it's homophobia that's a legacy of Western colonialism.

Although 66 countries signed a statement at the United Nations on Dec. 19 affirming that human rights protections extend to sexual orientation and gender identity, activists note that dozens of nations still criminalize homosexuality and seven impose the death penalty.
The New York-based Human Rights Watch says that the oppressive legacy of British colonialism is at the heart of many of these laws that penalize consensual sexual activity among adults of the same sex.
According to a report titled "This Alien Legacy", launched last week, more than half of the world's remaining "sodomy laws" derive from a single law on homosexual conduct that British colonial rulers imposed on India in 1860.
The law, known as Section 377 under the Indian penal code, was designed to set standards of behavior, both to "reform" the colonized and to protect the colonizers against "moral lapses".
It was the first colonial "sodomy law" integrated into a penal code, and it became a model for countries across Asia, the Pacific Islands and Africa -- almost everywhere the British imperial flag flew.
HRW notes that in recent years, judges, public figures and political leaders have defended those laws as citadels of nationhood and cultural authenticity, claiming that homosexuality came from the colonizing West, when in fact the opposite is true.

Since he’s not about to rescind the invitation, what happens next? For perspective, I asked Timothy McCarthy, a historian who teaches at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government and an unabashed Obama enthusiast who served on his campaign’s National Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Leadership Council. He responded via e-mail on Christmas Eve.

After noting that Warren’s role at the inauguration is, in the end, symbolic, McCarthy concluded that “it’s now time to move from symbol to substance.” This means Warren should “recant his previous statements about gays and lesbians, and start acting like a Christian.”

McCarthy added that it’s also time “for President-elect Obama to start acting on the promises he made to the LGBT community during his campaign so that he doesn’t go down in history as another Bill Clinton, a sweet-talking swindler who would throw us under the bus for the sake of political expediency.” And “for LGBT folks to choose their battles wisely, to judge Obama on the content of his policy-making, not on the character of his ministers.”

Amen. Here’s to humility and equanimity everywhere in America, starting at the top, as we negotiate the fierce rapids of change awaiting us in the New Year.

It’s not a coincidence that Dobson’s Focus on the Family, which spent more than $500,000 promoting Proposition 8, has now had to lay off 20 percent of its work force in Colorado Springs.

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She expressed huge disappointment with the U.S. decision not to sign the statement, pointing out that it is a country that has global influence, and should set an example in the recognition of human rights. China, Russia, the Vatican and Islamic countries also refused to sign the statement.

I'm seriously running out of places to put my anger and disappointment.

I feel your pain Jeffro - throw dating into the mix and it's nearly jump off the bridge time.

(...well not that bad - I was being dramatic - I'm gay - I have license )

I'm totally hitting on the next Safeway.com delivery guy to knock on my door!

West Hollywood, California (Monday, December 29, 2008) - Rick Warren, the influential pastor of Orange County’s Saddleback Mega Church, supporter of Prop 8 and the preacher invited to give President-elect Obama’s inaugural invocation, made what appeared to be a “politically-correct” appearance in West Hollywood last Monday.

[snip]
In other developments, the anti-gay statements made on the church’s website, which deny access to gays and lesbians because its god considers homosexuality a sin, were pulled after the nationwide controversy broke.

The offending paragraph read: ''Because membership in a church is an outgrowth of accepting the Lordship and leadership of Jesus in one's life, someone unwilling to repent of their homosexual lifestyle would not be accepted at a member of Saddleback Church.”

While the text disappeared soon after MSNBC’s lesbian news show host Rachel Maddow “outed” it on her cable show, Saddleback Church issued a video that explained that their condemnation of homosexuality was still in effect and had been pulled from the site only so the church could “repurpose it for clarity.”