Is Homosexuality an un-african, imported western vice?

The quick answer is Yes! But is it a bad thing? Yes.

Ok, so let me clarify because we are really talking about two different things. I presume that the initial question was about whether men sleeping with men was imported into Africa. The answer is clearly no. But something else is being imported and the discussion is starting to touch on this now.

This is an issue I feel very strongly about. Europe has, in my opinion, made series mistakes when dealing with this so I want to bring my perspective to this discussion. So apologies if this message is a bit long. If people don’t understand parts of it please ask me to explain it better! It’s difficult to think about something that has not yet taken place in Ghana but that is what I will try to raise with you now.

I was a queer activist in the UK. We helped to change attitudes to queers and helped create the community. When we had finished some of us looked at our creation and saw that it was not good.

The evidence that homosexuality is inborn is shaky and, can be counteracted quickly if you just think about the African experience and even the history of Greece. Some people think that if we say we were born this way then that will force people to accept us for who we are. I don’t think this is true. I don’t want to go into the implications of this now because there are other things I want to raise.

My whole problem is with the notion of a ‘gay’ identity and whether importing foreign solutions to African problems can really be effective. Even the language we use is American. Gays borrowed from the language of the black civil rights struggles. It is even being used in this discussion – have you noticed it?

Identity politics started in the USA. It is important to remember that, unlike Europe or Africa, most Americans are immigrants with relatively short histories in that country. The problem for them was how to create a cohesive identity amongst their disparate people. The solutions and models they created have been exported to Europe, with often disastrous results. The concept of gay identify is one American model.

Men have been having sex with men from as far back as we can research. It is also a natural phenomenon in the animal kingdom. But, in Africa, until recently, it was just something that people did. What is being imported, is the idea that it is not something you DO but is actually WHO YOU ARE. Alongside this go the ideas that you were ‘born this way’, there is a ‘gay gene’ and that we have ‘gay souls’. We are being asked to change the way we see ourselves. Instead of Ghanaians defining themselves in relationship to their family or community, they are now being expected to identity themselves in relationship to who they sleep with. An activity that may take about a few hours a week is now supposed to be who we are!

Initially, inventing a group – the ‘gay community’ – was useful for the type of political lobbying that works in those cultures. However, people quickly forget that the idea of a gay community was simply a convenient fiction and thought that gays were like another ethnic group! They started to believe that they were special simply because they liked dick! People started to say that gays were the best dressers, the best dancers, the best lovers and that there was a ‘gay sensibility’. I’ve also heard this nonsense in Ghana!

What happened next is that this community – actually a group of people that had nothing in common with each other except for who they slept with – created the idea of a gay culture. Now being gay meant you dressed a certain way, behaved a certain way, spoke a certain way, listened to ‘gay’ music, used ‘gay’ body creams and hair product and so the nightmare went on. Now, in Europe and America, gay seems to be little more than rampant consumerism. A drama in London summed it up gay life with it’s title – ******* and Shopping.

When this gay cult, sorry community, was powerful, suddenly the only way to be ‘gay’ was to join it, to ‘come out’, to be ‘proud’! And anyone who refused to comply was called a ‘self-loathing homosexual’. No criticism was allowed and no one could be really happy unless you joined them. We created a playground for ourselves which involved clubbing, drinking, taking drugs and promiscuity. This is the gay community that we are asking young people to be part of. It’s already started in Ghana.

The notion of gay pride is also revealing. Do you feel proud that you like r’n’b music or that you like Italian food? So why do we have to feel proud about our sexual tastes? Is it because we feel ashamed? I feel neither proud nor ashamed.

The fact Ghanaian men sleep with men is nothing new. What IS new is the way they are starting to understand this activity, and the language they are using to describe it. This whole mindset will lead to a certain outcome which no one is talking about.

Too often, Ghanaians copy foreign solutions to African problems without really looking to see what the consequences can be. Is it not time for African to be creative and find their own, African solutions to their problems?

Copied from "sexualminoritiesghana" contribution by our member Hitman61

Gay hate crimes like shown here in the picture on the right does not happen in Ghana. (Or does it....? tell us about it...). In Ghana you can lead a pretty safe and happy gay life as long as you keep a low profile. So why stirr things up?



Please if you want to contribute to this discussion, please start a thread below...!

I think this makes a lot of sense. Although I do believe one is born gay. I just read in an Asian site someone comparing it as thus: "some people are born gay just like some people are born lefthanded". When I was 7 years old I already developed certain feelings for boys, rather than girls, which I could only later label as being gay. It was well before anyone could have influenced me as I lived in a protective environment and had not been exposed to anything sexual. I was born Gay, I did not acquire it later. But you are right that it does not make sense to organize a community of left handed people.

In Europe the gay community got organized maybe in the years of the sexual revolution (from 1968). Af first it was the men that formed their own bars, clubs and associations. They needed a safe environment to be able to "be themselves". Later the Lesbiennes joined. Once they felt safe, united and strong they started to take things into the open more: gay pride, gay games etc. Now one can observe in Europe that the gay scene is slowly disappearing. Gay Discotheks are closing (the famous IT, the Roxy and Havana in Amsterdam) and there are fewer gay parties. Why? Because the level of acceptance makes that people dont have to hide in safe places anymore to behave gay. Gays go out to normal discothecs with friends, straight and gay. Because you are gay it does not mean you cant have straight friends. You want to go out where interesting people meet and fun things happen, and interesting does not automatically mean that these people should be gay or that only gay people have fun. If you just want to go out for a drink and a chat, there is no reason to be among gay people only.
I am a whole person and have many other interests and things in common with other people than only my sexual orientation. I do, think and feel the same as most other people except for what I prefer to do in bed. That is different from what the majority of people prefer (only about 7% of people have the similar preferences), but that is just a (n important but) small part of my life.

I guess the phase of forming a protected/protective group, gathering strength and confidence was a necessary phase in the emancipation drive. Maybe the African way could or should take a different evolution path. Maybe it does not have to copy the way it happened in the Western societies. There are two situational differences already (compared to the gay emancipation in the West) that provide other conditions and opportunities: the existence of HIV/AIDS and the availability of modern communication media like the internet.

Andy Shilongo

Excellent article in Nigerian Village about African Homosexuality

Nice blog here about gay africans...!

And this blog about a gay Kenyan