At my school, we each have a laptop which
we pretty much use all day long. And then being a person of the 21st century, I
also use it after school and into the night. So I have 24/7 access to the
internet, and I use that. During school, when I get bored, as I often do,
instead of being a normal teenage and reading funny things online, I like to
read up on the news. Mostly LGBT news. And by mostly I mean entirely. I like to
be up-to-date with things going on around me, because I care. And since I do
this everyday, I'd like to think I'm pretty well informed on things. For
example, one huge story has been the recent and still on-going progress of the so-called "Kill the Gays"
bill in Uganda. However, it only today really occurred to me that...well,
absolutely no one is talking about it. People on tumblr live for this stuff,
because everyone there (including me)is convinced that they are a civil rights
activist. And I've seen nothing on youtube or facebook or anything. Not even
the generic news on my schools webpage. Absolutely nothing. In a modern world
full of "signal-boasts" on the internet, they really missed something
huge here.
So I'd like to take a moment now to
educate at least someone. I'll even include sources for you. Because this is
something people should know is happening in our world. There are places out
there way less progressive than America. And those places matter and effect us,
too.
The basis of the bill is, by its name
sake, to kill off all gay people in Uganda. Actually, no. It would potentially
kill anyone even perceived as gay. Anyone who commits any gay act (and complete
intercourse is not required) will be killed, or suffer a lifetime imprisonment.
Citizens will be encouraged to turn in any law-violators, and in exchange be
spared their own lives. An ultimatum, so one partner will want to turn in the
other if they are both in danger. You can read more of the specifics of the law
here.
And worst thing about the lack of
awareness about this law is that it is set to be voted on and decided this week.
Why has no one mentioned this? And it's not like this doesn't concern us. For
one, Uganda’s Speaker of Parliament, Rebecca Kadaga, not only wants this law in place by the new year, she also hopes that this law will spread to all of
Africa. An entire continent where, in order to become more pure than this western
society, all people who seem to commit homosexual acts will be killed. No, a
continent-wide law is not set yet. But these are the early stages where we need
to stop it.
A second thing is that America and our
companies here could go and protest this, but we don't. Citibank is a huge
company in Uganda, yet they refuse even to go through with a petition to stop marketing there. The Family Research
Council’s Tony Perkins actually condones the bill. So the people that are really informed with what is happening, aren't doing
anything.
So I'm making this post as a final effort
to raise any awareness at all. It won't do much, but I can't just watch this
happen and hope it works out. America needs leaders to speak out against
injustices in the world, not just our country. Well, the time for that is now.
I really don't how to feel about this, I'm definitely not in support of this act. But in general things of this magnitude often make me feel very small and powerless. So I hope that our gov't although, they don't have the best track record, is at least discussing the issue. I think countries like: Uganda, Iraq, Iran, the list goes on, are just so ass backwards, it's really hard not to blame organized religion. This does stem from the Muslim faith and the subsets that's ten from that. What else besides plan ignorance, and hate of the "western world" who bred this type of action. I'm just a American teen trying to wrap my head around this ridiculous notion, and it's hard to believe that still people are this way. I think that as long as we have people in power of these countries the world can't make any progress. It's very hard to break down a brick wall.
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