SOUTH AFRICA FAILS LGBT PEOPLE AT UN
Shamefully, South Africa has again refused to support efforts to highlight discrimination against LGBT people as a legitimate human rights issue at the United Nations.
According to Jerry Matjila, South Africa’s official representative to the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva, the inclusion of sexual orientation in a report on racism and intolerance “demeans the legitimate plight of the victims of racism”.
He made the comment on Tuesday following the presentation of the report by Githu Muigai, the UN Rapporteur on “contemporary forms of racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance”.
Muigai said in his report that “the identity of each individual is made up of a multitude of components, such as gender, age, nationality, profession, sexual orientation, political opinion, religious affiliation and social origin”.
This notion was rejected by South Africa to the dismay of human rights defenders at the UN.
The South African government has previously sought to distance homophobia from racism, refusing to see these as equally legitimate human rights issues.
In February 2009, South Africa acted as spokesperson for African nations demanding the removal of references to sexual orientation from the draft declaration of the second UN World Conference against Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance.
Although primarily focused on issues of race, many who took part in that conference had the view that all forms of discrimination are related. In this spirit, a section was included in the declaration which condemned “all forms of discrimination and all other human rights violations based on sexual orientation”.
South Africa objected to this provision on the grounds that this went “beyond the framework” of the original declaration, and the section was removed from the document.
In December 2008 South Africa also refused to sign a symbolic UN declaration which called for the decriminalisation of homosexuality, despite the country’s constitution that specifically outlaws discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation.
Misunderstood. Its not so much that South Africa doesn’t support or promote the ideal of non-discrimination based on sexual orientation. Instead, it takes offence at Western (predominantly Caucasian) nations attempting to dilute the very real history and present occurrences of racism in the world. The fight for equality and non-discrimination of LGBT communities is certainly a priority for SA. However, one cannot seriously say (as the Western powers are trying to have us believe) that the suffering of people based on their sexual preference is a form of racism. Racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related (key word – RELATED) intolerance have absolutely nothing to do with sexual preference. South Africans should understand this more than most other nations as our LGBT community is as racially diverse as any. While sexual orientation is indeed a ground upon which people are discriminated against, it has nothing to do with fighting the scourge of racism and its new manifestations in terms of discriminating against groups based on their racial, ethnic, and religious identities. Furthermore, in the systems of international law, the notion of sexual orientation has not yet been defined. Thus, to support the idea would be to support the whims of foreign powers that would use such support to promote their own political agendas.
Racism/Sexual orientation discrimination.. What a load of bul%$#t! Most African leaders are clear about their stance on homosexuality. It is unAfrican!!! Besides the fact that this is blatant homophobia; how can it be distanced from racism!!! If anything, it makes sense that SA, given Zuma and Malema’s viewpoints, and others, has adopted this stance i.e. to distance sexual orientation discrimination from racism! This way, they can not be accused of racism for their views.
hey mark. hey mark well ok i have news to really tell you ok look we as gay and lesbians need to surpport anbd fight for the lgbt black gays and lesbians coz theyt are having a tough time in the township being gay in the town ship is not easy .
i met a few lesbaians and gays from town ships they say its really tough being gay there coz they say the African people say its unAfrican to be gay which i dont agree .
i mean why cant people just lieve the black gays and lesbians and us gay and lesbians alone so the striaght people must just stick they dam noses some where else where it belongs.
it just shows you there is still hertersexuals who hate us gays and discriment againist us and kill us now days.
we need to do some thing about it now before it gets to late.
to: ILOveSA. I honestly don’t see the difference between racism and homophobio. Both are born out of an inherent belief that someone else is inferior to you because of what they are, and acting on this belief.
The reason for trying to include gay rights as basic human rights is to stop this discrimination. And by this I don’t mean extending marriage right, but just very basic shit like not killing someone because they are gay.
This is ridiculous, I am losing my cool more and more as I write this. Think a little.