In the wake of President Obama’s momentous announcement, one of the most prominent LGBT activists in India has come out with a message of her own: It’s not getting better for gays and lesbians on the South Asian subcontinent.
Anjali Gopalan (right), one of Time magazine’s 100 Most Influential People in the World, tells Reuters that though her government legalized homosexuality in 2009, homophobic attitudes and discrimination are still widespread:
“Just because a law changes, doesn’t mean the way of thinking changes. That’s a slow process and something we have to keep working at. Homophobia is so entrenched I don’t think we realize we’re being homophobic. I’m talking about those of us working with the community too. So you have many NGOs working with the community who show very high levels of homophobia.
In 2001, Gopalan, 54, petitioned India’s government to decriminalize homosexuality, which eventually led to the law being changed almost a decade later. But even the advent of gay Pride parades haven’t changed prevailing attitudes in the country, even among LGBT people themselves. “The sad part is we still get a lot of [gay] men who say ‘Can I get medicine to not feel this way’ which is very heartbreaking,” says Gopalan. “But that’s the reality.”
True acceptance will take time, and maybe more than few obituaries: “It’s parliament which has to do the work,” she says. “And given that the average age of our parliamentarians is 80, I don’t see anything happening in the near future.”
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villa viper
I love it when I see brown love 🙂
Syl
“It may be true that the law cannot change the heart but it can restrain the heartless. It may be true that the law cannot make a man love me but it can keep him from lynching me and I think that is pretty important, also.” -the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
I have hope for India. They are a nation of great thinkers, have our Anglo common law, and are a nation of many diverse peoples who, although not without tension and occasional conflict, have managed to live together as a single nation. With time, I hope, they will come to accept our people; after all, it is largely the result of Islam and Christianity, and western culture in general, that they despise us. As in Africa, they once were more welcoming, and came to hate us only because of Western influences. They can, in time, come to welcome us once more.
villa viper
@Syl: Who and what are you talking about “them accepting”?
RayneVanDunem
@villa viper: He just said “our people”, those who are LGBT.