Well, this is terrifying. The government in Iran has begun forcing gay men to undergo sex reassignment surgery or risk being executed in an effort to cleanse the country of all homosexuality.
Being transgender became legal in Iran in 1987. Homosexuality, however, remains punishable by death. In an interview with the Sun, activist Shadi Amin explains that the Iranian government considers homosexuality a disease. Often, the “treatment” prescribed for the disease is changing a person’s sex.
“The government believes that if you are a gay man your soul is that of a woman and you should change your body.” Amin, who fled the country in 1983, explains. “They think this is a way to fight the existence of homosexual people because you change their body and you solve the problem.”
According to Amin, the government have been giving gay men a choice: have the surgery or face torture and execution.
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She says that many men “would rather carry out mass surgeries than executions because they know the world is watching them.”
Human rights activist Peter Tatchell adds, “The ayatollah’s are seeking to eliminate homosexuality by pressuring or forcing gay men to undergo gender reassignment surgery to make them ‘women’.”
“Some gay men agree to become trans women to protect themselves from prosecution and execution when they have sex with men. They don’t want to be trans but fear being hanged if they don’t transition.”
According to the Iranian government, over 4,000 sex reassignment surgeries are conducted in the country every year, with most being paid for by the government. Iran carries out more sex reassignment surgeries than any other nation in the world, second only to Thailand.
Amin believes the number is actually much higher than 4,000, claiming she spoke to one doctor who told her they performed between 30 to 40 surgeries a month, sometimes as many as three per day.
“This shows that it’s big business for some doctors and many of them are not even specialists for trans people,” Amin says. “Many of them are cosmetic surgeons.”
Amin adds that, after paying for their surgeries, the government cuts off any additional support for trans people. As a result, many are shunned by their communities and are forced into doing sex work, where they often being targets for sexual violence and rape.
“There is nothing which criminalizes attacks against trans people. After the surgery, they have no rights anymore. There is no physiological support after the surgery.”
Tatchell adds, “Iran’s policy of encouraging gender reassignment has nothing to do with supporting trans people. It is motivated by a desire to eradicate homosexuality and enforce traditional male and female gender norms.”
It is believed Iran has executed between 4,000 and 6,000 gay men since 1979, though the actual number is not known.
eeebee333
The Sun is a tabloid and Shadi Amin is a political exile who hasn’t lived in Iran since the early 1980s. This story should not be accepted as a fact based only those sources.
SteveM
Whether this story is true or not, it is a fact that Iran and almost all other Muslim nations actively persecute gay men and lesbians. I have nothing but contempt for the government in Muslim countries and I would urge all gay men and lesbians in those places to get out, if they can, and seek refuge in one of the EU countries, Canada, Australia or New Zealand (not the US, which under Trump would likely not accept them anyway). The governments of Muslim nations should be treated with no respect – in fact, I have far more respect for the Mafia.
Smith David
I was gonna say…… This can’t be a real story.
boymikefl
Sounds like the Coronavirus is punishing their country. When Impeach?leaves, I hope we can help our people.
SteveM
If so, Iran deserves God’s wrath more than almost any other country.
Hussain-TheCanadian
So Shadi is saying that 48000 (minimum) Iranian gay men are being turned to women by their government??
I find that hard to believe, my Farsi sucks, but I do follow Iranian social media and currently they (Iranians) are ripping the Iranian government a new one over their handling of the coronavirus outbreak.
If the forced sex change operations are happening at the magnitude claimed in the article, it would of been all over their social media long ago.
frapachino
Thet should be tortured severely for what they are doing to those poor gay men! Those Iranian government officials are evil scum!
Chrisk
Iran still executes men for being gay. One as recently as last year. Plus, who can forget the pics of the two 2 teen boys hanged 5 years ago for being gay.
Then there was Ahmadinejad’s remarks that Iran has no homosexuals.
It is a barbaric country so nothing would surprises me.