g_b PLEASE SIGN THE PETITION: Appeal to Sonia Gandhi not to meet George Lee Clark
Dear Friends Recent news article have given us the disturbing news that Mrs Sonia Gandhi will be meeting with George Lee Clark, who is a recognized homophobe and revels in preaching hatred against all LGBT persons. Please see the URL below for details: http://www.indiaprwire.com/pressrelease/film/200803218223.htm An online petition appealing to Mrs Gandhi has been started, requesting her not to legitimise the hatred of George Lee Clark by granting him a meeting. The appeal also urges Mrs Gandi to use her office and position as convener of UPA to dissuade the Prime Minister and the Supreme Court Judges from meeting with George Lee Clark. You are requested to sign this online petition by visiting the following URL: http://www.petitiononline.com/SGappeal/petition.html Thank you for your solidarity and support. Best regards to all Aditya Bondyopadhyay
g_b Dark in here..!!!
A woman takes a lover home during the day while her husband is at work. Her 9-year old son comes home unexpectedly , sees them and hides in the bedroom closet to watch. The woman's husband also comes home. She puts her lover in the closet , not realizing that the little boy is in there already. The little boy says , Dark in here. The man says , Yes , it is. Boy - I have a baseball. Man - That's nice. Boy - Want to buy it? Man - No , thanks. Boy - My dad's outside. Man - OK , how much? Boy - $150 Man - Sold. In the next few weeks , it happens again that the boy and the lover are in the closet together. Boy - Dark in here. Man - Yes , it is. Boy - I have a Wilson infielder's glove. The lover , remembering the last time , asks the boy , How much? Boy - $350 Man - Highway robbery. Sold. A few days later , the father says to the boy , Grab your gloves , let's go outside and have a game of catch. The boy says , I can't , I sold my ball and my glove. The father asks , How much did you sell them for? The boy says , $500 The father says , That's terrible to overcharge your friends like that... That is way more than those two things cost. I'm going to take you to church and make you confess your greed. They go to the church and the father makes the little boy sit in the confession booth and he closes the door. The boy says , Dark in here. The priest says , Don't start that shit again , you're in my closet now!
g_b Call for Abstracts: Islam and Sexuality
-- Forwarded message -- From: Kelly Mcdermott [EMAIL PROTECTED] Date: 26 Mar 2008 05:47 Subject: FW: Call for Paper - Islam and Sexuality. Please Circulate. To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Cc: Dédé Oetomo [EMAIL PROTECTED] FYI Kind regards Kelly McDermott Administrator Centre for Islamic Law and Society -- *From:* Sociology_of_Islam Discussion List [mailto: [EMAIL PROTECTED] *On Behalf Of *Yip Andrew *Sent:* Thursday, 20 March 2008 12:05 AM *To:* [EMAIL PROTECTED] *Subject:* Call for Paper - Islam and Sexuality. Please Circulate. *CONTEMPORARY ISLAM: DYNAMICS OF MUSLIM LIFE* *CALL FOR PAPERS* *A SPECIAL ISSUE ON** **ISLAM AND SEXUALITY* *Contemporary Islam** is an exciting and innovative multidisciplinary journal devoted to the exploration of contemporary Muslim lives.** **The journal provides insights into the contemporary dynamics of Muslim life by focusing on questions concerning the presence of Muslim migrants in the West as well as western-born Muslims, and the continuing active role that Islam plays in their lives. The journal also explores the idea of 'the West' among Muslims as well as the relationship between Muslim identities and social life.** **The Journal regards Islam as a modern religion in today's global societies.* *We seek high-quality theoretical and empirical articles of between 8,000 and 10,000 words to be considered for publication in a special issue on Islam and sexuality. We particularly welcome contributions in the following themes:* Ø * **Islamic constructions of human sexuality;* Ø * **Sexuality and sacred texts;* Ø * **The politics of sexuality in Muslim lives;* Ø * **Sexual and bodily practices in Muslim lives;* Ø * **Sexuality and gender in Islam;* Ø * **Sexual ethics in Islam;* Ø * **Heterosexuality and power;* Ø * **Intersection of sexual and religious identity;* Ø * **Non-heterosexualities, particularly homosexuality and bisexuality;* Ø * **Islam and transgenderism;* Ø * **Reproductive rights and gender.* *Please e-mail 150-word abstracts to the guest editor by 14 April 2008. Contributions are to be submitted via e-mail to the guest editor by 16 June 2008. Instructions for manuscript preparation can be found at:* * www.springer.com/journal/11562* http://www.springer.com/journal/11562* *** *Guest editor:*** *Dr. Andrew Kam-Tuck Yip, University of Nottingham, UK.** [EMAIL PROTECTED] * This message has been checked for viruses but the contents of an attachment may still contain software viruses, which could damage your computer system: you are advised to perform your own checks. Email communications with the University of Nottingham may be monitored as permitted by UK legislation.
g_b A Jihad for Love: Can your faith really kill you?
[image: Times Online] http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news A Jihad for Love: Can your faith really kill you? March 27, 2008 http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/film/article3626866.ece A film about gay Muslims will surprise a Western audience[image: Parvez Sharma] Tim Teeman Inevitably, Parvez Sharma filmed some moving testimonies in *A Jihad for Love, *a collection of real-life stories that show what it is like to be gay or lesbian and living within, or in the shadow, of Islam. The stories come from Iran, Turkey, India, Egypt, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Saudi Arabia and South Africa. In one of those quirks of timing, the film will be shown on Sunday at the London Lesbian and Gay Film Festival in the wake of the controversy around the case of Mehdi Ka-zemi, the gay Iranian whose deportation back to Iran was halted recently after an indecent, indeed shaming, amount of prevarication on the part of the Home Office. An Iranian lesbian, Pegah Emambakhsh, is also seeking asylum in this country. But Sharma isn't your typical campaigning film-maker. He shows how tough life can be for his subjects though he believes strongly that gay activists have behaved arrogantly in their condemnation of Iran which is symptomatic of a larger phenomenon of Iran-bashing. He adds: Around 70 per cent of Iran's population is under 30: issues are being talked about, it's a vibrant society. And don't forget history: a long time ago the West looked to the East as a place where homosexuality was tolerated, sometimes celebrated. He doesn't believe that the Iranian authorities are conducting an antigay witch-hunt (this despite the widely distributed pictures of two young, allegedly gay, men who were supposedly executed) and – as his film makes clear – despite the difficulty of their lives, many Islamic gay men and women hold their faith dear. Sharma says this was a very personal film to make: he is a Muslim himself and dislikes the polarisation of discussion of Islam between the Jihadists and the Bush supporters. It makes for difficult viewing, forcing us belief-bare Western liberals to examine why gays would have anything to do with a religionthat rejects them at every turn, and sometimes violently. Sharma filmed in secret in many countries for six years, amassing more than 400 hours of footage. He would put tourist-related material at the beginning and end of each tape so that if Customs took an interest in what he was doing it would find innocuous pretty pictures. He found his subjects through the internet and underground gay or HIV organisations. As a Muslim he could make himself invisible – it would have been much harder, he says, as a white Western film-maker to travel and film as he did. The film shows Imam Muhsin Hendricks, a Muslim man in South Africa publicly speaking out against the homophobia of Islam. We watch the flight of four gay men out of Iran in a desperate attempt to gain asylum. Two are afraid to show their faces. Nearly all have faith which they try, and inevitably fail, to square with their sexual orientation. They feel desperate that they will never see their families again, but know they have to get out. Kazemi's boyfriend was executed for sodomy; another man worries about the fate of his partner. He was my introduction to love, he says. One Egyptian, Mazen, recalls the lashing he received after being apprehended, with more than others, after attending a gay party. One half of a lesbian couple (Maha and Maryam), deeply in love, feels her faith has been compromised by her desire. Two Turkish lesbians, Ferda and Kiymet, go to visit Ferda's mother. Two of the Iranian men are granted asylum in Canada. How can I be free when so many others aren't? one says to his friend, who replies, with steely hope, One day they will all be free. Since filming, the subjects' lives have changed generally for the better, says Sharma, who reveals that three of the Iranians are now safely living in Canada – one has become a gay rights activist. The fourth has been granted asylum but is still waiting to enter the country. Muhsin has been given funding to set up a group for lesbian and gay Muslims. Mazen, living in Paris, is trying to find work in a xenophobic France, says Sharma. It's terribly difficult for me, having got so close to so many of them, not to be able to materially help them. Ferda and Kiymet have broken up. Sharma doesn't believe homosexuality will become acceptable within Islam in his lifetime: It is not top of the agenda, he says. But he hopes gays will make significant advances within Islam and that his film will be used as a tool for debate and also to give visibility to a group often rendered invisible. However, he is also tired of playing politics: as a film-maker he doesn't want to be limited to making gay movies, or having one identity. His next ambition, he says, laughing, is to go to Bollywood and make a Muslim musical. *— **A Jihad for Love* is showing at
g_b Shying away from supporting gays
*Shying away from supporting gays *27 Mar 2008, 0452 hrs IST,Radheshyam Jadhav,TNN Pune http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/Pune/Shying_away_from_supporting_gays/articleshow/2903128.cms Generally, politicians would not miss an opportunity to enter any movement and, if possible, hijack it to gain political mileage. But not this one for sure. Politicians are scurrying for cover with gay activists seeking their support to the movement against 'outdated' Section 377 of the IPC, framed in 1860, which defines homosexuality as a crime. In Pune, gay activists are mustering support at individual and mass level to scrap section 377. Basically, there is need for a political will to scrap the outdated section. We need political support, but they are not responding to our appeal, says software professional Bindumadhav Khire, who is a homosexual and runs Sampathik, an organisation for men's sexual health. Khire says gays are fighting legal battles against section 377. What we need is the support of politicians and common people. We want to approach people and inform that gays are not someone out of the world. We are the same people as you are says Khire. Gays across the nation are joining hands to intensify the agitation against section 377, which says that whoever has carnal intercourse against the order of nature with any man, woman or animal, shall be punished with imprisonment for life or with a term that may extend to 10 years, and shall also be liable to a fine. Pune is witnessing an increasing population of same-sex couples, says Khire, adding, At a time when a large number of countries have legalised gay and lesbian rights, why homosexuality is a crime in India? -- www.gaybombay.in www.gaybombay.info
g_b Here Comes The Bride...... And The Bride
Here Comes The Bride.. And The Bride By: Kavita Chhibber The gray cat dozes contentedly on a bench in the afternoon sun as Arvind Kumar, his head shaded by a floppy blue hat, plucks weeds from his garden. Upstairs in the San Jose home they have shared together for over a decade, Ashok Jethanandani is enjoying his Sunday siesta. It's a scene of cozy, almost Normal Rockwellesque Americana. But in it lie the seeds of a domestic revolution that has caught the attention of everyone, including the White House. Ashok and Arvind are gay. They have the house, the cats, the twin Toyotas, the joint bank account and the Costco shopping card. Now they would like to get married. Ashok Jethanandani and Arvind Kumar just got an email from the city of San Fransisco cancelling their April 30 marriage appointment. On Friday, Feb. 20, Ashok and Arvind rose at 5:30 am and drove an hour to San Francisco to do just that. When they reached City Hall, there were already some 300 couples ahead of them in line. Around noon they realized it was futile. But Ashok has no regrets. It was so festive. So many people were rooting for us. Even the garbage truck went by and honked its support. Though they came home empty handed that day, Ashok, editor of India Currents magazine, found on their doorstep a huge bouquet of flowers and a card from all his co-workers. It was completely unexpected, says Ashok. I hand't really given them any warning. The weekend before when San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom set the nation abuzz by instructing City Hall to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples, Mala Nagarajan and Vega Subramaniam were visiting Mala's sister in San Francisco from Seattle. They watched the excitement but decided not to be a part of it. They had already had their own wedding ceremony at their home in Washington in 2002, what they laughingly call perhaps the first lesbian Hindu wedding in America! Personally I would rather have the state be out of our personal relationship, says Vega. For me the most important thing was to have a ceremony with our loved ones. We were not sure we wanted to take the legal step. But within a month the repercussions from San Francisco had reached Seattle. On March 8, the Northwest Women's Law Center and Lambda Legal Defense Education Fund filed a lawsuit on behalf of six gay and lesbian couples who were denied marriage licenses. One of the couples was Mala and Vega. We wanted to help get the right to choose whether or not to get married. We wanted people to be able to bring their partners over (from another country) and have access to health care benefits, says Mala. A decade ago, few lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender (LGBT) Indians were visible in the United States. though major cities like San Francisco and New York had organizations like Trikone and SALGA. While mainstream gay America was fighting about the right to serve in the military or job discrimination, LGBT South Asians were grappling with issues of coming out and marriage. Now as America wrestles with the idea of same-sex marriage, LGBT desis find their Number One issue is suddenly headline news. Yatin Chawathe married his boyfriend of five years Thomas Zambito III in Seattle this FebruarySamina Ali can relate to this desi preoccupation with marriage. The San Francisco writer entered into an arranged marriage 13 years ago with a man who turned out to be gay. In Western culture, children grow up, leave the home, have lovers, get married or not; in the end, a person's life belongs to him/her, says the author of Madras on Rainy Days. In India, children's lives belong to their parents, to their community. So the idea of a person having the freedom to declare his/her homosexuality and then getting married to a person of the same sex seems almost unbelievable. But that was what happened to Aditya Advani. When he came out his mother suggested running a matrimonial in the Hindustan Times looking for a husband. I think Indians can understand marriage, even same-sex marriage, more easily than singledom, says Aditya, a landscape architect in Berkeley. In 1993 when he took his partner Michael Tarr home to New Delhi, he resisted going to yet another family wedding. No one is ever going to come to my wedding, he complained. His mother thought for a moment and then said, Why not? We could have a ceremony for you and Michael. Swami Bodhananda, the family's spiritual mentor, presided over the ceremony dedicating it to Ayyappa, son of an unusual union between two male gods, Lord Vishnu and Lord Shiva. I couldn't believe my luck, hreflects Aditya. Openly gay and married in my parents' drawing room at the age of thirty. Right on schedule as a good Indian boy should be. Not everyone's mother is quite so understanding. My father and brother were excited because Mala is so likeable, says Vega. But my mother
g_b hi
seeking friendship n more with mature person.if someone interested pls write me [EMAIL PROTECTED] hav a nice day
