LGBT in MENA

Regional Trends &

Rise of Online Activism: Modern Social Movements

Regional Trends

• Happiness Index: Despite the dismal political context, citizens in MENA countries appear remarkably happy. The World Values Survey (2010-2014, V10) illustrates that an average of 23.9% of respondents in the region claim to be “very happy” and an average of 52.9%—a majority —assert they are “rather happy” (compared to 36.1% and 53.5% in the United States, respectively). The level of happiness of a populace is a good indication that citizens do not feel their political situation is hopeless.
• Increased political activity: Citizens in the MENA region are becoming increasingly politically active even under heavily repressive regimes that attempt to violently stifle demonstrations.
• Technology and social media in past mass protests: In 2011 citizens across the MENA mobilized in protests. Events raise questions about what catalyzed unprecedented social mobilization. Many political scientists contend that technological growth, specifically higher levels of internet penetration, the proliferation of smartphones, and increased access to satellite television channels such as Al Jazeera has fostered conditions that allowed the Arab spring to occur (Lust 2013; Lynch 2012; Hussain & Howard 2013). Lust argues that the internet was a key tool for political mobilization.
• Surge in acts of civil disobedience among all types of postmaterialist activists in even the most repressive totalitarian and authoritarian regimes.
• Rise of Postmaterialist values: The World Values Survey (2010-2014) found that a majority of citizens in many MENA states hold mixed 3 material/postmaterialist values, and an average of 5.3% of citizens mostly embrace postmaterialist values.

Character of LGBT movements in MENA differ from their Western counterparts

Due to citizens’ increased access to the internet, advocates for gay rights and other “postmaterialist” causes are able to forge movements that could potentially gain ascendancy in the coming decades now that they have the ability to discreetly mobilize and collude with like-minded citizens to anonymously petition their governments for a redress of grievances. However, even with the presence of new political opportunities, this type of activism in the MENA region runs contrary to our current theoretical understandings of social movements and why they emerge in the first place.

• Gradual Political Liberalization
• Modernization Hypothesis
• Social Blowback Hypothesis
• Resource Mobilization Hypothesis
• Internet Penetration and Freedom Hypothesis

Long Term and Short Term Goals

In the West, LGBTQ activists’ short term goals may be full marriage equality and federal anti-discrimination legislation to protect their community from employment discrimination and/or societal prejudice. Their long-term goals will be broader and encapsulate full legal and societal equality. Conversely, the goals of gay rights activists in the MENA region may ultimately coincide with Western LGBTQ activists, but they fundamentally differ in one important respect: Western activists possess goals that cannot be feasibly achieved by activists in the MENA. A short-term goal for LGBTQ activists in many MENA countries is the amelioration of governmental persecution. In contrast, a common long-term goal is full legal recognition of one’s right to identify as gay, lesbian, bisexual, or transgender and practice homosexuality or express one’s gender identity freely.

Given that the mere act of homosexuality is legally prohibited in most MENA states, decriminalization is a common goal for most gay rights activists in the region MENA activists to adjust their expectations to match short and long-term goals that are actually feasible. One can expect LGBTQ movements in the MENA to have very large win-sets because they will be willing to except any concession from the government in order to improve their social situation even if it is unsatisfactory. MENA governments will forego negotiations altogether as highly disliked and disadvantaged groups do not yet pose a threat to the legitimacy of many authoritarian governments.

Presence, Infleunce and Longevity

Western movements been around much longer. Western activists have prodigious movements that have persisted for decades, and as a result, they have been able to gain considerable ground in many countries and are now in a position to ask for full recognition of their rights. This is not the case for many movements for postmaterialist causes in the MENA, especially when it comes to the issue of gay rights.

Necessity: is there a need for the movement?

Members of the LGBTQ community in the Middle East and North Africa are quite possibly more vulnerable and susceptible to prejudice than anywhere else in the world. They are subjected to two forms of discrimination: state-sponsored legal persecution and societal marginalization. Out of twenty-two MENA states and territories homosexuality is only legal in five; male homosexuality is legally prohibited in sixteen of them.

Options?

LGBTQ activists in MENA have two options: (a) participate in public activism abroad, or (b) engage in domestic activism almost exclusively online.

Expanding definition of social movement to accommodate for changing times and platforms: In the MENA region, gay rights activism occurs almost exclusively through the internet, thus making it seemingly amorphous. However, several types of tactics are easily identifiable and have proven to be quite effective to boot. There is a diverse array of methods employed by online activists, ranging from political declarations via social media, signing of online petitions, coordinated “hashtag” campaigns, and even DDoS attacks on government websites. Though the chief method in which LGBTQ activism occurs in the MENA (via online) is admittedly unorthodox, the dawn of the technological era requires us to update our preconceived notions of what constitutes “activism” or a “social movement” because LGBTQ activism in most MENA states—for the time being—is inextricably linked to the internet.

Nature of Action

• Physical Act: being OUT
• on the streets, hosting parades, festivals
• Electronic engagement
• anonyminity among community, identity revealed in online forums/ groups/ apps

Organziation Size and Stability

• Morocco: More political NGO, which advocates for equal treatment for gay people under the law, is based in Spain (Kif Kif), though run by a Moroccan since 2005. Initiated Morocco’s first gay magazine Mithly (meaning ‘the same as me’). Aswat (meaning Voices) is a well-known collective of individuals who since 2012 have worked together on an ad hoc basis for the rights of LGBTIQ persons in Morocco. One of the goals of Aswat’s activities is to promote a reform of the law which penalises homosexuality and to abolish Act no 489. Aswat operates anonymously according, and has deliberately chosen not to be an officially registered NGO and not to have a formal office out of fear of being persecuted by the authorities. Not being an official NGO, Aswat cannot ask for permission to organise demonstrations or campaigns in the public sphere.
• Algeria: Alouen (2011) is an activist organization that prioritizes social equality and advocates for decriminalization of homosexuality and the repeal of penal codes 333 and 338. Abu Nawas (2007) is more outreach-oriented and provides various resources to members of the gay community such as education on safe-sex practices. Both organizations specialize in political mobilization; Alouen coordinates events while Abu Nawas encourages LGBTQ citizens to vote two prominent online-exclusive LGBTQ magazines.
• Egypt: Bedayaa is a group of Egyptian & Sudanese Queers and home to all LGBTI in the nile valley Area Egypt & Sudan, founded in 2010 the first LGBTI rights organization in the Nile Valley focusing on reporting human rights abuses of LGBTI people. No Hate Egypt (NHE), founded Jan 11, 2016, is an initiative that aims to stop hatred and violence against any minority group. Solidarity with Egypt LGBT is a campaign to reach out to LGBT movements and individuals worldwide about the LGBT issues in Egypt.

Continued

• Jordan: The online magazine My.Kali, named after its founder Khalid Abdel-Hadi, went live eight years ago in English. It began life as a series of diaries documenting Abdel-Hadi's experiences and grew into a grassroots platform for the LGBT community before becoming an online magazine in 2008. Published a joint Arabic-English issue a in May/June 2016. During the summer of 2017, the Jordanian Audiovisual Commission, evidently acting under pressure from MP Tahboub, ordered My.Kali blocked on the grounds that the magazine had not obtained a license for publication. This act of censorship is a demonstration of how the conditions for internet freedom in Jordan have declined over the past five years.
• Lebanon: Helem (first registered LGBT ngo in Arab World, 2004), leads a peaceful struggle for the liberation from all sorts of legal, social and cultural discrimination. Helem’s office is deliberately hard to find. The group has claimed many victories — not least of which has been the battle over language. Arab media often used “degenerates” and other pejorative terms to refer to LGBT people. But after nationwide campaigning, Helem and its partners convinced journalists in Lebanon to use a neutral word, equivalent to the English “homosexual.” They even got the Lebanese Syndicate of Psychiatry to declare that homosexuality is not a mental-health disorder — a claim some TV shows repeated. Support+: HIV and Proud Lebanon was registered as a non-profit civil in May 2014.
• Tunisia: Association Shams registered May 18, 2015; five other Tunisian LGBTIQ groups (Mawjoudine, Damj, Chouf, Kelmty), working with the support of 14 national and international NGOs to meticulously analyze the unconstitutionality of Article 230 under Tunisia 2014 constitution; An online radio station catering for the LGBT community, believed to be the first of its kind in the Arab world (2017); Early in 2018 Mawjoudin film festival kicked off in Tunisia to show films exploring themes of 'sexuality, identity and gender affiliation'. Tunisian Association for the Defence of Individual Liberties (ADLI). Gay rights' groups gained an unprecedented space at the heart of Tunisia's civil society, taking the discussion in public and in the media.
• Iraq: IraQueer is a registered human rights organization focusing on the LGBT+ community in Iraq/Kurdistan region, founded on March 2015 making it the first and only LGBT+ focusing on the LGBT+ community in Iraq/Kurdistan region.