As most students gear up for the final week of work before finals, a decent crowd ventured into the cold to hear a panel discussion on LBGT human rights in sub-Saharan Africa.
The panel, sponsored by the Queer Straight Alliance, Pangea, the LGBT Center and the Institute for Global Leadership, featured a short video documentary before two speakers from Amnesty International shared their thoughts and information.
"These gays and lesbians live behind closed doors," event organizer junior Michael Eddy said before the video. "They live in fear."
After the video, which showed the brief stories of people's experiences living in Uganda, Namibia and Kenya, Michael Heflin spoke about the mission of Amnesty International (AI).
Heflin, who has headed up the OUT Front division of AI for six years, said the group primarily focuses on the worst human right violations around the world. OUT Front's aim is specifically aimed to address LGBT violations.
"It is difficult, and you don't want to generalize, but we know that LGBT people feel hatred and violence and abuse around the world today," he said. "In some cases they are killed by their own government."
He noted that about 40 percent of the world's nations criminalize homosexuality or homosexual act in some way.
The United States only very recently abolished its sodomy laws with the 2003 Lawrence V. Texas Supreme Court case.
Some 80 countries around the world criminalize homosexuality, he said. "In many countries the laws were imposed or inherited by colonialism, and they still exist today," Heflin said.
"Despite significant barriers, there is much progress that is being made, and many countries have come a long way," he said. He cited South Africa as the first nation in the world, in 2004, to afford equal rights to LGBT citizens in its constitution.
"It is quite historically significant that this happened in post-apartheid South Africa," he said.
He then compared the progress made in European nations and Canada in granting equal rights under the law. "A lot of progress has been made here in the United States," he said. "But our country is not one of the places we cite as making significant progress, since the United States is behind many European nations."
Heflin then went on to describe the discrimination and prosecution gays face in many African countries. Homosexuals can receive a life sentence in Uganda and, under Shariah law, the death penalty in some parts of Nigeria.
The second speaker was Msia Clark, the Uganda specialist for AI and a professor at Howard University.
"In Uganda one can be sentenced for a lifetime just for being gay; that's it," Clark said. While she noted that in actuality few cases actually make it to court, she explained that the very existence of the laws can be seen as "a threat and a violation of human rights."
She explained the prevalent mentality in Eastern Africa, condemning homosexuality as an imported evil. "They blame it on the Arabs, even though research shows there were homosexuals there before the Arabs got there," she said.
"The spread [of homosexuality] is blamed on westerners, as they came and said it was O.K.," she said. "Being homosexual is considered not African. You can't be African and be gay, the thought is."
Part of the difficulty for activists and human rights advocates, she explained, is that Africa is generally sexually conservative, and talking about sexual issues at all is a challenge.
She offered examples of people being taken from their homes in Uganda for questioning, a radio station that was fined for having gay talk show guests, and a newspaper that alleged the sexual orientation of eight men.
"It is a difficult fight because people can't talk about it because being gay is illegal," she said.
Clark said she thinks students are the best outlet for social activism. "Students are the best types of activists because they have more free time and fewer responsibilities," she said. "Students are the backbone of any activist organization."
"Hearing about the abuses that go on, I realized the rights that I have and how lucky I am to be at Tufts," senior Preston Dickey said after the discussion.
Senior Alex Kelston agreed. "With the amount of prejudice and hatred abroad it seems impossible to overcome," Kelston said. "Then you realize that it was once like that here, and it was overcome."
According to Eddy, the goal was to educate people about the situation abroad. "I was hoping to open up an issue that people don't think about," he told the Daily. "Gays living abroad face different challenges than those living here at home."
Freshman Sabina Carlson, who also organized the event, agreed. "We want to make this issue visible because it has been an invisible issue.
"We are all human beings, and we all deserve our human rights."
