Archeologists have found evidence of homosexuality from as far back as the Paleolithic era. And almost ever since then, homosexuals have fought for equal rights alongside straight couples. Now, in twenty-first-century America, the next stage of the battle for equality is the legalization of gay marriage. At the same time that we support the ability of homosexuals to enjoy the dignity and freedom of marriage, however, we must remember that the LGBTI (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and intersex) community in other countries is far behind us in terms of their having basic human rights.

Africa: Behind the Mask
Same-sex sexual activity is illegal in most African countries, according to the International Lesbian and Gay Association, and in some areas, the penalty for homosexuality is death. Interestingly, there are African countries―Ghana, Sierra Leone, Kenya, Nigeria, and Malawi, for example―where male homosexuality is illegal but female homosexuality is not.

In Uganda, where all homosexuality is illegal and gays are banned from participating in every aspect of public life (when they’re not in prison or executed), a newspaper printed a list of the country’s “top” homosexuals, along with their names and addresses, and urged readers to “hang them.” In the days since the story ran in mid-October 2010, at least four gay Ugandans on the list have been attacked and others are in hiding. One person named on the list had stones thrown at his house by his neighbor.

Details of this story come from Behind the Mask (BTM), an organization that works to provide a voice for the African LGBTI community. BTM uses journalistic activism to spread awareness of issues pertaining to homosexuals in Africa and to break down the walls of silence and prejudice that allow this kind of discrimination to continue.

Gays in Iraq: The Real Terror
CNN reports on the story of Kamal, who was just sixteen in 2005 when gunmen kidnapped him from the streets of Baghdad, threw him in the trunk of a car, and brought him to a house. The kidnappers realized that Kamal was gay when they took his shirt off and saw that his chest was shaved.

“They told me to take off my clothes to rape me or they would kill me immediately,” Kamal told CNN reporters through tears. “This moment was the worst moment in my life.

“The other two kidnappers took off my clothes by force,” Kamal continued, “and, at that time, I saw them as three dirty animals trying to tear my body apart.”

The men held Kamal for fifteen days, releasing him only after his family paid them a $1,500 ransom. He was raped every day he was in captivity.

CNN did not print Kamal’s last name to protect his life and that of his family, who do not know he is gay. Since the fall of Saddam Hussein in 2003 and the toppling of a secular government, the situation for gays in Iraq has become far more brutal. Though officially homosexuality has been decriminalized in Iraq, Sharia, the Islamic law that governs day-to-day life in the country, condemns same-sex relations and calls for death or torture if a man comes out as gay. Lesbians are also victims of harassment and violence, but not as often and to the degree that gay men are. The British newspaper the Guardian has likened the persecution of homosexuals in Iraq to a “pogrom.”

The most active LGBTI-rights organization that focuses on abuses in Iraq is the London-based Iraqi-LGBT, which uses financial aid and an underground railroad of benefactors to transfer endangered members of the LGBTI community in Iraq to safe locations outside the country. The organization also publishes news about developments within the Iraqi LGBTI cause on its website.

Living in the Caribbean Is No Vacation
Thousands of gay couples from the United States and Western Europe vacation in the Caribbean each year, but for homosexuals who actually live on the islands, being gay is no vacation. Jamaica, where same-sex relations among males is illegal, is particularly hostile to the LGBTI community. Change.org reports that in January 2008, a group of friends who were eating dinner together at a house in Mandeville, Jamaica, were ambushed by a mob of fifteen to twenty people wielding machetes and shouting anti-gay slurs. The mob then brutally assaulted the dinner party, cutting off one victim’s ear.

Experts cite religious beliefs and a homophobic reggae culture as the reasons why Jamaica has assumed the role of poster child for homophobia in the Caribbean.

Public health officials, like Sir George Alleyne, the UN’s special envoy of the secretary-general for HIV/AIDS in the Caribbean region, emphasize the connection between homophobia and the spread of HIV/AIDS. “There is rampant homophobia in the Caribbean,” says Alleyne. “A lot of it has its origins in the concept that HIV/AIDS was a disease of homosexual males, which of course, it is not.” The UN’s World Health Organization estimates that between 250,000 and 500,000 people have HIV/AIDS in the region, a number that could be reduced if its stigma as a “gay disease” was removed.

Organizations working to increase tolerance of homosexuality in Jamaica and the Caribbean are the Jamaica Forum for Lesbians, All-Sexuals and Gays (J-Flag) and the International Lesbian and Gay Association (Latin America & Caribbean Branch). Both aim to foster equal rights and safety for LGBTI Caribbean communities.

Adam Lambert: Too Gay for Malaysia
Asia as a whole is pretty tolerant of homosexuality, at least in terms of its having laws that support the rights of men and women to be gay. But there are pockets where homosexuality carries the harshest penalties, especially in countries with predominantly Islamic populations. In Malaysia, for example, gay men and women face a prison sentence of up to twenty years or whippings if they’re found guilty of same-sex sexual activity. A 1994 law prevents homosexuals from appearing in state-controlled media, according to LGBT Asylum News.

Recently, anti-gay sentiment in Malaysia was responsible for the effort to keep openly gay American Idol veteran Adam Lambert from performing in the country. The Pan Malaysian Islamic Party (PAS), the country’s Islamist opposition party, demanded that authorities cancel Lambert’s show because his performances “promote gay culture.”

“Adam Lambert’s shows … are outrageous, with lewd dancing and a gay performance that includes kissing male dancers … this is not good for people in our country,” said PAS youth leader Nasrudin Hasan.

Though PAS did not successfully stop Lambert from performing in Malaysia, the singer did “make a few minor adjustments” to his show “out of respect for the Malaysian government.”

While this show of intolerance made for a good public relations spectacle, it points to darker abuses against LGBTI rights in the country. The organization Tilted World, A Malaysian LGBT Community Project promotes the message that “nothing in the world is 100 percent straight,” and encourages people to be “the spark that ignites the passion in every Malaysian to fight the fight against apathy, indifference, prejudice, and discrimination [toward] LGBTI individuals as well as for tolerance, acceptance, respect and appreciation for the rights of all individuals regardless of sex, gender, and sexual orientation in the pursuit of life, liberty, and happiness.”

Europeans Are So Tolerant, Right?
Yes and no. As a whole, European nations are far beyond other areas of the world when it comes to the legalization of same-sex relations and even gay marriages and adoptions. But in countries with long histories, traditional ideas about love and marriage remain alongside more progressive laws.

For example, the United Kingdom and France do not recognize same-sex marriages, while Austria, Germany, Poland, Switzerland, Russia, Greece, and Italy (to name a few) recognize neither same-sex marriage or adoption by same-sex couples.

Even in Europe, prejudices remain. To fight them, organizations, like the International Lesbian and Gay Association of Europe, litigate for LGBTI plaintiffs in discrimination cases throughout Europe, fight to strengthen the LGBTI community in the region, and push for more LGBTI rights across the continent.

An International Issue
A gay couple can walk down the street hand-in-hand in New York City or San Francisco. But the fact that the same couple would be stoned, tortured, beaten, raped, and even murdered in other places around the world is shocking and reprehensible. The LGBTI community continues to fight for tolerance in the United States and make great strides toward securing equality with heterosexuals. But none of us―straight or gay―should forget the countries where having a shaved chest or eating dinner with friends is justification for abuse and murder.