Paige Kollock, November 9, 2010
A Lebanese woman shouts slogans as she takes part in a demonstration to demand full nationality rights for women in May 2009. The protest is part of a campaign by Lebanese women married to foreign men to demand citizenship rights for their children. (AFP Photo/Ramzi Haidar)
“One Day One Struggle” (ODOS) is an international campaign taking place in 12 countries across the Middle East, North Africa, South and Southeast Asia to promote sexual and bodily rights in Muslim societies and across the Arab world. The campaign is drawing attention to issues like sexual education, sexual health and LGBTTQ (Lesbian Gay Bisexual Transsexual Transgender Queer) rights, all of which activists say are lacking in Lebanon.
“Clearly there is a big silence regarding sexuality,” said Chantal Partamian, a spokesperson for the Lebanese women’s group Nasawiya, which is leading the campaign.
“If you go to a gynecologist, all you can see are brochures about fertility,” she said. “It’s like a single or unmarried woman’s life does not include sexual activity…. There is this vague idea that AIDS and sexually transmitted diseases are only for one part of the population (homosexuals), which is a complete misconception,” she said.
Almost 50 human rights organizations are participating in the event, which is composed of an online media blitz as well as workshops, film screenings, theater performances and photo exhibitions in Bangladesh, Egypt, Ghana, Indonesia, Iran, Lebanon, Malaysia, Pakistan, the Palestinian Territories, Sudan, Tunisia and Turkey.
Sexual rights can be as basic as bodily rights, which include the right to “express your body in whatever way you want…what you wear, dancing, running or even choosing the cut and color of your hair,” says Hiba Abbani, co-coordinator at the Lebanese LGBT group Helem.
Activists say sexual rights are under attack in Muslim societies because of a rising religious conservatism, one that uses sexuality as a tool of oppression.
“Religion is misused as a powerful instrument of control and sexual oppression with the goal of legitimizing human rights violations in the domain of sexuality,” according to the ODOS press release.
Specific incidents include the case of Sakineh Ashtiani, the Iranian woman recently sentenced to death by stoning, and the killing of hundreds of women and transsexuals in Turkey under the pretext of honor and morality. But it’s not just Muslim societies. “It’s all of society,” Partamian said.
One problem in Lebanon is that schools don’t educate children when it comes to sex and sexuality.
“Most of the schools concentrate on a very limited education, which is focused on reproduction and periods,” Partamian said. “Sexual reproduction is only talked about in the context of biology and the animal kingdom, but there is nothing about sexual health or prevention…which is a problem because people grow up with a lot of misconceptions, and there’s a tendency to try to get all that information from different sources, which sometimes give bad information.”
The law is another setback. For example, article 534 of the Lebanese penal code, which prohibits “intercourse against nature” and is basically used to prosecute homosexuals, is punishable by up to one year of prison, helping to fuel homophobia in a society where it is already rampant.
“If your neighbor says you’re a homosexual, it’s enough to have the police come and drag you to the police station,” Abbani said.
Outside of Lebanon, the problems of sexual discrimination persist.
In Turkey, Selma Aliye Kavaf, state minister for families and children, earlier this year made what Sezen Yalcin, who works for the Istanbul-based NGO Women for Women’s Human Rights, called a “catastrophic remark.”
“I believe homosexuality is a biological disorder, a disease,” Kavaf said, according to the Turkish daily Hurriyet. “It needs to be treated.”
Yalcin said hate crimes happen regularly in Turkey, even in the cosmopolitan capital of Istanbul.
“People are killing transsexuals, and sometimes they don’t get any punishment,” she said. “In our penal code, there is protection for those who harass or kill LGBT individuals because the courts consider it ‘unjust provocation’.”
It also applies to the murder of women, said Yalcin. “When men (who murder their wives) say ‘yeah I saw my wife talking to other men in the street’, they get a [reduced] sentence.”
Back in Lebanon, Nasawiya says that discussing sexuality and bodily rights in a more open, liberated way will not only benefit women. Liberating women, the NGO argues, will also help liberate men, who are often cornered by their friends’ and families’ patriarchal views of females even if they don’t necessarily agree.
“Clearly there is a big silence regarding sexuality,” said Chantal Partamian, a spokesperson for the Lebanese women’s group Nasawiya, which is leading the campaign.
“If you go to a gynecologist, all you can see are brochures about fertility,” she said. “It’s like a single or unmarried woman’s life does not include sexual activity…. There is this vague idea that AIDS and sexually transmitted diseases are only for one part of the population (homosexuals), which is a complete misconception,” she said.
Almost 50 human rights organizations are participating in the event, which is composed of an online media blitz as well as workshops, film screenings, theater performances and photo exhibitions in Bangladesh, Egypt, Ghana, Indonesia, Iran, Lebanon, Malaysia, Pakistan, the Palestinian Territories, Sudan, Tunisia and Turkey.
Sexual rights can be as basic as bodily rights, which include the right to “express your body in whatever way you want…what you wear, dancing, running or even choosing the cut and color of your hair,” says Hiba Abbani, co-coordinator at the Lebanese LGBT group Helem.
Activists say sexual rights are under attack in Muslim societies because of a rising religious conservatism, one that uses sexuality as a tool of oppression.
“Religion is misused as a powerful instrument of control and sexual oppression with the goal of legitimizing human rights violations in the domain of sexuality,” according to the ODOS press release.
Specific incidents include the case of Sakineh Ashtiani, the Iranian woman recently sentenced to death by stoning, and the killing of hundreds of women and transsexuals in Turkey under the pretext of honor and morality. But it’s not just Muslim societies. “It’s all of society,” Partamian said.
One problem in Lebanon is that schools don’t educate children when it comes to sex and sexuality.
“Most of the schools concentrate on a very limited education, which is focused on reproduction and periods,” Partamian said. “Sexual reproduction is only talked about in the context of biology and the animal kingdom, but there is nothing about sexual health or prevention…which is a problem because people grow up with a lot of misconceptions, and there’s a tendency to try to get all that information from different sources, which sometimes give bad information.”
The law is another setback. For example, article 534 of the Lebanese penal code, which prohibits “intercourse against nature” and is basically used to prosecute homosexuals, is punishable by up to one year of prison, helping to fuel homophobia in a society where it is already rampant.
“If your neighbor says you’re a homosexual, it’s enough to have the police come and drag you to the police station,” Abbani said.
Outside of Lebanon, the problems of sexual discrimination persist.
In Turkey, Selma Aliye Kavaf, state minister for families and children, earlier this year made what Sezen Yalcin, who works for the Istanbul-based NGO Women for Women’s Human Rights, called a “catastrophic remark.”
“I believe homosexuality is a biological disorder, a disease,” Kavaf said, according to the Turkish daily Hurriyet. “It needs to be treated.”
Yalcin said hate crimes happen regularly in Turkey, even in the cosmopolitan capital of Istanbul.
“People are killing transsexuals, and sometimes they don’t get any punishment,” she said. “In our penal code, there is protection for those who harass or kill LGBT individuals because the courts consider it ‘unjust provocation’.”
It also applies to the murder of women, said Yalcin. “When men (who murder their wives) say ‘yeah I saw my wife talking to other men in the street’, they get a [reduced] sentence.”
Back in Lebanon, Nasawiya says that discussing sexuality and bodily rights in a more open, liberated way will not only benefit women. Liberating women, the NGO argues, will also help liberate men, who are often cornered by their friends’ and families’ patriarchal views of females even if they don’t necessarily agree.
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