Things are getting very, very scary in Nigeria right now. During a session of a Shariah court in northern Nigeria earlier today, thousands of protesters showed up to throw stones:
Thousands of protesters threw stones into the Shariah court in a north Nigerian city Wednesday, urging the speedy convictions and executions of 11 men arrested for belonging to gay organizations.
Security officials fired into the air to disperse protesters in Bauchi city so the accused men could be safely returned to the prison. Judge El-Yakubu Aliyu closed the court abruptly.
“No one can be sentenced to death until confirmed without a reasonable doubt,” Aliyu said in response to calls for the men’s execution.
The court was arraigning seven of 11 accused men on Wednesday. Only three had given testimony when the mayhem began.
When we refer to the anti-gay pogroms that are sweeping the third world, we are not exaggerating. When we connect the dots between the American fundamentalists who are offering these regimes a helping hand, we are dead serious. Anyone who would do anything other than outright condemn what is going on in places like Nigeria, and recognize that this is a vicious cycle of hate that must stop, is a part of the problem.
The article offers more background on the new anti-gay laws in Nigeria, explaining that it’s coming both from the government and from Islamic law:
The Same Sex Marriage Prohibition Act that President Goodluck Jonathan signed on Jan. 7 has resulted in a frenzy of arrests of gays. The law bans all gay associations, with penalties up to 14 years’ imprisonment for marriage.
Bauchi state has both a Western-style penal code and Shariah, or Islamic law, in which sodomy can carry the death sentence with a judge deciding whether it should be done by a public stoning or by lethal injection. Shariah law is implemented to different degrees in nine of Nigeria’s 36 states. About half of the country’s more than 160 million people are Muslims, the other half Christians.
Speaking of American fundamentalists whose irrational hatred for gays prevents them from reacting morally, Matt Barber and Mat Staver sat for a chilling session recently, where they praised nations like Nigeria for passing these laws. They either are ignorant or are outright lying (it’s a coin toss really) when they claim that Nigeria merely banned marriage equality. If they are lying, I do not know how they sleep at night. As Jeremy pointed out, this is a long clip, but it’s worth listening to in its entirety, as it exposes just how vicious these folks really are, and how lucky we are to live in an open secular society that, by its nature, constrains people like Matt Barber and Mat Staver from acting on their deepest beliefs. Jeremy reflects on the clip:
They don’t want us here, folks. Like literally. They don’t want us living here as citizens of our country, openly and free. Period. Undeniably. It’s no longer about rights; it’s about us as people.
The worst bullies are scared bullies, and that’s exactly what these activist groups are now displaying. It’s clearly their last ditch. But let’s be clear: a lot of good people could fall into their ditches before it’s all said and done.
The eliminationist rhetoric has grown as the anti-gay right has lost in the United States. They are indeed scared bullies when dealing with their own country. We are now seeing what happens when they find weaker, poorer, more desperate people to prey on.
Here’s the clip:
