JAMAICA HATES YOU

News, Travel by HOMOVISION on October 5, 2009 at 8:35 am

John Terry

A twenty three year old man has been arrested over the murder of UK diplomat John Terry, whose body was found in his Jamaican home. What the BBC fail to mention in their feature is that Terry’s body was found partly clothed, he’d been beaten around the head and a handwritten note on the bed described him as a “batty man”, and added “This is what will happen to ALL gays”.

In response to Terry’s murder there’s a great article printed in September’s Independent about homophobia in Jamaica.

The paper reports that, in the last 18 months, at least 33 incidents of mob violence against homosexuals have been recorded, including an attack in Montego Bay where three supposedly gay men attending a carnival were chased in the street – one of them beaten with a manhole cover. Elsewhere, mobs have gathered outside a gay man’s funeral and chased another man to his death off a pier.

Interviews with Jamaican gays include stories of how local church ministers condemn gays as the devil, how police often stand aside while gay men get beaten up, and how gangs shoot gays in the street as rites of passage.

Many critics also state that some lyrics of reggae singers glorify such violence: Buju Banton boasts of shooting gays and burning them with acid, while Elephant Man sings how lesbians should be raped.

Meanwhile The Black Music Council, a UK-based group set up to defend such singers, has accused gay rights campaigners of censorship and racism.

Commenting on this, Human Rights campaigner Peter Tatchell adds: “Some of their most popular hit tunes urge listeners to shoot, burn, stab, hang and drown queers. These songs are incitement to murder, which is a criminal offence under Jamaican law. But the government and police refuse to prosecute the singers.”

Additionally, Tatchell describes how successive Jamaican Prime Ministers have failed to challenge homophobic violence. “The Police Commissioner has done nowhere near enough to crack down on the violence. The killers of gays usually get away with murder.”

“The homophobic lynch mob mentality is worse in Jamaica than in Saudi Arabia or Iran. It’s time British and EU aid was made contingent on Jamaica repealing its anti-gay laws and protecting its citizens against homophobic violence.”