Why Kenya is NOT ready for the gay community
Is Kenya ready to embrace the gay community?
Forgetting for a minute the revealing albeit questionable survey that hugged the Standard Front Page yesterday, what do people think about this issue?
For starters, the widespread belief is that homosexuals are not genetically predisposed as such, but rather make conscious lifestyle choices. The jury is still out in this regard. Rather than pretend or lie or even worse, adopt an indifferent opinion, I am of the opinion that until they isolate the gene responsible, homosexuality IS a lifestyle choice.
But the question I posed was: Is Kenya ready?
I propose that we need not worry about the genesis of homosexuality to answer a very definitive “no.” Why?
What if we consider one's sexual orientation as a moral norm?
A norm becomes stable in a society when the benefits associated with subscribing to the norm outweigh the costs. I believe we have not reached this juncture. The costs (stigma, ridicule, physical punishment, workplace discrimination, etc) far outweigh any benefits a gay Kenyan might think of. Furthermore, I think that the delicate interplay between the attendant costs and benefits is evolutionary in nature. I believe that it is harmful in the long run to attempt to accelerate the process. Obviously in Kenya, we are headed towards, rather than away from tolerating gay people. The tipping point might come, but not as soon as some of us would wish.
We had a lengthy debate about this issue on another forum and one member posed this scenario:
“How much should society permit? Sooner or later, polyandrist leaning individuals, persons of group sex orientation etc will come out of the closet advocating for their rights.Society is organic and whereas at any one given time it has its limits of tolerance, it, beyond the ebb and flow, always finds a way of steering towards where the best interests of all lie.”
And now I ask all of you, If you all agree that citizens cede authority to a central government so that the “most good” (i.e the interests of the majority) is done, then why do we seem to have a problem submitting to a norm that has withstood the test of time – one that society holds stable for whatever reasons – but surely for the best interests of society?
As for my personal feelings, I would be flat out lying if I said it was a simple matter to reconcile inwards. Nay, all I would hope for is that in the final analysis, I should be found tolerant, devoid of the blemish of prejudice.
posted by jm at 9:58 AM
7 Comments:
Gay or straight...why do we waste so much time talking about petty issues like these? We are all in charge of our bodies and whatever path we choose to follow be it gay or straight does not make us less human. Refusing to accept the gay community in Kenya is not going to stop change a gay person being gay. They are there and Kenyans should learn to live with each other regardless their sexuality.
@Anonymous
Whoa! Whoa! slow down
It was just an opinion.
@Mwangi
This issue is increasingly becoming sensitive!!Bt I say we are not ready.......
@ Klara: We are discussing it in another forum with some of my high school mates and some comments there are just pure vitriol ... we REALLY are not ready
Democratic governments exist to protect the public interest, not to enforce a moral code. In that case, it should not matter whether homosexuality is a choice or a genetic disposition. The question should be: does the consensual sexual act of two adults injure the public interest? I fail to see how it could. As the Swahili say, pilipili usiyoila yakuwashia nini?
Gathara:
Even though the government is not charged with enforcing moral codes, it often has to step in to prevent the “tyranny of the majority.” Thus, in a way, moral issues are entangled within the concept of “public interest”
Majority of society thinks, for whatever reason, that sex between two males, for example, is a bad thing. Certain members of society are likely to react in unpredictable manners, to “punish” those who are perceived to be going against the moral code, or should I say, the norm. Again we go back to our interesting exchange on the evolution of norms …
In the absence of government, is it fair to say that parallel norms cannot exist? In this case, if it were entirely up to society to decide, it would purge itself of homosexuals?
Here, then it matters whether homosexuality is a choice. If so, humans, being rational, would see that the payoffs to being gay are hugely outweighed by the costs ….
The role of the government in this case, is to protect the interests of the minority. Its role is to violate norms. But since norms are naturally evolving, artificial attempts to alter the said norms are inevitably met with commensurate resistance as the nature seeks to return to steady state …
The preamble to the US Constitution states in part that: We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights...That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men.
Democratic governments exist, at least in part, to secure the rights of the governed. These "rights", being God-given and inalienable, are not subject to societal whims or norms -the tyranny of the majority to which you refer.
Norms within society can exist absent a government. However, they could not be enforced since governments are the agents of the collective will. And that is the difference between norms and laws. While the former suggest a voluntary acquiescence, compliance with the latter is mandatory. Norms may evolve into laws and vice versa (consider the case of the "queueing law" in Britain: if memory serves right, there was a call to remove the law from the books as the practice had now become an accepted social norm). A government though always deals in the latter.
In that case, it then matters little whether homosexuality is by choice or birth. The government is duty-bound to protect the right, if it so deemed, at the expense of the norm if necessary.
Good words.
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