"Gay people will curse our country and we already have curses."
I hate to say it, but Pat Robertson may have been right: Haiti is an island
that is cursed. Cursed with hate. Good old fashioned Christian Right hate, but
hate nonetheless.
PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti -- Two men, assumed to be gay, were beaten and killed on Friday during an anti-gay protest in Haiti led by religious organizations.
According to one
Haitian newspaper, some protestors, who shouted anti-gay marriage slogans
and homophobic slurs, were also armed with knives, sticks, blocks and other
objects, and attacked several people they accused of being gay.
And it took 3
hours for the police to respond to the situation.
Back in January of 2010, Pat Robertson said that Haiti suffered "terrible
things" (and a devastating earthquake) because its leaders had signed a
pact with the devil back in the 18th century. What Pat meant by "terrible
things" was meshed in his addled reasoning, but people took the phrase as
"cursed".
Maybe it is: cursed with ignorance, self-righteousness ... and hate. The below
video is in Haitian-French, but the distorted faces and anger need no
translation. Some of them were reported to shout "We'll kill them. Destroy
them. We don't need that in this country."
The rally was a response to a proposal by a gay rights group to Parliament to
legalize same-sex marriage. It was brought together by Protestant and Muslim
faith-based groups, threatening to burn down parliament if the measure was
considered.
Like Jamaica, Haiti is virulently anti-gay and many people fear for their lives
and cannot report hate crimes for fear of reprisal by their own government.
Enter Francis?
The fact that the one thousand protesters were Protestant (amid some Muslims)
is indicative of American Christian Right influence in Haiti since most
Haitians are Catholic, so whether or not pope Francis I will respond to the
violence may well be moot. Should his ecumenism dictate a response? Probably,
but Francis has yet to reach out to the American Christian Right community
(Evangelicals, Southern Baptists, etc) and he may well think it wise not to
cast aspersions on anyone yet.
The World Mourned But God's Ambulance Chasers Rejoiced
During the chaotic and pestilential aftermath of the earthquake, it was noted
that religious groups attempted to come into the country with more than food
and medical supplies. One group tried to set up automated "talking bibles"
($100,000) broadcasting the word of God among the starving and medically
unkempt. Some of them adamantly stayed on, rejoicing that they had an audience
- however captive it night seem. Despite the obvious criticism, they made
inroads in some areas of the country and, much like Scott Lively (Uganda's
"Kill the gays" bill instigator), they began to sow the seeds of
hostility.
Huffington
Post's Paul Raushenbush:
It started at the Haiti earthquake. Robertson's explanation was that God sent this earthquake because of a "pact with the devil" the Haitians had made to throw off the oppression of the French. Robertson reminded us that our patience with religious leaders who talk such nonsense has run out.
Unfortunately, some in Haiti have been more patient than the rest of the western
hemisphere: they've accepted the Christian Right's focus on hatred and
superstition, self-righteousness and bigotry. How long this will last in the
impoverished country, few have any idea: look at Uganda, Rwanda, Nigeria,
Moldava, and Russia.
Love has a long, long way to go in these countries.
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