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"A Jihad For Love" at Toronto Film Festival As we reported a while back, documentary about Islam and homosexuality is in the lineup at the Toronto International Film Festival. A Jihad For Love, documents the plight of gay and lesbian Muslims battling racial profiling and harassment post 9/11.
"We are presenting Islam's most unlikely storytellers," Sharma said of his debut feature, which does not yet have North American distribution. Sharma told Reuters that his documentary puts a focus on Islam distinct from the dominant perspectives of the Western media and "violent extremists."
Curious to know more about Sharma and his documentary? Check out this audio interview: Submitted by on Thu, 2007-09-13 13:12. |
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A documentary worth
making and seeing, unfortunately prior commitments will prevent me from seeing it at the Toronto International Film Festival. In the gay community we have a tendency to get wrapped up in our quest for greater equality and often forget about how difficult it is for GLBT in other cultures. In the early 90's I had the honour of helping an Iranian man out of a very bad mental space he was in (I was working on a gay counselling & information line at the time). He was visiting his family and they were pressuring him to do what their culture expected (get married have kids etc.). He was going crazy! After I got him calmed down and gave him some references on who to talk to (and after my blood pressure got back to normal) I thought about how lucky I was to live in a society that, for all its' faults, at least gave gays some opportunity to live their lives.
Cheers
JBE
Gay Issues Foremost Concern
Parvez Sharma is not doing any gay person favors with that title. Jihad? Why don’t we save the haters time and make up hateful things about gay people for them?
You are not going to see mein kampf in the title of any gay movie even though it means “my struggle.” Some things should be left alone. If someone wants to take back the original meaning of jihad or mein kampf then let it be a straight person. Gay people have too much to deal with to be messing around with words that have nothing to do with us. Gay people were the least wanted neighbor in all western countries conducted in this survey. So much so that the researchers concluded "Homophobia is, by far, the main source of bigotry in most Western countries." This is just one of many problems facing gay people.
I do not support people propping up religion. Religion is dangerous. It’s divisive. People are killed in the name of “god.” Which was the working title for this film “In the Name of Allah.” The killings, the prejudice, the segregation, the rituals, the sacrifice is all for nothing.
Check out these books and organizations.
The God Delusion
God is Not Great
Gay and Lesbian Humanists
Atheist Alliance
I am a Secular Humanist
by instinct and upbringing (I used to fall asleep in church), so I certainly can relate to your distrust of religion especially when it comes to gays. However, I am willing to cut this guy some slack with his use of the word jihad. The fact that a Moslem gay man is making a documentary about gays in his religion is a step in the right direction. Islam is a very insular and conservative religion, and does not take kindly to anyone who does not conform. It must have taken a lot of courage to make this film. It gives me hope for the future of GLBT people in the world.
Cheers
JBE