To Sustain an LGBTQ Affirming Islamic Discourse, Lateral Violence Must End
By Junaid Jahangir,
New Age Islam
2 October
2020
Lateral
violence is a term used to describe how people without much power deflect their
discontent towards one another instead of tackling the issue by facing those
with power, the ones responsible for oppression in the first place. Such
violence arises from a sense of powerlessness and the frustration of not being
able to do much. This behaviour perpetuates the status quo as infighting only
strengthens the position of the oppressor.
Such
behaviour is quite pronounced within the LGBTQ community and this includes
LGBTQ Muslims. The reason is simple for many queer people experience
frustration and anger at unresolved issues pertaining to self-acceptance,
affirmation by family and community and the inability to forge lifelong sincere
relationships. All of this informs toxic attitudes that shape a culture of
shrieking, which is reflected when queer people start attacking the very people
who have contributed most to alleviating their plight.
Also Read: Why Gay Muslims Are Upheld To Standards That Not Even
Prophets Fulfil?
Consider
Imam Daayiee Abdullah, the first openly gay Imam in North America and perhaps
the world. He has been involved in gay rights activism since the 1970s. The
fact that he has had to endure abuse as a black man and as a gay Imam and that
he still continues to bear a warm, compassionate disposition is a testament to
his inner strength, character and integrity. However, apart from the usual
suspects – white supremacist Islamophobes and conservative Muslim homophobes –
he has been scathingly targeted by closeted Muslims.
I recall a
time when these Muslims who rejected the labels of “ex-gay” and defined
themselves as struggling with same-sex desires, would engage in Gheebah (backbiting) by targeting him
specifically on the website “Eye on Gay Muslims.” It was a space where instead
of working on their inner insecurities and unaddressed traumas, they would
obsessively attack pioneering gay Muslim scholars, thinkers and Imams.
The
experience of Scott Kugle, the first Muslim academic, to broach the issue of
affirming gay Muslims in Islam, is no different. Ever since he offered his
pioneering scholarship, apart from the usual suspects, conservative Muslims who
called for banning his books on Sufism, closeted Muslims and other LGBTQ
critics also opposed him for one issue or another. It seems many such LGBTQ
critics end up defining themselves in opposition to Kugle’s work than by
crafting their own independent body of work.
I am now
beginning to notice the same with my own body of work. While the scholarship I
have crafted with Dr. Hussein Abdullatif is cutting edge and pushes boundaries
in Muslim communities across the globe, it is making some closeted folks
uncomfortable enough to lash out.
Imam Daayiee eloquently states:
“Many want others to give them the answer, to
provide a template so that they have a "perfect" result from their
family, friends, and others they are so overwhelmingly concerned with. They
refuse to learn the facts, and are afraid of building their own voice, ... When
they refuse to face the truth of their own selves and their need to be truthful
before the world, they do not step outside the cage's open door -- and they
remain in the covered cage, and the song the caged bird sings is one of woe.”
Many
closeted Muslims and other LGBTQ Muslims address their sexuality in very
unhealthy ways. Some outrightly state they have no interest in an LGBTQ
affirming Islam and wish to perpetuate a model where LGBTQ Muslims are shown
pity as sinners. It’s as if they feel they are not worthy of affirmation to
live as responsible Muslim citizens and only seek toleration for their secret
affairs. Similarly, others find the strictures of a legal contract that
regulates sexual conduct as suffocating and downplay LGBTQ affirming Islamic
scholarship.
It is
therefore not surprising that there are not many who lead the discourse in
LGBTQ affirming Islamic scholarship and that much of the activism is led in a
public secular setting through social justice activism. While this can possibly
lead to toleration of LGBTQ Muslims, it does not lead to affirmation
specifically in Muslim spaces where Islamic law is of paramount significance.
It is
unfortunate that Muslim men who view their lives as a struggle against same-sex
desires become the most vociferous critics of LGBTQ affirming scholarship in
Islam. They perhaps see it as a purification ritual that helps cleanse
themselves from their own private affairs consumed by alcohol, drugs and random
sex hookups. Sometimes they mask their behaviour with the language of radical
activism or turn to it as a mechanism to cope with their inner issues and
hurts.
It is true
that they have been hurt by religion to such an extent that either they don’t
want anything to do with it or merely exist with a deep-rooted internalized
homophobia that is perpetuated with the heritage of homophobic texts.
Such a
behaviour of course is not unique to Muslims and is found amongst closeted
homosexuals of various religions and ideological affiliations. Regardless, such
judgmental attitudes never emerge from a place of piety but from a place of
deep-rooted insecurities and unresolved issues and it is time that they are
called out as such.
The future
lies with the narrative of an affirming Islam, for as Karen Armstrong writes,
“human beings cannot endure emptiness and desolation.” They will always look
for something to fill the vacuum within. Loud in your face exaggerated activism
has its place but it is not sustainable for finding inner peace. Therefore, to
this end of sustaining an affirming Islamic discourse, lateral violence must end.
------
Junaid
Jahangir is an Assistant Professor of Economics at MacEwan University. He is
the co-author of Islamic Law and Muslim Same-Sex Unions. With Dr. Hussein
Abdullatif, a paediatric endocrinologist in Alabama, he has co-authored several
academic papers on the issue of same-sex unions in Islam. He contributed this
article to NewAgeIslam.com.
URL: https://newageislam.com/islamic-ideology/to-sustain-lgbtq-affirming-islamic/d/123021
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