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Are LGBTI People Discriminating Amongst Themselves? |
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The second annual Shame and Prejudice Dialogue was held recently at the Winchester Mansions in Green Point and formed part of the events leading up to Cape Town Pride.
In her introduction, Liesl Theron, Executive Director of Gender DynamiX, said that while we are always accusing heterosexual or straight people of being prejudiced or discriminatory, is it not also happening in the  LGBTI community? Are we not doing it amongst ourselves about ourselves?
Three panellists spoke from vastly diverse perspectives. Wayne Henry Berger, who spoke through an interpreter, is from Deaf South Africa and the Western Cape branch of Gay, Lesbian and Bisexual Deaf Persons. Sipho Mtakati spoke from the view point of a SOFFA (Significant Other, Friends, Family and Allies) and partner of a transgender person who constantly faces prejudices within the lesbian community. Caroline Bowley, who works at Gender DynamiX, spoke about the challenges she faces as a transgender woman who is also a lesbian.
Having been born in Queenstown, a small town in the Eastern Cape, and raised in Belhar in the Western Cape, Sipho is a black woman brought up in a coloured community. She said being prejudged as a human being does not start with your sexuality. In her case she was “too black to be coloured and too coloured to be black”. At a young age she learnt to be an individual and that was how she learnt to overcome most of the obstacles she encountered. “I was taught to be an individual so my sexual orientation never affected me in such a way that I had to ‘come out’, she said.
It was only in the workplace that her sexuality seemed to be a problem, so much so that she left the company. “After that I dedicated my life to serving the LGBTI community. I dedicated my life to doing more research about myself. I’ve been visible in lesbian circles. I’ve been there as an individual who feels we need to be there for each other,” she said.
She added that she experienced a sense of belonging within LGBTI circles until she met and fell in love with a transgender person and experienced total rejection from the LGB community. “Do I really need to belong to a certain group of people to fall in love? Are we falling in love with a gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender or are we falling in love with a human being?”
Wayne highlighted the difficulties the deaf LGBTI community faces and called on the hearing community to accept and understand that being deaf does not mean being stupid. He explained that there has always been the difficulty of incorporating the deaf and that is why they joined Triangle Project three years ago. However, they need the services of an interpreter and have to ensure that the interpreter has a strong code of ethics and confidentiality when the many psychological problems of deaf people are being discussed.
“There are very few deaf people who are out. They are very shy and embarrassed and often there is miscommunication between deaf people and the hearing community,” he said. He added that people often mock deaf people, saying that “our language is like monkey language.” He said it is an ongoing process to continue lobbying for the rights of the deaf.
“And what we’d really like is that the hearing and the deaf would be able to understand each other and that we can unite,” he concluded.
Caroline always felt like a female even though she had been born in a male body. In 1997, when she gained access to the internet, and “finally discovered what was going on”, she started transitioning and in 2005 had genital reassignment surgery.
“I have been living full-time as a woman, which is really exciting for me. I’m really happy now and it’s an amazing feeling to finally be what you always knew you wanted to be or always felt you were,” she said.
But people couldn’t understand that she was not romantically interested in men. “They struggle to understand why I could go through so much rejection and so much pain to be a woman and then be a lesbian.” She would explain to them that Gender identity and sexual orientation are two different things and we must not confuse the two.
So where should she hang out? Where does she find a partner? In the lesbian community, she thought. “But the lesbian community does not see me as a ‘real’ woman because I do not have ovaries, I don’t have a womb and I don’t naturally produce oestrogen.” She pointed out that many women have those same problems but they are still seen as women because that is what they are deep within their beings. And that’s what makes her a woman, too.
A number of comments came from the floor from people who had similar experiences and who felt rejected or ‘othered’ because of who they are.
“I consider myself incredibly heterosexual. The concept of lesbian does not sit comfortably. But I am so in love with a woman right now and I’m enjoying it. But I’m being ‘othered’ all the time and it is so frustrating,” said Jacqueline. She said she feels frustrated because she has always been totally accepting of anybody and everybody.
Godfrey, who is a social activist, was of the opinion that we suffer from “entrenched homophobia”. He said that we have internalised all the prejudice and self-loathing and are starting to hate each other. “We need to embrace each other. We are all fighting the same battle and in order to overcome this we need to reach out to each other and say, ‘I share whatever you are going through’,” he said.
Commenting on the turn-out, Liesl said that of the 51 people who attended the event there were people from all over the world, including the United States, Burundi, Zambia, Uganda, Zimbabwe, Kenya and Sweden.
The event was sponsored by Tatt2 Personal Health, manufacturers of Assegai Personal Lubricants who supplied giveaways to those attending. |
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