By MEGAN REYNOLDS
Tribune Staff Reporter
mreynolds@tribunemedia.net:
"DIRTY secrets" of sexual molestation will no longer be kept in government schools, as Minister of Education Desmond Bannister warned hundreds of teachers that complaints of a sexual nature will not be ignored.
In the first all-day seminar on sexual abuse in schools organised by the Bahamas Union of Teachers (BUT) for male staff yesterday, Mr Bannister informed them of the strict protocol by which all complaints are investigated.
All men who teach at New Providence government schools were invited to the seminar, said to be the first of its kind in Bahamian history, and those schools that did not comply with the invitation will not have the opportunity to do so again, Mr Bannister warned.
He called on hundreds of educators who filled the All Saints Anglican Church and Community Centre hall in Joan's Heights, off East Street South, to live up to their legal, moral and professional responsibility to protect school students by reporting all suspicions of abuse and never turning a blind eye.
"We know that these things are happening and we cannot as parents, as law-abiding citizens, or as teachers to allow it to continue," Mr Bannister said.
"You can expect, when a matter is reported, that it will be investigated thoroughly, and the necessary action will be taken.
"There is no sweeping the matter under the rug.
"For too long we have been keeping these little dirty secrets, far too many people have washed their hands of these matters.
"The important thing is to put a stop to it, address it and ensure our children are protected. They go to school to learn, not to be destroyed or victimised."
A Sexual Complaints Unit established at the Ministry of Education last year is mandated to investigate all allegations of sexual abuse across the islands and has already launched investigations to the alleged abuse of at least 18 schoolchildren in Andros and Eleuthera this year.
The Minister assured teachers that the team, including an investigator, attorney, and school psychologist will thoroughly examine all allegations to protect both students and teachers as he said he understands how they too can be vulnerable to allegations of abuse.
Leader of the Sexual Complaints Unit Sterling Gardiner informed the male teachers how the unit operates, while Attorney General's office lawyer Neil Braithwaite informed them of the legal implications and motivational speaker, family therapist Dr Wayne Thompson addressed the emotional issues attached to sexual abuse.
The first seminar of its kind invited men only as men are the perpetrators in the majority of sex abuse cases in Bahamian schools. However there is scope for building on the initial one day seminar which is the first to address the accountability of teachers in sexual abuse claims on such a scale.
Invitations were sent to schools across the island, which closed at midday yesterday, and Mr Bannister said those who did not accept the invitation will be required to attend next time.
The men attending the seminar objected to the presence of a woman reporter covering the event, and The Tribune's reporter was removed from the room by BUT president Belinda Wilson.
April 01, 2010
tribune242
A political blog about Bahamian politics in The Bahamas, Bahamian Politicans - and the entire Bahamas political lot. Bahamian Blogger Dennis Dames keeps you updated on the political news and views throughout the islands of The Bahamas without fear or favor. Bahamian Politicians and the Bahamian Political Arena: Updates one Post at a time on Bahamas Politics and Bahamas Politicans; and their local, regional and international policies and perspectives.
Friday, April 2, 2010
Thursday, April 1, 2010
Bahamas Illegal Immigration Policy Shifts Once Again
By Krystel Rolle ~ Guardian Staff Reporter ~ krystel@nasguard.com:
In an apparent shift once again in its illegal immigration policy, the government has repatriated a group of undocumented Haitians.
Deputy Prime Minister Brent Symonette, who is also the minister of immigration, told The Nassau Guardian that the 86 Haitians, who were caught on Long Island last weekend, were returned to Haiti yesterday morning.
The immigrants were found by police wandering in the area of Stevens, Long Island on Saturday. The group, which included 77 men and nine women, were transported to New Providence.
"They are back in Haiti," Symonette confirmed.
Asked if the government has shifted its policy, Symonette declined to speak on the matter.
"That's all I want to say at the moment — that we have returned that group to Haiti," he said.
The repatriation exercise comes about two months after a group of 49 Haitian migrants who landed in New Providence in January was charged in court with illegal landing. The men were sent to prison for six months, and the women were sent to the Carmichael Road Detention Centre, along with the children in the group, according to statement from the Department of Immigration.
Prime Minister Hubert Ingraham changed the policy so that Haitians could be charged and thereby detained for longer periods.
The policy shift came after a 7.0 earthquake struck Haiti's capital Port-au-Prince on January 12, destroying many buildings, killing hundreds of thousands of people and leaving millions more homeless.
Days after the earthquake, Ingraham also announced that Haitian immigrants who were held in the Carmichael Road Detention Centre prior to the disaster were being released and given temporary status. There were a little over 100 Haitian immigrants in the temporary holding facility at the time. Ingraham added that repatriation exercises would be postponed until further notice.
Former Minister of Immigration Vincent Peet told The Guardian yesterday that it is clear that the government has no clear policy.
"I think some Bahamians would be surprised and some would not be surprised that the immigration policy changes almost every week," Peet said.
"The repatriation today by the government clearly indicates a new policy which was not announced to the public. One has to wonder what those illegal immigrants who were detained at the Fox Hill prison and those who were set free are now thinking. The government must be consistent. We are all concerned about the plight of Haitians and Haiti is now gradually recovering. The question is are they at the stage where they can take these immigrants back and if that is the case, then when will the others be repatriated?"
Peet said the government is clearly unfocused as it has no coherent policy. He added that the constant shift is policy is probably confusing to Bahamians.
April 01, 2010
thenassauguardian
In an apparent shift once again in its illegal immigration policy, the government has repatriated a group of undocumented Haitians.
Deputy Prime Minister Brent Symonette, who is also the minister of immigration, told The Nassau Guardian that the 86 Haitians, who were caught on Long Island last weekend, were returned to Haiti yesterday morning.
The immigrants were found by police wandering in the area of Stevens, Long Island on Saturday. The group, which included 77 men and nine women, were transported to New Providence.
"They are back in Haiti," Symonette confirmed.
Asked if the government has shifted its policy, Symonette declined to speak on the matter.
"That's all I want to say at the moment — that we have returned that group to Haiti," he said.
The repatriation exercise comes about two months after a group of 49 Haitian migrants who landed in New Providence in January was charged in court with illegal landing. The men were sent to prison for six months, and the women were sent to the Carmichael Road Detention Centre, along with the children in the group, according to statement from the Department of Immigration.
Prime Minister Hubert Ingraham changed the policy so that Haitians could be charged and thereby detained for longer periods.
The policy shift came after a 7.0 earthquake struck Haiti's capital Port-au-Prince on January 12, destroying many buildings, killing hundreds of thousands of people and leaving millions more homeless.
Days after the earthquake, Ingraham also announced that Haitian immigrants who were held in the Carmichael Road Detention Centre prior to the disaster were being released and given temporary status. There were a little over 100 Haitian immigrants in the temporary holding facility at the time. Ingraham added that repatriation exercises would be postponed until further notice.
Former Minister of Immigration Vincent Peet told The Guardian yesterday that it is clear that the government has no clear policy.
"I think some Bahamians would be surprised and some would not be surprised that the immigration policy changes almost every week," Peet said.
"The repatriation today by the government clearly indicates a new policy which was not announced to the public. One has to wonder what those illegal immigrants who were detained at the Fox Hill prison and those who were set free are now thinking. The government must be consistent. We are all concerned about the plight of Haitians and Haiti is now gradually recovering. The question is are they at the stage where they can take these immigrants back and if that is the case, then when will the others be repatriated?"
Peet said the government is clearly unfocused as it has no coherent policy. He added that the constant shift is policy is probably confusing to Bahamians.
April 01, 2010
thenassauguardian
Wednesday, March 31, 2010
The National Development Party (NDP) Demands “Full And Frank” Disclosure On Safety Protocol At The Freeport Container Port (FCP)
By Karissma Robinson:
The National Development Party (NDP) is calling on the government and Hutchison Port Holdings (HPH) to provide a full and frank disclosure about safety protocol at the Freeport Container Port (FCP).
Hutchison is a subsidiary of the multinational conglomerate Hutchison Whampoa Limited (HWL).
In a press statement released yesterday, the NDP insisted that the type of work conducted at FCP puts its employee’s lives at a great risk on a daily basis.
Three Container Port workers were killed and 11 injured on Monday after a powerful tornado ripped through Grand Bahama, toppling a crane two of the workers were in.
"We want a full and frank disclosure as to safety protocols that were in place at the site and on the island to reduce this risk for the protection of workers. We want to know whether protocols were followed by the relevant authorities," the release said.
The NDP also expressed its condolences to Grand Bahamians.
According to initial reports, one of the cranes could not be stabilised due to the high winds and heavy rain.
As a result, that crane crashed into another creating a domino effect.
One of the toppling cranes crashed to the ground where some persons were conducting maintenance.
FCP CEO Gary Gilbert, as well as FCP Director Godfrey Smith sent out their condolences to the families of those employees who were killed. They also offered the company’s prayers for the full and complete recovery of those workers who were injured and are currently being treated at the Rand Memorial Hospital.
At least three tornadoes touched down in the Freeport area between midday and 1:00 p.m. leaving behind uprooted trees, scattered debris, damage homes, and vehicles.
The report came just before a severe thunderstorm watch was issued for the island warning of possible heavy rainfall, hail, heavy flooding, frequent lightning and funnel clouds.
Prime Minister Hubert Ingraham, along with the National Security Minister Tommy Turnquest and Social Development Minister Dion Foulkes made a special trip to Grand Bahama yesterday to get a first hand look at the damage.
March 31st, 2010
jonesbahamas
The National Development Party (NDP) is calling on the government and Hutchison Port Holdings (HPH) to provide a full and frank disclosure about safety protocol at the Freeport Container Port (FCP).
Hutchison is a subsidiary of the multinational conglomerate Hutchison Whampoa Limited (HWL).
In a press statement released yesterday, the NDP insisted that the type of work conducted at FCP puts its employee’s lives at a great risk on a daily basis.
Three Container Port workers were killed and 11 injured on Monday after a powerful tornado ripped through Grand Bahama, toppling a crane two of the workers were in.
"We want a full and frank disclosure as to safety protocols that were in place at the site and on the island to reduce this risk for the protection of workers. We want to know whether protocols were followed by the relevant authorities," the release said.
The NDP also expressed its condolences to Grand Bahamians.
According to initial reports, one of the cranes could not be stabilised due to the high winds and heavy rain.
As a result, that crane crashed into another creating a domino effect.
One of the toppling cranes crashed to the ground where some persons were conducting maintenance.
FCP CEO Gary Gilbert, as well as FCP Director Godfrey Smith sent out their condolences to the families of those employees who were killed. They also offered the company’s prayers for the full and complete recovery of those workers who were injured and are currently being treated at the Rand Memorial Hospital.
At least three tornadoes touched down in the Freeport area between midday and 1:00 p.m. leaving behind uprooted trees, scattered debris, damage homes, and vehicles.
The report came just before a severe thunderstorm watch was issued for the island warning of possible heavy rainfall, hail, heavy flooding, frequent lightning and funnel clouds.
Prime Minister Hubert Ingraham, along with the National Security Minister Tommy Turnquest and Social Development Minister Dion Foulkes made a special trip to Grand Bahama yesterday to get a first hand look at the damage.
March 31st, 2010
jonesbahamas
Tuesday, March 30, 2010
Bahamas Government has abandoned women suffering in silence
By NOELLE NICOLLS
Tribune Staff Reporter
nnicolls@tribunemedia.net:
MY MOTHER always told me, 'a wise man can't reason away what a fool believes', so I have little faith my analysis will change the opinions of those afflicted with the ignorance virus, as it relates to the current debate about spousal rape.
I do hope those who are more informed and simply afflicted with a severe case of "spinelessness" will stop to think again about the impact their cowardice will have on victims of one of the most heinous crimes.
Victims of rape are not fantasies of the public's imagination; they are real people, as the woman who wrote about her ordeal in The Tribune last year testifies.
"When he forced himself on me he would say he paid for the right to have sex with me whenever he wanted. Many times I was left bruised and sore for days.. On two occasions I even contracted sexually transmitted diseases. He was a chronic "sweethearter" even to relations with a baby-sitter and a maid. The man made my life a nightmare and because of his abuse I often took it out on the children," she said.
"I often felt dirty, disgusted, hopeless and not in control of my own body. Since leaving nineteen years ago, I have not had a relationship with any other man -- scars are too deep. I vowed never to have to go through that kind of sexual abuse ever again! Thank you, Mrs Turner, for paving the way for women to have recourse and to be allowed to have control over their own bodies. I am sure a lot of women appreciate it," she said.
With the Government's decision to kill the bill proposed to amend to the Sexual Offences and Domestic Violence Act, 1991 to extend protection against rape to married women, they have abandoned all of those women suffering in silence, like the one above. They have abandoned their so called progressive agenda; they have opted to represent those that oppress rather than those that are oppressed. According to a 2007 joint report of the United Nations and the World Bank, the Bahamas has the highest per capita rate of rape; not only in the region or the hemisphere, but in the world.
Last week, the Minister of State for Social Development Loretta Butler-Turner revealed the government has no intention of reintroducing the proposed amendments to the Sexual Offences Act when parliament is reconvened. The bill was dropped off the legislative agenda with the prorogation of Parliament last week.
This ends months of speculation about the future of the bill and whether Prime Minister Hubert Ingraham was truly "determined" to have it debated in the House of Assembly. Minister Butler-Turner said the reluctance was in large part because "the people who were meant to benefit most of all from the protection were the ones that have been quite quiet on it and even opposed to it."
This seems oddly suspicious considering just five months ago Prime Minister Hubert Ingraham said he was "encouraged" by support for the proposal. He said so speaking at an FNM Women's Association meeting, where he also claimed the FNM was committed to equality for women.
Even though the Prime Minister is still at liberty to change his mind, which I certainly hope he does, the statement from Ms Butler-Turner is significant, because for months, while responding to the Tribune's coverage of the impact of prorogation, she has been reluctant to say the government was anything less than committed to having the debate. Her position was consistently confident in the Prime Minister's determination.
"This is not something we put forward without thought," she said at one time. When pessimism took her over in the past she avoided comment or dodged questions. Last week she said point blank the likelihood of progress is slim to none.
"Unfortunately it appears that we have a significant sector of our community that does not wish to participate in 21st Century progress," said Ms Butler-Turner.
Why is the Government scared to or incapable of taking a position on this matter? Each Member of Parliament should stand up and be counted; each should be held accountable for the support or lack thereof.
Why are they capitulating to nonsense claims of people like Deangelo Duncombe, who wrote last year: "As we know the majority of Bahamian women in society tend to be very spiteful. So here it is, her husband comes home after a hard day of work, and feels the need to perform sexual intercourse, but due to an argument they might have had the night before she decides she will not engage in such activity. Bear in mind she is only doing this to get back at him, now if the law was to pass and he insists on performing sex on her he can be imprisoned. Therefore, to save himself from going to jail he decides to go elsewhere to another female who is willing to satisfy him. However, he is now committing adultery and the wife wants a divorce, which can be morally wrong because the reason for him cheating is because of her displaying her spiteful characteristics."
I wonder if this is the message the Government truly wants to align itself with. I wonder if this is the lesson Mr Duncombe has taught his mother, sister or daughter. His use of language, no doubt unconscious, reveals a lot about his psychology and the psychology of some people in the Bahamian society. He speaks of a man "performing sex" on his wife, not having sex with his wife. Sex should be a mutual sharing between consenting adults. In this case, if a man wants a stage performance he should get a prostitute.
"Men go by what they see, women go by their emotions. A wife cannot walk around in the house half nude, come out of the shower wet, sleep in the same bed under her husband and expect him not to roll over and not wanting sex. If a husband is upset and he sees his wife, 99.1 per cent of husbands today if they are upset and they see their wife in a good sexual way they want to have sex (just to please themselves). A wife works by her emotions or (mind). If her husband did not cover one to three of a woman's five basic needs for that day, she will shut down. She will close shop, put on three layers of clothes just for bed, will not cook or clean and last, but not least, she will put on pads and say this is her time of the month -- move away," stated Terrance Gilbert, in a letter expressing his views last year.
Why is it, that in the 21st Century, we have to try to convince elected officials and some people in the Bahamian public that this perception is nothing but a bigoted, dogmatic, chauvinistic, and narrow-minded point of view?
This is not the law of the Commonwealth of the Bahamas. No woman should feel or be made to feel as though that is her duty, obligation, or legal mandate.
No man should feel or be made to feel as though this is his right. A government that enables these views to persist is being extremely dishonest, highly irresponsible and downright offensive.
On the day that the 2002 referendum was defeated - the one that would have empowered Bahamian woman to pass on automatic Bahamian citizenship to their children - Prime Minister Hubert Ingraham declared he was "ashamed" the majority of voters decided not to bring the Bahamas in line with United Nations conventions on equal rights for women.
"I said during the course of the campaign that a 'no' vote in the Bahamas on the question of equality says we are not willing to be in compliance with the international convention for the elimination of all forms of discrimination against women and that we are unwilling to be in compliance with the United Nations on the rights of a child and that would cause me to hold my head in shame," said Mr Ingraham.
Question one of the 2002 referendum asked voters if they agreed that "all forms of discrimination against women, their children and spouses should be removed from the Constitution and that no person should be discriminated against on the grounds of gender and do you approve the proposed amendments to Articles 3,5,8,9,10,13,14,26 and 54 of the Constitution?"
Many of these articles, Articles 3, 8, 9 in particular, sought to correct the inequality between Bahamian men and women where only a male with Bahamian citizenship is able to transfer his citizenship to his children. In the end the referendum was defeated with more than 60 per cent of voters voting 'no'.
At the time the Prime Minister said he felt very comfortable with history saying that when Hubert Ingraham was prime minister of the Bahamas he sought to get the Bahamas to deepen its democracy and he sought to get the Bahamas to be in compliance with "these very fundamental international conventions with respect to human rights of women children and their spouses".
"History will show that I was on the right side," said Mr Ingraham.
At this eerily similar time, I think it is fitting to say, once again, what a sad and shameful day for the Bahamas. This time, history will not be on the prime minister's side, because his government did not even have the political will or good will of the people in mind, to offer the proposed amendment for debate on the floor of the House of Assembly.
They claim it has already defeated based on the response from the public, but when has that stopped the Government before. How many unpopular bills have made it to the floor and further to the law books?
As an online commentator posted at Tribune242.com: "What an incredibly sad day for the Bahamas. It would have been good for the usually biggety Ingraham administration to have pushed this through; now, the "vimens dem" know what the Ingraham administration thinks of us. What a sham."
Whatever happened to standing up for principle, not popular opinion? The principle of the matter is spouses should have the same legal protection from being raped by someone to whom they are married as any other person has from being raped by someone to whom they are not wed. That is good governance. That is basic human rights.
Pandering for votes and running scared is not leadership. The Hubert Ingraham-led government did not lose to the will of the people, they threw in their cards; they caved to the mob; they burned down their own house.
From the time the bill was introduced last July, it caused controversy, with opponents claiming it would increase infidelity, promiscuity and even homosexuality; it would destroy the institution of marriage and contradict the word of God. In fact it would only remove the loophole giving perpetrators of spousal rape impunity. With such a laundry list of nonfactual, illogical, misguided and ill-informed complaints, it is difficult to pinpoint where to start in refuting claims from the bill's opponents.
Kingdom Life Church pastor Cedric Moss argued that rape cannot be committed in marriage as each spouse gives the other authority over their body and agrees to open-ended sexual consent in the marriage vows. This view is endorsed by the Bahamas Christian Council, which is pretty much the only Christian body withholding support of the bill.
The Roman Catholic Archdiocese in the Bahamas and the Turks and Caicos Islands, the Bahamas Conference of the Methodist Church and the Seventh-Day Adventist Church all endorsed the proposed amendments, as well as several local advocacy groups.
"When will I, as a Bahamian woman, be considered equal to all other citizens in the nation I was born in? When will I no longer have to suffer because of arrogant 'men of the cloth' such as Cedric Moss? Who elected him to have jurisdiction over my marital bed or my immortal soul for that matter? My Lord, Jesus Christ, has not informed me of Cedric Moss' or the Christian Council's dominion over the religious or sexual affairs of my life," posted Woman Scorned on Tribune242.com.
"I do not recognise their authority and am fed up with being subject to their hateful, chauvinistic and selfish opinions on matters that are very, very personal and precious to me, such as my freedom," she said.
Cedric Moss and his fellow members of the clergy are out of touch with many in the Bahamian public and with international standards. Their lackey politicians are locked in step.
Sorry to say, the only reason rape cannot be committed in marriage is because there is an exception clause in the Sexual Offences Act that says: "Rape is the act of any person not under fourteen years of age having sexual intercourse with another person who is not his spouse."
The only reason it says "who is not his spouse" is because the law is antiquated. The entire controversy surrounding the bill is based on the removal of these five words.
The exception was inherited from 18th and 19th Century English common law.
At that time in history, women had few to no legal rights - they could not vote, give evidence in court, attend university, gain custody of their children, and had limited property and inheritance rights and few employment opportunities.
Furthermore, at that time the law did not even apply to men and women of African descent because we were enslaved and considered chattel. The laws governing animals and property applied to us. To add insult to injury, the Christian basis of English common law is Old Testament Levitical Law, under which women were also considered chattel. Apparently, this is where some people in the Bahamas want us to say.
Times change. History has proven that. But apparently, time by-passed the Bahamas, as it relates to women's rights, sexual rights and common sense. In less than one decade, two major legislative pushes that would have advanced the rights of women in the Bahamas failed, because of partisan politics, political obstructionism, and an outright effort to miseducate the populous.
"Leaders lead and leaders should do the right thing. The leaders of this country must protect women's rights, even if (some of) the women themselves aren't educated enough to know why they need them. They won't get more educated until they get their rights. Unbelievable. Like living in the Dark Ages sometimes," stated regular Tribune242.com commenter, Erasmus Folly.
Although I disagree with much his online commentary, he and I are aligned on this issue.
Another online commentator claimed Erasmus Folly was posturing himself as the "wisest man in the world," labelling everyone with a different opinion to his own, ignorant.
In response, Erasmus said: "I don't claim perfect knowledge, but I am happy to point out obvious ignorance when I see it. Not allowing for the reform of the law and preventing married women their rights is ignorance. So, yes, silly you, if you happen to think that way. It is a morally reprehensible and ignorant position to take. The ignorant are ignorant whether they know it or not - in fact that is the whole point - they don't know it and instead live in Bahamian hypocritical 'Christian' bliss while defending positions that Jesus himself would balk at." Let the preacher say, amen.
Marriage in the Commonwealth of the Bahamas is a legal contract governed by the laws of the land. It's most tangible impact, legally, is the way in which it regulates the distribution of assets, and inheritance. Most of the meaning society ascribes to marriage is symbolic; it is a belief maintained by a collection of individuals, predominantly with a Christian world view.
The fact that marriage has religious symbolism has no bearing on the fact that marriage is governed by the Marriage Act and the Matrimonial Causes Act.
Aside from an obligation to abide by the laws of the land, everyone in the Bahamas is free to determine for themselves if they choose to ascribe to a particular belief. Everyone is free to practice civil disobedience, to challenge or break laws, especially when they are believed to be unjust, oppressive, or antiquated, as long as they know their actions to be such.
I choose not to ascribe to the belief, touted most fervently by the Bahamas Christian Council that marriage means open ended sexual consent and further that a woman's body belongs to her husbands. That is my right. If the government wants to oblige me to live by that belief then they should enshrine that principle in law, and even then I would exercise my right to challenge the law. For the time being, there are no such laws in the Bahamas. If some Christians want to argue it is God's law, then I will take my chances on judgment day.
Religious morals do not govern the contract of marriage; they only govern a symbolic meaning of marriage; neither do they govern the Commonwealth of the Bahamas. Laws do.
Although our laws are influenced by Christian principles, the extent of such is outlined in the setting of laws. Let us stop kidding ourselves. The preamble to the constitution is not law. It is a guiding principle. The founding fathers themselves cautioned the Church not to manipulate the meaning of the preamble.
Former parliamentarians George Smith and Sir Arthur Foulkes - both delegates to the 1972 constitutional conference in London - would probably agree, the notion that religious moral or religious ethic supersedes law is a dangerous proposition. The implications of such a vision are most evident in certain Muslim countries in which Islamic law, or Sharia law, is a part of the legal code. In countries where Sharia law is the law of the land, religious leaders have legal authority to determine aspects of daily life, including mandated daily routines, familial, financial and religious obligations.
For the time being, in the Bahamas, as Sir Arthur so eloquently said last year: "The church itself has no constitutional power. No church has the right to perform a government function."
At the end of the day, the argument for the government to stay out of the marital bed is completely a smoke screen, concocted to safeguard the last bastion of male dominance, which is the belief that a woman belongs to a man once wed, and therefore her body is his to do with as desired.
No matter how loud and impassioned the opponents scream; no matter which pulpit they cry bloody murder from, this is only a law in the minds of bible-thumping zealots, misinformed fanatics and their sheep. In this hypocritical 'Christian' society, where sweet-hearting is the norm, for pastors and politicians too, the government has the nerve to support those who seek to convince women that it is their duty, obligation and legal mandate to consent open-endedly to their spouses.
I say it again: This is not the law of the Bahamas, and no woman should feel or be made to feel as though that is her duty, obligation, or legal mandate..
No man should feel or be made to feel as though this is his right. A government that enables these views to persist is being extremely dishonest, highly irresponsible and downright offensive.
This thinking is so radically and fundamentally opposed to the basic tenants of human rights it is astounding. My body is my own. The Church, the government, my husband and no other entity has or should have a right to determine how, when and with whom it is used.
The proposed amendment has nothing to do with regulating marriage. Let me repeat. The proposed amendment has nothing to do with regulating marriage.
It seeks to regulate a heinous sexual offence, hence the reason it is an amendment to the Sexual Offences Act. It seeks to address the problem of sexual violence in our country that is all too prevalent.
Rape is not just some sexual activity taking place between consenting men and women inside or outside of the marriage. Rape is deadly business striking at the core of human dignity.
The irony of this playing out at the same time the United States is pushing through landmark health care legislation in the midst of an all out opposition war is striking. The health care bills were passed in an atmosphere where roughly two thirds of Americans said they were satisfied with the health insurance coverage they already had.
President Barack Obama had the courage to act on behalf of the other third - including 32 million previously uninsured individuals - despite the fact that his approval rating dropped as low as 40 per cent during the most difficult period of his campaign.
He was willing to put his neck on the chopping block because of the principle of the matter. He set his own personal standard that his success as president would be determined by his ability to succeed on health care.
Members of Congress had the courage to act even in face of a maddening crowd, responsible for vandalising senatorial offices and spreading racist propaganda.
The Bahamian Government did not even coordinate an effective public education campaign to galvanize support for the bill. It floundered the entire time. The full weight of the bill was placed on the shoulders of Loretta Butler-Turner.
The Government's excuse that the people most affected by the loophole were not speaking up is vexing to say the least. Rape is a crime in which victims suffer in silence. In the Bahamas, where the level of intolerance and lack of empathy for victims is frighteningly high, I completely understand why this is so.
And in any event, when since was it that only a woman could speak for a woman; only victims could speak for victims? Is this the regressive agenda of the so called progressive FNM government? If that is the case then we should implement an instant quota in the House of Assembly to reflect the relative gender distribution of the nation. Women make up almost 51 per cent of the population, and yet they sit in only five of the 41 seats in the House of Assembly.
This is acceptable in society because we operate based on a system of representational politics, in which citizens elect officials to have their voices represented, irrespective of whether that elected official is of the same gender, background, or political persuasion. Leaders are supposed to represent.
That being said, this is an issue that affects all women in Bahamian society. Therefore, women regardless of their political, religious or social affiliations should unite to counteract the oppressive societal beliefs that afflict our country today.
There is clearly a virus in the air that the Ministry of Health needs to investigate, seriously. It is making Bahamians repulsed by the thought of all women having equal protection against men who rape. This virus is infecting the minds of otherwise good thinking men and women in the country, straight to the top leadership of the country.
This debate makes it clear that unless an issue has political currency it has no value to politicians. I urge the prime minister to check himself and to check his party. Do what is right, not what is politically prudent. For a change, stand up for voiceless victims of heinous crime, not just people with political and financial clout. Let the opposition be on the wrong side of history.
If bringing the bill back only results in its death then give it an opportunity to die a noble death. To borrow the words of Harlem Renaissance poet, Jamaican born Claude McKay, "Like men (let it) face the murderous, cowardly pack, Pressed to the wall, dying, but fighting back!"
Mr Prime Minister, I urge you to bring the bill back.
March 29, 2010
tribune242
Tribune Staff Reporter
nnicolls@tribunemedia.net:
MY MOTHER always told me, 'a wise man can't reason away what a fool believes', so I have little faith my analysis will change the opinions of those afflicted with the ignorance virus, as it relates to the current debate about spousal rape.
I do hope those who are more informed and simply afflicted with a severe case of "spinelessness" will stop to think again about the impact their cowardice will have on victims of one of the most heinous crimes.
Victims of rape are not fantasies of the public's imagination; they are real people, as the woman who wrote about her ordeal in The Tribune last year testifies.
"When he forced himself on me he would say he paid for the right to have sex with me whenever he wanted. Many times I was left bruised and sore for days.. On two occasions I even contracted sexually transmitted diseases. He was a chronic "sweethearter" even to relations with a baby-sitter and a maid. The man made my life a nightmare and because of his abuse I often took it out on the children," she said.
"I often felt dirty, disgusted, hopeless and not in control of my own body. Since leaving nineteen years ago, I have not had a relationship with any other man -- scars are too deep. I vowed never to have to go through that kind of sexual abuse ever again! Thank you, Mrs Turner, for paving the way for women to have recourse and to be allowed to have control over their own bodies. I am sure a lot of women appreciate it," she said.
With the Government's decision to kill the bill proposed to amend to the Sexual Offences and Domestic Violence Act, 1991 to extend protection against rape to married women, they have abandoned all of those women suffering in silence, like the one above. They have abandoned their so called progressive agenda; they have opted to represent those that oppress rather than those that are oppressed. According to a 2007 joint report of the United Nations and the World Bank, the Bahamas has the highest per capita rate of rape; not only in the region or the hemisphere, but in the world.
Last week, the Minister of State for Social Development Loretta Butler-Turner revealed the government has no intention of reintroducing the proposed amendments to the Sexual Offences Act when parliament is reconvened. The bill was dropped off the legislative agenda with the prorogation of Parliament last week.
This ends months of speculation about the future of the bill and whether Prime Minister Hubert Ingraham was truly "determined" to have it debated in the House of Assembly. Minister Butler-Turner said the reluctance was in large part because "the people who were meant to benefit most of all from the protection were the ones that have been quite quiet on it and even opposed to it."
This seems oddly suspicious considering just five months ago Prime Minister Hubert Ingraham said he was "encouraged" by support for the proposal. He said so speaking at an FNM Women's Association meeting, where he also claimed the FNM was committed to equality for women.
Even though the Prime Minister is still at liberty to change his mind, which I certainly hope he does, the statement from Ms Butler-Turner is significant, because for months, while responding to the Tribune's coverage of the impact of prorogation, she has been reluctant to say the government was anything less than committed to having the debate. Her position was consistently confident in the Prime Minister's determination.
"This is not something we put forward without thought," she said at one time. When pessimism took her over in the past she avoided comment or dodged questions. Last week she said point blank the likelihood of progress is slim to none.
"Unfortunately it appears that we have a significant sector of our community that does not wish to participate in 21st Century progress," said Ms Butler-Turner.
Why is the Government scared to or incapable of taking a position on this matter? Each Member of Parliament should stand up and be counted; each should be held accountable for the support or lack thereof.
Why are they capitulating to nonsense claims of people like Deangelo Duncombe, who wrote last year: "As we know the majority of Bahamian women in society tend to be very spiteful. So here it is, her husband comes home after a hard day of work, and feels the need to perform sexual intercourse, but due to an argument they might have had the night before she decides she will not engage in such activity. Bear in mind she is only doing this to get back at him, now if the law was to pass and he insists on performing sex on her he can be imprisoned. Therefore, to save himself from going to jail he decides to go elsewhere to another female who is willing to satisfy him. However, he is now committing adultery and the wife wants a divorce, which can be morally wrong because the reason for him cheating is because of her displaying her spiteful characteristics."
I wonder if this is the message the Government truly wants to align itself with. I wonder if this is the lesson Mr Duncombe has taught his mother, sister or daughter. His use of language, no doubt unconscious, reveals a lot about his psychology and the psychology of some people in the Bahamian society. He speaks of a man "performing sex" on his wife, not having sex with his wife. Sex should be a mutual sharing between consenting adults. In this case, if a man wants a stage performance he should get a prostitute.
"Men go by what they see, women go by their emotions. A wife cannot walk around in the house half nude, come out of the shower wet, sleep in the same bed under her husband and expect him not to roll over and not wanting sex. If a husband is upset and he sees his wife, 99.1 per cent of husbands today if they are upset and they see their wife in a good sexual way they want to have sex (just to please themselves). A wife works by her emotions or (mind). If her husband did not cover one to three of a woman's five basic needs for that day, she will shut down. She will close shop, put on three layers of clothes just for bed, will not cook or clean and last, but not least, she will put on pads and say this is her time of the month -- move away," stated Terrance Gilbert, in a letter expressing his views last year.
Why is it, that in the 21st Century, we have to try to convince elected officials and some people in the Bahamian public that this perception is nothing but a bigoted, dogmatic, chauvinistic, and narrow-minded point of view?
This is not the law of the Commonwealth of the Bahamas. No woman should feel or be made to feel as though that is her duty, obligation, or legal mandate.
No man should feel or be made to feel as though this is his right. A government that enables these views to persist is being extremely dishonest, highly irresponsible and downright offensive.
On the day that the 2002 referendum was defeated - the one that would have empowered Bahamian woman to pass on automatic Bahamian citizenship to their children - Prime Minister Hubert Ingraham declared he was "ashamed" the majority of voters decided not to bring the Bahamas in line with United Nations conventions on equal rights for women.
"I said during the course of the campaign that a 'no' vote in the Bahamas on the question of equality says we are not willing to be in compliance with the international convention for the elimination of all forms of discrimination against women and that we are unwilling to be in compliance with the United Nations on the rights of a child and that would cause me to hold my head in shame," said Mr Ingraham.
Question one of the 2002 referendum asked voters if they agreed that "all forms of discrimination against women, their children and spouses should be removed from the Constitution and that no person should be discriminated against on the grounds of gender and do you approve the proposed amendments to Articles 3,5,8,9,10,13,14,26 and 54 of the Constitution?"
Many of these articles, Articles 3, 8, 9 in particular, sought to correct the inequality between Bahamian men and women where only a male with Bahamian citizenship is able to transfer his citizenship to his children. In the end the referendum was defeated with more than 60 per cent of voters voting 'no'.
At the time the Prime Minister said he felt very comfortable with history saying that when Hubert Ingraham was prime minister of the Bahamas he sought to get the Bahamas to deepen its democracy and he sought to get the Bahamas to be in compliance with "these very fundamental international conventions with respect to human rights of women children and their spouses".
"History will show that I was on the right side," said Mr Ingraham.
At this eerily similar time, I think it is fitting to say, once again, what a sad and shameful day for the Bahamas. This time, history will not be on the prime minister's side, because his government did not even have the political will or good will of the people in mind, to offer the proposed amendment for debate on the floor of the House of Assembly.
They claim it has already defeated based on the response from the public, but when has that stopped the Government before. How many unpopular bills have made it to the floor and further to the law books?
As an online commentator posted at Tribune242.com: "What an incredibly sad day for the Bahamas. It would have been good for the usually biggety Ingraham administration to have pushed this through; now, the "vimens dem" know what the Ingraham administration thinks of us. What a sham."
Whatever happened to standing up for principle, not popular opinion? The principle of the matter is spouses should have the same legal protection from being raped by someone to whom they are married as any other person has from being raped by someone to whom they are not wed. That is good governance. That is basic human rights.
Pandering for votes and running scared is not leadership. The Hubert Ingraham-led government did not lose to the will of the people, they threw in their cards; they caved to the mob; they burned down their own house.
From the time the bill was introduced last July, it caused controversy, with opponents claiming it would increase infidelity, promiscuity and even homosexuality; it would destroy the institution of marriage and contradict the word of God. In fact it would only remove the loophole giving perpetrators of spousal rape impunity. With such a laundry list of nonfactual, illogical, misguided and ill-informed complaints, it is difficult to pinpoint where to start in refuting claims from the bill's opponents.
Kingdom Life Church pastor Cedric Moss argued that rape cannot be committed in marriage as each spouse gives the other authority over their body and agrees to open-ended sexual consent in the marriage vows. This view is endorsed by the Bahamas Christian Council, which is pretty much the only Christian body withholding support of the bill.
The Roman Catholic Archdiocese in the Bahamas and the Turks and Caicos Islands, the Bahamas Conference of the Methodist Church and the Seventh-Day Adventist Church all endorsed the proposed amendments, as well as several local advocacy groups.
"When will I, as a Bahamian woman, be considered equal to all other citizens in the nation I was born in? When will I no longer have to suffer because of arrogant 'men of the cloth' such as Cedric Moss? Who elected him to have jurisdiction over my marital bed or my immortal soul for that matter? My Lord, Jesus Christ, has not informed me of Cedric Moss' or the Christian Council's dominion over the religious or sexual affairs of my life," posted Woman Scorned on Tribune242.com.
"I do not recognise their authority and am fed up with being subject to their hateful, chauvinistic and selfish opinions on matters that are very, very personal and precious to me, such as my freedom," she said.
Cedric Moss and his fellow members of the clergy are out of touch with many in the Bahamian public and with international standards. Their lackey politicians are locked in step.
Sorry to say, the only reason rape cannot be committed in marriage is because there is an exception clause in the Sexual Offences Act that says: "Rape is the act of any person not under fourteen years of age having sexual intercourse with another person who is not his spouse."
The only reason it says "who is not his spouse" is because the law is antiquated. The entire controversy surrounding the bill is based on the removal of these five words.
The exception was inherited from 18th and 19th Century English common law.
At that time in history, women had few to no legal rights - they could not vote, give evidence in court, attend university, gain custody of their children, and had limited property and inheritance rights and few employment opportunities.
Furthermore, at that time the law did not even apply to men and women of African descent because we were enslaved and considered chattel. The laws governing animals and property applied to us. To add insult to injury, the Christian basis of English common law is Old Testament Levitical Law, under which women were also considered chattel. Apparently, this is where some people in the Bahamas want us to say.
Times change. History has proven that. But apparently, time by-passed the Bahamas, as it relates to women's rights, sexual rights and common sense. In less than one decade, two major legislative pushes that would have advanced the rights of women in the Bahamas failed, because of partisan politics, political obstructionism, and an outright effort to miseducate the populous.
"Leaders lead and leaders should do the right thing. The leaders of this country must protect women's rights, even if (some of) the women themselves aren't educated enough to know why they need them. They won't get more educated until they get their rights. Unbelievable. Like living in the Dark Ages sometimes," stated regular Tribune242.com commenter, Erasmus Folly.
Although I disagree with much his online commentary, he and I are aligned on this issue.
Another online commentator claimed Erasmus Folly was posturing himself as the "wisest man in the world," labelling everyone with a different opinion to his own, ignorant.
In response, Erasmus said: "I don't claim perfect knowledge, but I am happy to point out obvious ignorance when I see it. Not allowing for the reform of the law and preventing married women their rights is ignorance. So, yes, silly you, if you happen to think that way. It is a morally reprehensible and ignorant position to take. The ignorant are ignorant whether they know it or not - in fact that is the whole point - they don't know it and instead live in Bahamian hypocritical 'Christian' bliss while defending positions that Jesus himself would balk at." Let the preacher say, amen.
Marriage in the Commonwealth of the Bahamas is a legal contract governed by the laws of the land. It's most tangible impact, legally, is the way in which it regulates the distribution of assets, and inheritance. Most of the meaning society ascribes to marriage is symbolic; it is a belief maintained by a collection of individuals, predominantly with a Christian world view.
The fact that marriage has religious symbolism has no bearing on the fact that marriage is governed by the Marriage Act and the Matrimonial Causes Act.
Aside from an obligation to abide by the laws of the land, everyone in the Bahamas is free to determine for themselves if they choose to ascribe to a particular belief. Everyone is free to practice civil disobedience, to challenge or break laws, especially when they are believed to be unjust, oppressive, or antiquated, as long as they know their actions to be such.
I choose not to ascribe to the belief, touted most fervently by the Bahamas Christian Council that marriage means open ended sexual consent and further that a woman's body belongs to her husbands. That is my right. If the government wants to oblige me to live by that belief then they should enshrine that principle in law, and even then I would exercise my right to challenge the law. For the time being, there are no such laws in the Bahamas. If some Christians want to argue it is God's law, then I will take my chances on judgment day.
Religious morals do not govern the contract of marriage; they only govern a symbolic meaning of marriage; neither do they govern the Commonwealth of the Bahamas. Laws do.
Although our laws are influenced by Christian principles, the extent of such is outlined in the setting of laws. Let us stop kidding ourselves. The preamble to the constitution is not law. It is a guiding principle. The founding fathers themselves cautioned the Church not to manipulate the meaning of the preamble.
Former parliamentarians George Smith and Sir Arthur Foulkes - both delegates to the 1972 constitutional conference in London - would probably agree, the notion that religious moral or religious ethic supersedes law is a dangerous proposition. The implications of such a vision are most evident in certain Muslim countries in which Islamic law, or Sharia law, is a part of the legal code. In countries where Sharia law is the law of the land, religious leaders have legal authority to determine aspects of daily life, including mandated daily routines, familial, financial and religious obligations.
For the time being, in the Bahamas, as Sir Arthur so eloquently said last year: "The church itself has no constitutional power. No church has the right to perform a government function."
At the end of the day, the argument for the government to stay out of the marital bed is completely a smoke screen, concocted to safeguard the last bastion of male dominance, which is the belief that a woman belongs to a man once wed, and therefore her body is his to do with as desired.
No matter how loud and impassioned the opponents scream; no matter which pulpit they cry bloody murder from, this is only a law in the minds of bible-thumping zealots, misinformed fanatics and their sheep. In this hypocritical 'Christian' society, where sweet-hearting is the norm, for pastors and politicians too, the government has the nerve to support those who seek to convince women that it is their duty, obligation and legal mandate to consent open-endedly to their spouses.
I say it again: This is not the law of the Bahamas, and no woman should feel or be made to feel as though that is her duty, obligation, or legal mandate..
No man should feel or be made to feel as though this is his right. A government that enables these views to persist is being extremely dishonest, highly irresponsible and downright offensive.
This thinking is so radically and fundamentally opposed to the basic tenants of human rights it is astounding. My body is my own. The Church, the government, my husband and no other entity has or should have a right to determine how, when and with whom it is used.
The proposed amendment has nothing to do with regulating marriage. Let me repeat. The proposed amendment has nothing to do with regulating marriage.
It seeks to regulate a heinous sexual offence, hence the reason it is an amendment to the Sexual Offences Act. It seeks to address the problem of sexual violence in our country that is all too prevalent.
Rape is not just some sexual activity taking place between consenting men and women inside or outside of the marriage. Rape is deadly business striking at the core of human dignity.
The irony of this playing out at the same time the United States is pushing through landmark health care legislation in the midst of an all out opposition war is striking. The health care bills were passed in an atmosphere where roughly two thirds of Americans said they were satisfied with the health insurance coverage they already had.
President Barack Obama had the courage to act on behalf of the other third - including 32 million previously uninsured individuals - despite the fact that his approval rating dropped as low as 40 per cent during the most difficult period of his campaign.
He was willing to put his neck on the chopping block because of the principle of the matter. He set his own personal standard that his success as president would be determined by his ability to succeed on health care.
Members of Congress had the courage to act even in face of a maddening crowd, responsible for vandalising senatorial offices and spreading racist propaganda.
The Bahamian Government did not even coordinate an effective public education campaign to galvanize support for the bill. It floundered the entire time. The full weight of the bill was placed on the shoulders of Loretta Butler-Turner.
The Government's excuse that the people most affected by the loophole were not speaking up is vexing to say the least. Rape is a crime in which victims suffer in silence. In the Bahamas, where the level of intolerance and lack of empathy for victims is frighteningly high, I completely understand why this is so.
And in any event, when since was it that only a woman could speak for a woman; only victims could speak for victims? Is this the regressive agenda of the so called progressive FNM government? If that is the case then we should implement an instant quota in the House of Assembly to reflect the relative gender distribution of the nation. Women make up almost 51 per cent of the population, and yet they sit in only five of the 41 seats in the House of Assembly.
This is acceptable in society because we operate based on a system of representational politics, in which citizens elect officials to have their voices represented, irrespective of whether that elected official is of the same gender, background, or political persuasion. Leaders are supposed to represent.
That being said, this is an issue that affects all women in Bahamian society. Therefore, women regardless of their political, religious or social affiliations should unite to counteract the oppressive societal beliefs that afflict our country today.
There is clearly a virus in the air that the Ministry of Health needs to investigate, seriously. It is making Bahamians repulsed by the thought of all women having equal protection against men who rape. This virus is infecting the minds of otherwise good thinking men and women in the country, straight to the top leadership of the country.
This debate makes it clear that unless an issue has political currency it has no value to politicians. I urge the prime minister to check himself and to check his party. Do what is right, not what is politically prudent. For a change, stand up for voiceless victims of heinous crime, not just people with political and financial clout. Let the opposition be on the wrong side of history.
If bringing the bill back only results in its death then give it an opportunity to die a noble death. To borrow the words of Harlem Renaissance poet, Jamaican born Claude McKay, "Like men (let it) face the murderous, cowardly pack, Pressed to the wall, dying, but fighting back!"
Mr Prime Minister, I urge you to bring the bill back.
March 29, 2010
tribune242
Monday, March 29, 2010
Perry Christie Christie - Opposition Leader won't stay on for another full term as prime minister
By Candia Dames ~ Guardian News Editor ~ candia@nasguard.com:
Opposition Leader Perry Christie has confirmed that while he plans to lead his party into the next general election and fully expects to become prime minister again, it is his intention to step aside before the end of another five-year term.
Asked specifically about this, Christie told The Nassau Guardian, "Prime ministers should not say that, people who want to be prime ministers should not put a lame duck provision in their leadership, but I think when one looks mathematically at politics and you look at the ages of people, you look at the work they are doing to bring people into the party, you'd be able to read the tea leaves and to know that my work is to strengthen the Progressive Liberal Party."
If the next general election is called in early 2012, Christie would be 68 years old. While he confirmed that he does not intend to serve another five-year term, he did not specify when he intends to retire.
Christie said he is working aggressively to prepare the party for new, younger leadership.
He explained that this is why he is involved in attracting new faces to the PLP.
Christie said he believes he is the best person to lead the party into the elections, and he noted that this was certified during the party's November convention when he was reelected by an overwhelming majority of delegates.
The PLP leader also said the recent Elizabeth by-election defeat was a clear indication to him that more Bahamians are turning away from the Free National Movement and to the Progressive Liberal Party.
"Given what we had to face in the Elizabeth election, an experienced prime minister who decided to use the entire central government, all his arsenal in that by-election in terms of infrastructure improvements that would have pleased people to no end, the clearance of properties that would have pleased people to no end... notwithstanding that we were able to hold back the tide and win," he said.
"I think that demonstrates very clearly that there is a swing in this country, most certainly up to this point. That's what it demonstrates. I think the people wanted to make a statement and they did and they're not satisfied (with the current administration). This has happened in The Bahamas now and people are used to that."
Christie added, "I was sailing along at the end of 2006 with the economy booming, no one could have persuaded me to believe that I could possibly lose the 2007 election, but you know we have to come to terms with one reality, and that is the people choose and I think that the people of Elizabeth spoke well.
"And I don't pay any attention to a claim that we reduced the majority from 40-plus votes. To me, this is a magnificent victory for Ryan Pinder and the Progressive Liberal Party. It is good for the democracy of The Bahamas that we were able to hold that seat because it rejected the arrogance that happens with governments."
The PLP has already started naming candidates for the next general election. The naming of the first four candidates has come more than two years before the election must be called.
In 2007, PLP candidates were formally announced a few weeks before the general election.
Asked whether he regrets that late announcement, Christie told The Guardian, "There's no question about that. Looking back, hindsight is a wonderful thing, but you have to learn from mistakes.
"And I regret all sort of things, not just the time it took us to get going with the campaign, but also that there were some mistakes that I personally made in terms of accepting situations from colleagues and situations from members of Parliament that I ought to perhaps have been much more decisive in dealing with.
"Now, I've owned up to that, and I wanted to own up to that, because it is a series of mistakes that were made. And it is important that I promise people that I will not make them again."
While Christie has confirmed his intention not to stay on for another full five-year term should the PLP win the next general election, Prime Minister Hubert Ingraham has not yet announced whether he plans to lead his party into the election.
He has said, however, that he plans to make his intention known at the end of 2010.
March 29, 2010
thenassauguardian
Opposition Leader Perry Christie has confirmed that while he plans to lead his party into the next general election and fully expects to become prime minister again, it is his intention to step aside before the end of another five-year term.
Asked specifically about this, Christie told The Nassau Guardian, "Prime ministers should not say that, people who want to be prime ministers should not put a lame duck provision in their leadership, but I think when one looks mathematically at politics and you look at the ages of people, you look at the work they are doing to bring people into the party, you'd be able to read the tea leaves and to know that my work is to strengthen the Progressive Liberal Party."
If the next general election is called in early 2012, Christie would be 68 years old. While he confirmed that he does not intend to serve another five-year term, he did not specify when he intends to retire.
Christie said he is working aggressively to prepare the party for new, younger leadership.
He explained that this is why he is involved in attracting new faces to the PLP.
Christie said he believes he is the best person to lead the party into the elections, and he noted that this was certified during the party's November convention when he was reelected by an overwhelming majority of delegates.
The PLP leader also said the recent Elizabeth by-election defeat was a clear indication to him that more Bahamians are turning away from the Free National Movement and to the Progressive Liberal Party.
"Given what we had to face in the Elizabeth election, an experienced prime minister who decided to use the entire central government, all his arsenal in that by-election in terms of infrastructure improvements that would have pleased people to no end, the clearance of properties that would have pleased people to no end... notwithstanding that we were able to hold back the tide and win," he said.
"I think that demonstrates very clearly that there is a swing in this country, most certainly up to this point. That's what it demonstrates. I think the people wanted to make a statement and they did and they're not satisfied (with the current administration). This has happened in The Bahamas now and people are used to that."
Christie added, "I was sailing along at the end of 2006 with the economy booming, no one could have persuaded me to believe that I could possibly lose the 2007 election, but you know we have to come to terms with one reality, and that is the people choose and I think that the people of Elizabeth spoke well.
"And I don't pay any attention to a claim that we reduced the majority from 40-plus votes. To me, this is a magnificent victory for Ryan Pinder and the Progressive Liberal Party. It is good for the democracy of The Bahamas that we were able to hold that seat because it rejected the arrogance that happens with governments."
The PLP has already started naming candidates for the next general election. The naming of the first four candidates has come more than two years before the election must be called.
In 2007, PLP candidates were formally announced a few weeks before the general election.
Asked whether he regrets that late announcement, Christie told The Guardian, "There's no question about that. Looking back, hindsight is a wonderful thing, but you have to learn from mistakes.
"And I regret all sort of things, not just the time it took us to get going with the campaign, but also that there were some mistakes that I personally made in terms of accepting situations from colleagues and situations from members of Parliament that I ought to perhaps have been much more decisive in dealing with.
"Now, I've owned up to that, and I wanted to own up to that, because it is a series of mistakes that were made. And it is important that I promise people that I will not make them again."
While Christie has confirmed his intention not to stay on for another full five-year term should the PLP win the next general election, Prime Minister Hubert Ingraham has not yet announced whether he plans to lead his party into the election.
He has said, however, that he plans to make his intention known at the end of 2010.
March 29, 2010
thenassauguardian
Sunday, March 28, 2010
Bahamas: Third Party Leaders React To Election Court Decision
By Karissma Robinson:
Two third party leaders who ran in the Elizabeth by-election last month are reacting to Progressive Liberal Party (PLP) candidate, Ryan Pinder’s Election Court victory.
On Tuesday, Senior Supreme Court Justices Anita Allen and Jon Isaacs decided to allow five protest votes to be counted in Mr. Pinder’s favour.
The decision led to Mr. Pinder winning the February 16, by-election.
The Bahama Journal spoke with National Development Party (NDP) candidate, Dr. André Rollins and Worker’s Party candidate, Rodney Moncur, who weighed in on the ruling.
Dr. Rollins pointed out that from the beginning of the court battle his party maintained that no voter should be disenfranchised and all lawful votes should be counted.
However, he said that the controversy surrounding the by-election process is a direct reflection of the country’s electoral process.
As a result, Dr. Rollins said parliamentarians "must take electoral reform very seriously."
"This is something that must be done in this country. It is unfortunate that it took so long for parliamentarians to realise that something is wrong with the process," said Dr Rollins.
Dr. Rollins suggested that parliamentarians look at several issues that he believes directly impacts the integrity of The Bahamas’ electoral process, including, establishing a fixed date for all general elections; compiling a database linking the National Insurance number, driver’s license number, passport number, voter identification number and a newly created public utility services Number to verify voters’ identities and to keep better track of where they live and when they die.
He said they should also look at making it mandatory for any voter register used in an election to be completed no less than six months prior to the election for which it is used.
Dr. Rollins said he was happy that the Elizabeth constituents have finally gotten a representative.
"The people of Elizabeth should not have been without a representative for a long period of time. I am most pleased with the fact that the ruling has been executed with a great deal of urgency," said Dr. Rollins
Meantime, Mr. Moncur maintained that Ryan Pinder – now the duly elected Member of Parliament for the Elizabeth constituency – is not the right man for the job.
In fact, he insists Mr. Pinder is still not qualified to even hold the Elizabeth seat.
"I am currently reviewing the ruling and consulting with counsel to make sure that I properly understand what I have read. After I would have read the ruling, I will determine whether or not that American (Mr. Pinder) should be sitting in a Bahamian parliament," said Mr. Moncur.
"I have not seen any evidence that this man has renounced his U.S. citizenship. It is scandalous that an American be elected to run in any of The Bahamas’ elections."
Mr. Pinder will be sworn in as the newest Member of Parliament on April 14 at the opening of parliament.
March 25th, 2010
jonesbahamas
Two third party leaders who ran in the Elizabeth by-election last month are reacting to Progressive Liberal Party (PLP) candidate, Ryan Pinder’s Election Court victory.
On Tuesday, Senior Supreme Court Justices Anita Allen and Jon Isaacs decided to allow five protest votes to be counted in Mr. Pinder’s favour.
The decision led to Mr. Pinder winning the February 16, by-election.
The Bahama Journal spoke with National Development Party (NDP) candidate, Dr. André Rollins and Worker’s Party candidate, Rodney Moncur, who weighed in on the ruling.
Dr. Rollins pointed out that from the beginning of the court battle his party maintained that no voter should be disenfranchised and all lawful votes should be counted.
However, he said that the controversy surrounding the by-election process is a direct reflection of the country’s electoral process.
As a result, Dr. Rollins said parliamentarians "must take electoral reform very seriously."
"This is something that must be done in this country. It is unfortunate that it took so long for parliamentarians to realise that something is wrong with the process," said Dr Rollins.
Dr. Rollins suggested that parliamentarians look at several issues that he believes directly impacts the integrity of The Bahamas’ electoral process, including, establishing a fixed date for all general elections; compiling a database linking the National Insurance number, driver’s license number, passport number, voter identification number and a newly created public utility services Number to verify voters’ identities and to keep better track of where they live and when they die.
He said they should also look at making it mandatory for any voter register used in an election to be completed no less than six months prior to the election for which it is used.
Dr. Rollins said he was happy that the Elizabeth constituents have finally gotten a representative.
"The people of Elizabeth should not have been without a representative for a long period of time. I am most pleased with the fact that the ruling has been executed with a great deal of urgency," said Dr. Rollins
Meantime, Mr. Moncur maintained that Ryan Pinder – now the duly elected Member of Parliament for the Elizabeth constituency – is not the right man for the job.
In fact, he insists Mr. Pinder is still not qualified to even hold the Elizabeth seat.
"I am currently reviewing the ruling and consulting with counsel to make sure that I properly understand what I have read. After I would have read the ruling, I will determine whether or not that American (Mr. Pinder) should be sitting in a Bahamian parliament," said Mr. Moncur.
"I have not seen any evidence that this man has renounced his U.S. citizenship. It is scandalous that an American be elected to run in any of The Bahamas’ elections."
Mr. Pinder will be sworn in as the newest Member of Parliament on April 14 at the opening of parliament.
March 25th, 2010
jonesbahamas
Friday, March 26, 2010
Bahamas: Dismantling lecture on homosexuality
"God, in His grace, has already revealed the truth. It is our responsibility to seek out that truth, if we so choose. As ministers we have a greater responsibility to seek out the truth because we will be held accountable to correctly teach it,"
African-American minister, K Darnell Giles in the preface to his book, 'What Did Jesus Say? Why The Bible Did Not Condemn Homosexuality'.
By TANEKA THOMPSON
Tribune Staff Reporter
tthompson@tribunemedia.net:
NEARLY three weeks after I wrote an Insight article exposing the use of Biblical scriptures to demonise and ostracise gays and lesbians as a fallacy, I became the target of ridicule from one of our country's most prominent clergymen.
In a nearly 3,000 word retort, Pastor Lyall Bethel, senior pastor of Grace Community Church, questioned what authority I have to "passionately lecture" the "unsuspecting general public" on the "gay militant agenda". Juxtaposed next to a photo of the smiling pastor, appearing squeaky clean in a suit and tie, was a lengthy assault on gays, riddled with questionable statistics and quotes primed to put fear and prejudice in readers' minds.
Pastor Bethel, who accused me of naiveté, in his attempt to legitimise his claim that gays are disease-ridden, immoral folk, went so far as to cite the work of "Doctor" E Fields of Marietta, Georgia. "Doctor" Fields has been exposed as a non-practicing chiropractor, known white supremacist, neo-Nazi and member of the Klu Klux Klan. The Anti-defamation League, the United State's leading civil rights agency formed in 1913 to fight anti-Semitism and now all forms of bigotry, has extensive details on Mr Fields' decades-long links to racist and fascist groups.
Conservatives, who in the past have unwittingly cited Fields' material, have publicly apologised and distanced themselves from Fields, the author of "Is Homosexual Activity Normal". In my naiveté, I would expect that an upstanding man like Pastor Bethel, a respected black Christian leader, will follow suit.
But I digress.
As Pastor Bethel rebuked me, he attempted to undermine the gay rights movement. He subversively linked all gays with paedophilia, disease, extreme levels of domestic violence, promiscuity - even providing statistics to claim that gays run a higher risk of getting murdered than their straight counterparts. He also scoffed at my comparison of today's gay struggle to the historic civil rights movement in the United States. Yet he overlooked the thrust of my argument: That there is room for interpretation of Biblical scriptures used to condemn gays and therefore a religious argument against sexual orientation is invalid. But this is an issue I will revisit later.
First, I want to dismantle several statements in the pastor's "enlightened" lecture.
SEXUAL ORIENTATION IS A CIVIL RIGHT
Pastor Bethel lists numerous goals of "the gay militant agenda" , which he said were expressed during the 1993 March on Washington for Lesbian, Gay and Bi Equal Rights and Liberation. His selective account of the event shocked me. I was surprised that he forgot to mention that several high-profile black civil rights leaders threw their support behind the April 25 protest, which called for an end to discrimination of gays in the military. On February 26, 1993, The Washington Post reported that leaders of the National Association for the Advancement of Coloured People (NAACP) endorsed the march, one of the largest protests in the DC area.
"The NAACP has always been in the forefront in the struggle for equal rights," said George Carter, then deputy director of the NAACP, at a press conference ahead of the march. The Post reported that at the time, the NAACP's board of directors had adopted a stance "to end discrimination against gay men and lesbian Americans in areas of American life where all citizens deserve equal protection and equal opportunity under the law."
According to The Boston Globe, before a crowd of hundreds of thousands of exuberant gay men and lesbian women attending that march, Reverend Benjamin Chavis, then executive director of the NAACP said: "We must be against all forms of injustice. We must be against treating all people unfairly, because of their race, their class or their sexual orientation."
This alone unravels one of Pastor Bethel's fallacious statements, which claimed that American civil rights leaders do not empathise with the gay community nor see similarities in their plight. Pastor Bethel mocked me because I drew a correlation between African Americans' struggle for equality to the plight of gays worldwide. "Sexual preference is nothing like skin colour," he Writes. "Homosexuality is not a civil right. It is an affront to African-Americans to say having past generations being prevented from taking a drink from a public water fountain or being sprayed down by fire hoses in a public park was on par with preventing a man from marrying another man."
He goes on to quote American civil rights leader Jesse Jackson, who said in a 2004 Boston Globe article that gays were never "called three-fifths of a person in the Constitution". What Mr Bethel does not tell you is that in that same article, Mr Jackson said he supports "equal protection under the law" for gay couples.
And what of Julian Bond, the NAACP's chairman from 1998 until February of this year, a champion to the gay and lesbian community for his fight for the rights of all people? As he received an award from the Human Rights Campaign in 2005, the largest lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender political organisation in the US, Mr Bond was asked if gay rights are civil rights.
He said, "Of course they are. Civil rights are positive legal prerogatives - the right to equal treatment before the law. These are rights shared by all - there is no one in the United States who does not - or should not - share in these rights.
"When others gain these rights, my rights are not reduced in any way. The fight for civil rights is a win/win game; the more civil rights are won by others, the stronger the army defending my rights becomes. My rights are not diluted when my neighbour enjoys protection from the law - he or she becomes my ally in defending the rights we all share.
"For some, comparisons between the African-American civil rights movement and the movement for gay and lesbian rights seem to diminish the long black historical struggle with all its suffering, sacrifices and endless toil. However, people of colour ought to be flattered that our movement has provided so much inspiration for others, that it has been so widely imitated, and that our tactics, methods, heroines and heroes, even our songs, have been appropriated by or served as models for others," Bond said, according to the October 15, 2005, issue of the Atlanta Inquirer.
Mr Bond, as I did in my earlier piece, even compared the controversy surrounding gay marriage to the bigoted criticisms of interracial marriage during eras of racial tension: "We know there was a time, not so long ago, when black people in this country couldn't marry the person of their choice either."
This information is readily available to anyone with an internet connection, yet Pastor Bethel omitted these references from his essay. I wonder why.
THE 'AGENDA'
Pastor Bethel, and like-minded persons, are quick to point out that they are not fighting the gay individual but rather they are waging war on "the gay agenda". Pastor Bethel takes the words of writer Michael Swift - which are widely accepted as satire - and omits the crucial first line of his essay, which puts the tone of the paper into context.
"This essay is an outré (bizarre), madness, a tragic, cruel fantasy, an eruption of inner rage, on how the oppressed desperately dream of being the oppressor," writes Swift in the preface to his 1987 article, The Gay Manifesto. In his hasty essay, Pastor Bethel ignores this introduction - in the typical vein of extremists - only exposing readers to carefully selected portions of Swift's piece. But surely, the pastor can grasp the concepts of satire and farce.
Too many times I've heard the word agenda - which is simply a list of things to be done - used as if it is a secret, evil plot to take over the world (insert evil laugh here). Uber conservatives and fundamentalists throw the phrase "gay agenda" around like a conspiracy theory, as if other minority groups and, people in general, don't have their own interests to push as they fight for their rights to be heard in this unfair world.
"Lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) people are as diverse in our political beliefs as other communities ... notions of a 'homosexual agenda' are rhetorical inventions of anti-gay extremists seeking to create a climate of fear by portraying the pursuit of civil rights for LGBT people as sinister," the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD) has stated.
Right now in the United States, there is a heated debate between African-American leaders on whether or not President Barack Obama needs to advance the "black agenda" in the face of rising unemployment levels within the black sector, as the US reels from the job losses brought on by the recession. Embroiled in this dispute is Reverend Al Sharpton, and author and talk show host Tavis Smiley. Mr Smiley - who reportedly planned to host a panel of civil rights leaders and scholars entitled "We Count: The Black Agenda Is the American Agenda" - has lambasted the reverend for saying President Obama does not need to identify a black agenda to properly serve the needs of that community.
A Google search of "black agenda" turns up 20,600,000 results. A search for the "feminist agenda" reveals 895,000 results. A similar search on "gay agenda" provides 5,050,000 results. So if other minority groups are pushing their causes, and proudly label them as agendas, why should we fear one from the gay community?
Because being gay is "vile" with "painful and sometimes deadly consequences," says Mr Bethel.
DEBUNKING THE MYTHS
If a non-objective reader drew nothing else from the pastor's reproof, it would be that all gays are child molesters, infected with a myriad of nasty diseases, violent, and intent on destroying the family. Throughout his piece, the pastor clumps homosexuality with the illicit act of paedophilia, as if the two are interchangeable.
He says that homophobes are right to fear gays as molesters ready to snatch little children out of their beds. He mentions an association - the North American Man and Boy Love Association (NAMBLA) - not mentioning that the fringe group has long been ostracised from and denounced by the international gay community for advocating for legal sex with young boys.
"These goals (of NAMBLA) constitute a form of child abuse and are repugnant to GLAAD," the group has said. NAMBLA has been subject to intense investigation and raids by the FBI, has about 1,200 members worldwide.
However it is not a new phenomenon for people to disenfranchise minorities by painting them all as lecherous fiends.
"Members of disliked minority groups are often stereotyped as representing a danger to the majority's most vulnerable members. For example, Jews in the Middle Ages were accused of murdering Christian babies in ritual sacrifices. Black men in the United States were often lynched after being falsely accused of raping white women. In a similar fashion, gay people have often been portrayed as a threat to children," writes Dr Gregory Herek, professor of psychology at the University of California at Davis, and an authority on sexual prejudice, in the essay Facts About Homosexuality and Child Molestation.
Pastor Bethel says he is arguing based on the facts, and lists a number of dubious statistics detailing, among other things, the high rates of violence, disease and promiscuity among homosexuals. The conclusion he would like persons to reach is that gays are afflicted with these problems only because they are homosexuals. Using his line of thinking, I wonder what Pastor Bethel would say about the high rate of violence among African-Americans in the US? Is it because they are black?
Of course not. What is true however, is that in many countries both gays and blacks are classified as minority groups. As such, they have historically been subjected to discrimination, violence and marginalised. Indeed this pattern repeats itself among oppressed minorities around the world including American Indians, non white Hispanics, etc.
On the question of promiscuity, I don't believe heterosexuals possess the moral high ground on this. Here in the Bahamas the most recent figures released by the Department of Statistics revealed that out of the 5,126 live births in the Bahamas in 2007 - 3,047 of them were to unwed mothers. Young girls between the ages of 15 and 19, who accounted for 604 live births in the respective period, had 581 children out of wedlock.
GAYS AND GOD
After my earlier article was published, I received an email from an angry reader who stressed to me that there should be no debate on this subject because the Bible decrees being gay an "abomination". The reader added that if God intended gays to be a part of the natural order, he would have created "Adam and Steve, not Adam and Eve".
K Darnell Giles, writes that the Creation story and a handful of other scriptures have been used by extremists to justify hatred and exclusion of gays. But this stance is based on "historical church practice and rumours" rather than an educated analysis of the Bible, Giles contends.
He explains that one cannot interpret today's Bible without understanding the cultural context of the scriptures. Scriptures that were translated into English from ancient Hebrew and Greek languages, which may not have had equivalent English translations.
It is argued that God created a man and a woman to populate the earth in His image, something extremists argue is impossible in a gay relationship therefore against God's master plan.
For this argument to hold water, it would have to apply to sterile men or infertile women, people who are biologically or otherwise incapable of reproducing.
"Are these men and women to be cast away by God because they are not bearing His image through procreation? Are they committing some type of sin because they cannot or choose not to produce children? Of course not," says Giles in his book, What Did Jesus Say? Why the Bible Does Not Condemn Homosexuality.
"I believe African Americans, above all other people, owe it to themselves to take a deeper look at the scriptures for a clearer understanding of its teaching on homosexuality instead of passively continuing the marginalizing of this people group.
"For hundreds of years, African American people have been oppressed as homosexuals are today, although in manners and with methods far more harsh.
"Our oppressors misinterpreted the same Bible to enslave our ancestors; and it is now used to marginalize and teach ignorance about homosexuals. The same holds true for how women have been treated in the distant and recent past within church culture and society as a whole," wrote Giles.
WHAT ARE WE FIGHTING FOR?
I don't see it as a stretch to say that Pastor Bethel responded so vehemently to my article because he thought it was a fight he thought he could win - presumably because he feels the majority of Bahamians are on his side. This is not the only way in which Pastor Bethel and the rest of the Christian Council are strategic in their choice of battles - they also choose only to attack issues which threaten their privileged position as self-appointed moral arbiters of the nation.
This is why domestic abuse, crime, violence, infidelity and a host of other problems this country faces are not on their most wanted list - everyone agrees these are social evils. Instead, they choose to rail against sexual orientation, gambling and "immoral" films, as these fall into the category of things they could formerly control, but which an increasing number of Bahamians feel are private affairs.
Lyall Bethel and his colleagues would pretend that in policing perceived "immoral activities", they are merely expressing their right to voice their opinions. But in agitating for stricter anti-gambling laws, urging Bahamians to take a stand against "further infiltration of homosexuality" and attempting to ban certain films from being seen by adults in theatres in the Bahamas, they are pushing for the state to limit the freedom of responsible, intelligent, adult individuals - much like the Sharia law in fundamentalist Islamic societies.
This suggests that they hold a number of assumptions which are incompatible with modern Bahamian society - among them that we are not qualified to make our own moral choices, that we are little more than children and require the enlightened guidance of men of the cloth, and - ironically - that their influence is so weak that they need the law to reinforce their position.
tribune242
African-American minister, K Darnell Giles in the preface to his book, 'What Did Jesus Say? Why The Bible Did Not Condemn Homosexuality'.
By TANEKA THOMPSON
Tribune Staff Reporter
tthompson@tribunemedia.net:
NEARLY three weeks after I wrote an Insight article exposing the use of Biblical scriptures to demonise and ostracise gays and lesbians as a fallacy, I became the target of ridicule from one of our country's most prominent clergymen.
In a nearly 3,000 word retort, Pastor Lyall Bethel, senior pastor of Grace Community Church, questioned what authority I have to "passionately lecture" the "unsuspecting general public" on the "gay militant agenda". Juxtaposed next to a photo of the smiling pastor, appearing squeaky clean in a suit and tie, was a lengthy assault on gays, riddled with questionable statistics and quotes primed to put fear and prejudice in readers' minds.
Pastor Bethel, who accused me of naiveté, in his attempt to legitimise his claim that gays are disease-ridden, immoral folk, went so far as to cite the work of "Doctor" E Fields of Marietta, Georgia. "Doctor" Fields has been exposed as a non-practicing chiropractor, known white supremacist, neo-Nazi and member of the Klu Klux Klan. The Anti-defamation League, the United State's leading civil rights agency formed in 1913 to fight anti-Semitism and now all forms of bigotry, has extensive details on Mr Fields' decades-long links to racist and fascist groups.
Conservatives, who in the past have unwittingly cited Fields' material, have publicly apologised and distanced themselves from Fields, the author of "Is Homosexual Activity Normal". In my naiveté, I would expect that an upstanding man like Pastor Bethel, a respected black Christian leader, will follow suit.
But I digress.
As Pastor Bethel rebuked me, he attempted to undermine the gay rights movement. He subversively linked all gays with paedophilia, disease, extreme levels of domestic violence, promiscuity - even providing statistics to claim that gays run a higher risk of getting murdered than their straight counterparts. He also scoffed at my comparison of today's gay struggle to the historic civil rights movement in the United States. Yet he overlooked the thrust of my argument: That there is room for interpretation of Biblical scriptures used to condemn gays and therefore a religious argument against sexual orientation is invalid. But this is an issue I will revisit later.
First, I want to dismantle several statements in the pastor's "enlightened" lecture.
SEXUAL ORIENTATION IS A CIVIL RIGHT
Pastor Bethel lists numerous goals of "the gay militant agenda" , which he said were expressed during the 1993 March on Washington for Lesbian, Gay and Bi Equal Rights and Liberation. His selective account of the event shocked me. I was surprised that he forgot to mention that several high-profile black civil rights leaders threw their support behind the April 25 protest, which called for an end to discrimination of gays in the military. On February 26, 1993, The Washington Post reported that leaders of the National Association for the Advancement of Coloured People (NAACP) endorsed the march, one of the largest protests in the DC area.
"The NAACP has always been in the forefront in the struggle for equal rights," said George Carter, then deputy director of the NAACP, at a press conference ahead of the march. The Post reported that at the time, the NAACP's board of directors had adopted a stance "to end discrimination against gay men and lesbian Americans in areas of American life where all citizens deserve equal protection and equal opportunity under the law."
According to The Boston Globe, before a crowd of hundreds of thousands of exuberant gay men and lesbian women attending that march, Reverend Benjamin Chavis, then executive director of the NAACP said: "We must be against all forms of injustice. We must be against treating all people unfairly, because of their race, their class or their sexual orientation."
This alone unravels one of Pastor Bethel's fallacious statements, which claimed that American civil rights leaders do not empathise with the gay community nor see similarities in their plight. Pastor Bethel mocked me because I drew a correlation between African Americans' struggle for equality to the plight of gays worldwide. "Sexual preference is nothing like skin colour," he Writes. "Homosexuality is not a civil right. It is an affront to African-Americans to say having past generations being prevented from taking a drink from a public water fountain or being sprayed down by fire hoses in a public park was on par with preventing a man from marrying another man."
He goes on to quote American civil rights leader Jesse Jackson, who said in a 2004 Boston Globe article that gays were never "called three-fifths of a person in the Constitution". What Mr Bethel does not tell you is that in that same article, Mr Jackson said he supports "equal protection under the law" for gay couples.
And what of Julian Bond, the NAACP's chairman from 1998 until February of this year, a champion to the gay and lesbian community for his fight for the rights of all people? As he received an award from the Human Rights Campaign in 2005, the largest lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender political organisation in the US, Mr Bond was asked if gay rights are civil rights.
He said, "Of course they are. Civil rights are positive legal prerogatives - the right to equal treatment before the law. These are rights shared by all - there is no one in the United States who does not - or should not - share in these rights.
"When others gain these rights, my rights are not reduced in any way. The fight for civil rights is a win/win game; the more civil rights are won by others, the stronger the army defending my rights becomes. My rights are not diluted when my neighbour enjoys protection from the law - he or she becomes my ally in defending the rights we all share.
"For some, comparisons between the African-American civil rights movement and the movement for gay and lesbian rights seem to diminish the long black historical struggle with all its suffering, sacrifices and endless toil. However, people of colour ought to be flattered that our movement has provided so much inspiration for others, that it has been so widely imitated, and that our tactics, methods, heroines and heroes, even our songs, have been appropriated by or served as models for others," Bond said, according to the October 15, 2005, issue of the Atlanta Inquirer.
Mr Bond, as I did in my earlier piece, even compared the controversy surrounding gay marriage to the bigoted criticisms of interracial marriage during eras of racial tension: "We know there was a time, not so long ago, when black people in this country couldn't marry the person of their choice either."
This information is readily available to anyone with an internet connection, yet Pastor Bethel omitted these references from his essay. I wonder why.
THE 'AGENDA'
Pastor Bethel, and like-minded persons, are quick to point out that they are not fighting the gay individual but rather they are waging war on "the gay agenda". Pastor Bethel takes the words of writer Michael Swift - which are widely accepted as satire - and omits the crucial first line of his essay, which puts the tone of the paper into context.
"This essay is an outré (bizarre), madness, a tragic, cruel fantasy, an eruption of inner rage, on how the oppressed desperately dream of being the oppressor," writes Swift in the preface to his 1987 article, The Gay Manifesto. In his hasty essay, Pastor Bethel ignores this introduction - in the typical vein of extremists - only exposing readers to carefully selected portions of Swift's piece. But surely, the pastor can grasp the concepts of satire and farce.
Too many times I've heard the word agenda - which is simply a list of things to be done - used as if it is a secret, evil plot to take over the world (insert evil laugh here). Uber conservatives and fundamentalists throw the phrase "gay agenda" around like a conspiracy theory, as if other minority groups and, people in general, don't have their own interests to push as they fight for their rights to be heard in this unfair world.
"Lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) people are as diverse in our political beliefs as other communities ... notions of a 'homosexual agenda' are rhetorical inventions of anti-gay extremists seeking to create a climate of fear by portraying the pursuit of civil rights for LGBT people as sinister," the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD) has stated.
Right now in the United States, there is a heated debate between African-American leaders on whether or not President Barack Obama needs to advance the "black agenda" in the face of rising unemployment levels within the black sector, as the US reels from the job losses brought on by the recession. Embroiled in this dispute is Reverend Al Sharpton, and author and talk show host Tavis Smiley. Mr Smiley - who reportedly planned to host a panel of civil rights leaders and scholars entitled "We Count: The Black Agenda Is the American Agenda" - has lambasted the reverend for saying President Obama does not need to identify a black agenda to properly serve the needs of that community.
A Google search of "black agenda" turns up 20,600,000 results. A search for the "feminist agenda" reveals 895,000 results. A similar search on "gay agenda" provides 5,050,000 results. So if other minority groups are pushing their causes, and proudly label them as agendas, why should we fear one from the gay community?
Because being gay is "vile" with "painful and sometimes deadly consequences," says Mr Bethel.
DEBUNKING THE MYTHS
If a non-objective reader drew nothing else from the pastor's reproof, it would be that all gays are child molesters, infected with a myriad of nasty diseases, violent, and intent on destroying the family. Throughout his piece, the pastor clumps homosexuality with the illicit act of paedophilia, as if the two are interchangeable.
He says that homophobes are right to fear gays as molesters ready to snatch little children out of their beds. He mentions an association - the North American Man and Boy Love Association (NAMBLA) - not mentioning that the fringe group has long been ostracised from and denounced by the international gay community for advocating for legal sex with young boys.
"These goals (of NAMBLA) constitute a form of child abuse and are repugnant to GLAAD," the group has said. NAMBLA has been subject to intense investigation and raids by the FBI, has about 1,200 members worldwide.
However it is not a new phenomenon for people to disenfranchise minorities by painting them all as lecherous fiends.
"Members of disliked minority groups are often stereotyped as representing a danger to the majority's most vulnerable members. For example, Jews in the Middle Ages were accused of murdering Christian babies in ritual sacrifices. Black men in the United States were often lynched after being falsely accused of raping white women. In a similar fashion, gay people have often been portrayed as a threat to children," writes Dr Gregory Herek, professor of psychology at the University of California at Davis, and an authority on sexual prejudice, in the essay Facts About Homosexuality and Child Molestation.
Pastor Bethel says he is arguing based on the facts, and lists a number of dubious statistics detailing, among other things, the high rates of violence, disease and promiscuity among homosexuals. The conclusion he would like persons to reach is that gays are afflicted with these problems only because they are homosexuals. Using his line of thinking, I wonder what Pastor Bethel would say about the high rate of violence among African-Americans in the US? Is it because they are black?
Of course not. What is true however, is that in many countries both gays and blacks are classified as minority groups. As such, they have historically been subjected to discrimination, violence and marginalised. Indeed this pattern repeats itself among oppressed minorities around the world including American Indians, non white Hispanics, etc.
On the question of promiscuity, I don't believe heterosexuals possess the moral high ground on this. Here in the Bahamas the most recent figures released by the Department of Statistics revealed that out of the 5,126 live births in the Bahamas in 2007 - 3,047 of them were to unwed mothers. Young girls between the ages of 15 and 19, who accounted for 604 live births in the respective period, had 581 children out of wedlock.
GAYS AND GOD
After my earlier article was published, I received an email from an angry reader who stressed to me that there should be no debate on this subject because the Bible decrees being gay an "abomination". The reader added that if God intended gays to be a part of the natural order, he would have created "Adam and Steve, not Adam and Eve".
K Darnell Giles, writes that the Creation story and a handful of other scriptures have been used by extremists to justify hatred and exclusion of gays. But this stance is based on "historical church practice and rumours" rather than an educated analysis of the Bible, Giles contends.
He explains that one cannot interpret today's Bible without understanding the cultural context of the scriptures. Scriptures that were translated into English from ancient Hebrew and Greek languages, which may not have had equivalent English translations.
It is argued that God created a man and a woman to populate the earth in His image, something extremists argue is impossible in a gay relationship therefore against God's master plan.
For this argument to hold water, it would have to apply to sterile men or infertile women, people who are biologically or otherwise incapable of reproducing.
"Are these men and women to be cast away by God because they are not bearing His image through procreation? Are they committing some type of sin because they cannot or choose not to produce children? Of course not," says Giles in his book, What Did Jesus Say? Why the Bible Does Not Condemn Homosexuality.
"I believe African Americans, above all other people, owe it to themselves to take a deeper look at the scriptures for a clearer understanding of its teaching on homosexuality instead of passively continuing the marginalizing of this people group.
"For hundreds of years, African American people have been oppressed as homosexuals are today, although in manners and with methods far more harsh.
"Our oppressors misinterpreted the same Bible to enslave our ancestors; and it is now used to marginalize and teach ignorance about homosexuals. The same holds true for how women have been treated in the distant and recent past within church culture and society as a whole," wrote Giles.
WHAT ARE WE FIGHTING FOR?
I don't see it as a stretch to say that Pastor Bethel responded so vehemently to my article because he thought it was a fight he thought he could win - presumably because he feels the majority of Bahamians are on his side. This is not the only way in which Pastor Bethel and the rest of the Christian Council are strategic in their choice of battles - they also choose only to attack issues which threaten their privileged position as self-appointed moral arbiters of the nation.
This is why domestic abuse, crime, violence, infidelity and a host of other problems this country faces are not on their most wanted list - everyone agrees these are social evils. Instead, they choose to rail against sexual orientation, gambling and "immoral" films, as these fall into the category of things they could formerly control, but which an increasing number of Bahamians feel are private affairs.
Lyall Bethel and his colleagues would pretend that in policing perceived "immoral activities", they are merely expressing their right to voice their opinions. But in agitating for stricter anti-gambling laws, urging Bahamians to take a stand against "further infiltration of homosexuality" and attempting to ban certain films from being seen by adults in theatres in the Bahamas, they are pushing for the state to limit the freedom of responsible, intelligent, adult individuals - much like the Sharia law in fundamentalist Islamic societies.
This suggests that they hold a number of assumptions which are incompatible with modern Bahamian society - among them that we are not qualified to make our own moral choices, that we are little more than children and require the enlightened guidance of men of the cloth, and - ironically - that their influence is so weak that they need the law to reinforce their position.
tribune242
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