if “promoting homosexuality” were a crime, they wouldnt have access to legal assistance. lawyers wouldnt be in a hurry to help them, since court would be quick to punish those who “promote homosexuality” by defending LGBT ugandans in court… 5 to 7 years aint no joke.

ugandans need to decriminalize homosexuality and introduce laws to protect its LGBT citizens from dangerous elements in their anti-gay environment.

those opposing the bill would have to tiptoe their way around being accused of promoting homosexuality, being “pro-gay” or receiving pink dollars from the western-based multi-billion dollar neo-colonialist Gay International Organisation floating somewhere up in the sky, drizzling big bucks on those willing to oppose the bill, promote homosexuality or recruit kids.

i saw the contents of the “teenager’s toolkit” publication from unicef… it advised teens struggling with same sex attractions not to freak out and advised peers to be compassionate towards those struggling with same sex attractions… stuff like that got unicef accused of “promoting homosexuality” in schools.

as pointed out in the article, outlawing “the promotion of homosexuality” would present a major setback in that country’s HIV/AIDS response.

entering a gay chatroom, setting up a profile on a gay personals website, sending a text message to your same gender significant other, purchasing will & grace dvds, joining an LGBT facebook group, a pride flag on your bumper, or posting comments on LGBT websites… any of those actions could get you 5 to 7 years for “promoting homosexuality”.

“promoting homosexuality” is extremely broad and breaches freedom of speech, and or the right to privacy. dunno about freedom of speech in uganda, but the right to privacy is in the ugandan constitution.

while this development is very welcome – it’s much better than passing that horrible bill as it was written… call me pushy or ungrateful, but i’m sorry… this isn’t good enough.

these guys wanna imprison people over “promoting homosexuality” because they know that as long as Ugandans are free to talk, discuss or debate LGBT concerns – gay rights for LGBT Ugandans will become an inevitable reality. so, in a twisted acceptance of defeat, they shut the whole thing down because they are anticipating a serious intellectual, legal, theological and international beat down in their fight against LGBT rights. that’s all they’ve got left.

clearly uganda wants and needs to be part of the global community. i think they’ve got a seat on the UN security council, we’ve all heard about ugandan oil reserves. but introducing laws against “promoting homosexuality” is so backward and auto-ostracizing in a world where openly gay people serve as big decision makers in politics, religion, development, trade etc. this, while the rest of the world debates gay marriage, anti-discrimination laws for LGBT citizens or at least decriminalization of homosexuality.

they should not be allowed to get away with this.

In addition to simply amending existing bills to incorporate the draconian aspects of Bahati’s bill rather than leaving it as a stand alone (or new) bill.

In other words, my expectation is that not much will improve and am waiting to see the actual amount of damage they’re committed to creating.