Comments on Burkina Faso’s New Policies
I read recently that Burkina Faso implemented laws criminalizing homosexuality in the nation. As is usually the case, these new laws have incited much discourse and debate over the nature of such laws not only in Burkina Faso, but in Africa. The debate is usually split between those who view such laws as being rooted in reactionary religious views which seek to impose harsh penalties on individuals who are engaging in behaviors which ultimately do not materially harm the citizens of Burkina Faso. Others defend such laws on the grounds that African nations should have the right to pass laws which uphold the cultural values of those societies.
Part of the issue with these debates is that they are always framed in alien cultural terms. This is to state that the dichotomy presented is usually between Western liberal values and Western/Arabic religious views. One side frames the issue as being that certain groups wish to impose Western liberal values on Africa, whereas the other side frames the issue as being that African societies have become too heavily indoctrinated with the foreign religious doctrines of Christianity and Islam. It should be noted here that Africa did have its own views on homosexuality which existed independently of what Western Christian and Arabic Islamic societies were doing.
I addressed traditional African attitudes on homosexuality in an essay titled “Homosexuality in Africa: A Cultural Debate”. The conclusion that I draw in that essay is that some African societies did in fact have a negative view of homosexuality. The Azande people, for example, believed that any man who preferred being with another man rather than a woman had to be crazy. I make this point here to show that negative views of homosexuality did exist in Africa even independently of Abrahamic religions influences.
Abrahamic religions are historically hostile towards homosexuality. This is expressed in the Book of Leviticus in which the Hebrews are instructed to kill any man who has sex with another man. Sodom and Gomorrah were also destroyed because of its immoral sexual behavior (Jude 1:7). The Bible does not explicitly state the two cities were engaged in homosexual actions, but the association with these cities and homosexuality was such that the English word sodomy comes from the city of Sodom. The Quran very explicitly states that the people of Sodom and Gomorrah were destroyed because they lusted after men rather than women (7:80–81). In the Bible and the Quran, homosexuality is not only a sin, but one which is punished very violently.
These denouncements of homosexuality within Abrahamic religions have led to a history of very harsh persecution of homosexuals. This is where traditional African societies and Abrahamic religious tradition depart because even though some African cultures held a negative view of homosexuality, this did not result in the brutal oppression of individuals who engaged in such acts. In my essay, I give one example of violence against an individual who failed to conform to establish gender norms. This was an incident mentioned in The Ovimbundu of Angola in which it was noted that a man who dressed like a woman was beaten by his father, brother, and uncle. Otherwise, there is no mention of violence against such persons, despite the fact that it was noted in the same book that the Ovimbundu people regarded homosexuality as being “very bad”.
Kwame Ture argued that the problem of homosexuality was really a problem of Western intolerance. He noted that African cultures are historically very tolerant of differences. This is largely true. Even African societies in which homosexuality was viewed negatively, there was still a general tolerance which meant that such individuals were not typically repressed as is often the case in many modern African nations which have strong foreign cultural influences. This often results in rather contradictory positions, such as in the Gambia where Yahya Jammeh decried the presence of prisons in Africa as being the consequence of colonialism. In the very same speech, Jammeh also proclaimed that he would jail all the homosexuals in his country.
Apart from the contradiction of implementing colonial solutions in the name of defending traditional African culture, there is also the problem of the hypocritical manner in which these laws are implemented. For example, the Book of Leviticus also instructs that men who commit adultery should be killed along with the women that they commit the act with, yet African nations which pass laws to ban homosexuality tend not to pass laws outlawing adultery. There was one incident in Nigeria in which Bukar Abba Ibrahim, who implemented Sharia Law in Yobe state when he was governor, was caught on film having an affair. Under Sharia Law the penalty for such a transgression is 40 lashes, but no such penalty was inflicted upon Ibrahim. In Africa, laws which impose upon the sexual morality of the ordinary citizens are often violated by political leaders who are very selective about which Biblical and Quranic laws regarding sexual morality are to be upheld.
I am completely against the hypocritical practice of Western nations speaking out about human rights in Africa where the topic of homosexuality is concerned when those same Western nations either turn a blind eye to or support other human rights abuses. With that being stated, I am also concerned about the draconian laws around homosexuality. I understand that African societies have their own traditional views on this matter which are rooted in the family-centered nature of traditional African societies. At the same time, I also have the view that laws which are designed to criminalize those who engage in homosexuality reflect a foreign cultural influence on Africa.
