Facing Backlash Brunei Says It Will Not Enforce Gay Sex Death Penalty

Protesters outside the Dorchester hotel in London, owned by Sultan Hassanal Bolkiah.

I continue to see fundamentalist religions of all stripes as a bane on human existence and responsible for far more misery and death than their often pathetic charitable endeavors can ever outweigh. Fundamentalism, be it Christian or Islamic, puts literal interpretations of selective passages from supposed scripture to target those who do not conform or who hold differing faiths,  By both design and default, hatred of others and a division of society are the primary fruits of fundamentalism.  Fortunately, both in the USA and around the world - at least outside of Muslim countries - more and more people are recognizing fundamentalist religion and its message of hate and inhumanity towards others as reprehensible and unacceptable.  This is the lesson the Sultan of Brunei has learned the hard way after implementing "Sharia law" that would subject gays to death by stoning. The backlash to this medieval law has been wide and intense, ranging from boycotts of the top tier hotels owned by the Sultan to nations refusing to have their personnel in Brunei.   A piece in The Guardian looks at the Sultan's announcement that the barbaric law will not be enforced (while an improvement, it needs to be repealed).  Here are article highlights:

Brunei’s Sultan, Hassanal Bolkiah, has extended a moratorium on the death penalty to incoming legislation on punishments for gay sex, after a global backlash led by celebrities such as George Clooney and Elton John.

The country provoked an outcry when it rolled out its interpretation of Islamic laws, or sharia, on 3 April, punishing sodomy, adultery and rape with death, including by stoning.
Brunei has consistently defended its right to implement the laws, . . . . However, in a rare response to criticism aimed at the oil-rich state, the sultan said on Sunday that the death penalty would not be enforced in the implementation of the sharia penal code order (SPCO).

The vastly wealthy sultan, who once piloted his own 747 airliner to meet the former US president Barack Obama, often faces criticism from activists who view his absolute monarchy as despotic, but it is unusual for him to respond.

The sultan’s office released an official English translation of his speech, which is not common practice.

“Both the common law and the sharia law aim to ensure peace and harmony of the country,” he said. “They are also crucial in protecting the morality and decency of the country as well as the privacy of individuals.”

The law’s implementation, which the UN condemned, prompted celebrities and rights groups to seek a boycott on hotels owned by the sultan, including the Dorchester in London and the Beverley Hills hotel in Los Angeles.

Several multinational companies have since banned staff from using the sultan’s hotels, while some travel companies have stopped promoting Brunei as a tourist destination.

Hate Group Role in Bermuda Marriage Repeal; Options to Boycott Bermuda and Cruise Lines

Cunard's Queen Mary 2 is among the ships registered in Bermuda.

One of the often unnoticed efforts of American Christofascists is to export their hate and fear based religious beliefs to less developed nations, especially in Africa where a less educated populace is susceptible to their lies and propaganda. Having lost the war against same sex marriage - at least for now - in America, their focus is on maintaining hate and prejudice abroad.  The Southern Poverty Law Center - the same organization that tracks Neo-Nazi and white supremacist groups - tracts the activities of anti-LGBT groups that disseminate deliberate lies and false propaganda and where appropriate certifies these groups as hate groups.  Among those who have earned the hate group designation is a veritable who's who of "family values" groups to which the Republican Party routinely prostitutes itself (we saw this on Thursday in Virginia in the House of Delegates).  One such hate group is the secretive National Organization for Marriage ("NOM") that has never revealed its principal sources of funding. Now, NOM - always big into self promotion - is claiming responsibility for the propaganda campaign that saw Bermuda rescind same sex marriage.  Here's part of the press release:

NOM played a significant behind-the-scenes role in the tremendous victory in Bermuda. Our team advised pro-marriage supporters there on strategies to preserve marriage and I travelled there twice to meet with activists from Preserve Marriage Bermuda to discuss potential strategies. In 2016, Bermuda conducted a national referendum to advise the Parliament on whether gay ‘marriage’ should be allowed, with 68% of voters resoundingly rejecting same-sex ‘marriage.’

Despite the overwhelming voter rejection of redefining marriage, in 2017 the Bermuda Supreme Court imposed gay ‘marriage’ on the nation. This proved to be a short-lived ruling as the Preserve Marriage Bermuda coalition rallied supporters to demand that marriage be restored.

NOM heartily congratulates the people of Bermuda and the leadership of Preserve Marriage Bermuda. Their efforts are a powerful proof point that the “inevitability” of same-sex ‘marriage is a lie and that the fight for marriage can be won, even when the judicial elite think they can impose their will on a country, as tragically occurred here in the U.S. 

Meanwhile, CNBC is reporting that Bermuda's embrace of bigotry will prove costly to both Bermuda and cruise lines registered in Bermuda - Cunard, P&O, Princess Cruises, etc., - which no find themselves tied to an anti-gay country and susceptible to possible boycotts.  One can only hope that these cruise lines will change their country of registry to one less hostile to LGBT tourists.  Personally, I have always wanted to do a Cunard cruise, but that will not happen as long as Cunard's vessels are registered in an anti-gay country such as Bermuda.  Here are excerpts from the CNBC article:

The decision has put Bermuda tourism and some major cruise lines in a difficult spot. Carnival subsidiaries Cunard and P&O Cruises are both registered in Bermuda. Regardless of where the ships are in the world, they will no longer be allowed to host same-sex marriages. Princess Cruises, also part of Carnival, has ships registered in Bermuda as well. In August, the three Carnival cruise lines said they had started taking bookings for same-sex marriages at sea.

Bermuda hosted 693,000 tourists in 2017, and these visitors spent $431 million. The same-sex marriage ban will force many couples to rethink their travel plans. Bermuda's cruise ship economy grew last year. Bermuda received 161 cruise ship calls, bringing 416,049 passengers, an increase of 4.6 percent, and the government was forecasting more growth this year based on the 2017 numbers.

"Bermuda will have a backlash," Justin Nelson, the president and co-founder of the National LGBT Chamber of Commerce, wrote in an email. "Countries and travels brands know that LGBT inclusive tourism is big business — and Bermuda is going to suffer painful economic losses because of its decision to turn back the clock on same-sex marriages."

Nelson says more than 80 percent of the American LGBT population has passports, compared to about 40 percent for the rest of the population. He estimates the economic impact of LGBT travel worldwide at more than $100 billion. "Our communities make conscientious decisions based upon who has demonstrated policies that have our backs," Nelson wrote.

The Bermuda Tourism Authority wrote a letter to the Senate in December urging the lawmakers not to pass the repeal. "Same-sex marriage is already the law of our island and to roll that back for what will be seen as a less equal union will cause us serious reputational damage," the letter reads. "It's not only LGBT travelers that care about equal rights based on sexual orientation. Our research indicates many companies, consumers and travelers, including the overwhelming majority of the younger visitors powering Bermuda's growth, care about this issue."

P&O Cruises and Cunard must now grapple with how to appeal to same-sex couples who can no longer get married on their ships. . . . . As long as Bermuda's same-sex marriage ban remains, Bennington and his husband — and likely many other couples like them — said they will travel elsewhere.

Also of note, for those seeking a tropical island vacation but without the bigotry of Bermuda, Rex Wockner's blog provides alternatives where same sex marriage is legal.  Here are excerpts:

Bonaire » Caribbean Sea
Guadeloupe » Caribbean Sea

Martinique » Caribbean Sea
Puerto Rico » Caribbean Sea
Saba » Caribbean Sea
Saint Barthélemy » Caribbean Sea
Saint-Martin » Caribbean Sea
Sint Eustatius » Caribbean Sea
 U.S. Virgin Islands » Caribbean Sea

Could Jamaica End Colonial-Era Gay Sex Ban?

Years ago I traveled to Jamaica on business when I was in-house counsel for an oil company.  I found the country to be gorgeous (on one trip I stayed here), the people friendly and a place I'd love to visit again were it no so homophobic.  Indeed, because of the rabid homophobia in Jamaica and its sodomy laws that date back to the imposition of British penal law against same sex relations - which calls for punishment of up to 10 years in prison with hard labor for those convicted of the "abominable crime of buggery" - in my view, one would have to be crazy to visit Jamaica if you are gay.  It's simply too dangerous.  Now, a legal challenge has been launched to have the law repealed.  It goes without saying that ignorance embracing "Christians" and parasitic pastors are opposed to bringing the nation into the 21st century.   Interestingly, the nation's largest newspaper, The Gleaner, has come out in favor of repeal of the law.  First highlights on the legal action from The Advocate:

Human rights activist Maurice Tomlinson filed a constitutional challenge to Jamaica's 1864 law banning "buggery," a.k.a. sodomy, on Thursday, the Associated Press reports — and some are seeing it as a first step at tackling the Caribbean nation's deep animus toward LGBT people.

Tomlinson's challenge follows a similar lawsuit that was brought last year, but was later withdrawn after the plaintiff faced threats against himself and his family. The initial challenge prompted a homophobic rally that brought 25,000 people to the streets.

The current law calls for punishment of up to 10 years in prison with hard labor for those convicted of the "abominable crime of buggery." Tomlinson's attorney say the law violates the Jamaican constitution by conflicting with the nation's Charter of Fundamental Rights and Freedoms. Activists say the law legitimizes discrimination and encourages violence against LGBT people, of which there is no shortage in Jamaica.

"The law is a gross violation of my human rights and those of all LGBTI people in my country," Tomlinson said in a statement. "It directly infringes numerous rights guaranteed by Jamaica's Charter of Fundamental Rights and Freedoms, and also fuels horrific violence."

As for The Gleaner's editorial, here are excerpts:

[W]e, like Mr Tomlinson and many other rational Jamaicans, know instinctively that not only are those laws offensive to the universal principles of individual rights and freedoms, but they are probably contrary to guarantees afforded by Jamaica's Constitution.

Under Jamaica's anachronistic sections of the Offences Against the Person Act, anal penetration, even between consulting adults, including husband and wife, and conducted in utmost privacy, is illegal, for which people can be sent to jail. But this criminalisation of anal sex is a cudgel used primarily against males in a still largely homophobic society, despite the pockets of increasing tolerance for male homosexuality.

These old attitudes, underpinned by the law, have consequences, some, while perhaps unintended, painfully severe. Not least of these being the assault on the dignity and emotional well-being of that significant proportion of the Jamaican society, male and female, that is homosexual. They are denied the right to openly display affection, or, in privacy, engage in acts of physical intimacy with persons they love or with whom they wish to have sexual relations.
If the State doesn't get you, the vigilantes might.

Little wonder that Jamaica has among the hemisphere's highest rates of HIV-AIDS among men who have sex with men. So, there is a public-health problem that is exacerbated by this silly old law.

Further, as we often argue, this newspaper sees no logic to the Jamaican State setting itself up as a kind of voyeuristic commissar of sexual practices. It certainly has no right in people's bedrooms to determine the acts in which they engage, whatever the gender or status of the participants.

The fundamental argument in favour of the buggery law is framed in a fundamentalist Christian and biblical construct of morality, to which probably the majority of Jamaicans subscribe. However, the Constitution prescribes freedom of religion, which we believe means not only the Judaeo-Christian variety. Importantly, also implied in this construct, we believe, is freedom from religion. Religious people have no greater right than others to be final arbiters of moral principles.