Americans’ Role Seen in Uganda Anti-Gay Push

A podcast I listen to almost religiously, The Bugle, was recently reporting on a new bill put forth in Uganda that would bring about a death penalty to those ruled as being homosexual or engaging in homosexual activity. Yes, the death penalty. Other facets of the bill included reparations for 'victims' of homosexuality and other equally ludicrous propositions. It turns out that the entire thing has been pushed through the government system by a small troop of evangelical Christians who made presentations a few months ago (download the recordings). Read the news article detailing the mess:

The theme of the event, according to Stephen Langa, its Ugandan organizer, was “the gay agenda — that whole hidden and dark agenda” — and the threat homosexuals posed to Bible-based values and the traditional African family.

For three days thousands of Ugandans, including police officers, teachers and national politicians, listened raptly to the Americans, who were presented as experts on homosexuality. The visitors discussed how to make gay people straight, how gay men often sodomized teenage boys and how “the gay movement is an evil institution” whose goal is “to defeat the marriage-based society and replace it with a culture of sexual promiscuity.”

The three Americans who spoke at the conference — Scott Lively, a missionary who has written several books against homosexuality, including “7 Steps to Recruit-Proof Your Child”; Caleb Lee Brundidge, a self-described former gay man who leads “healing seminars”; and Don Schmierer, a board member of Exodus International, whose mission is “mobilizing the body of Christ to minister grace and truth to a world impacted by homosexuality” — are now trying to distance themselves from the bill.

The Ugandan government, facing the prospect of losing millions in foreign aid, is now indicating that it will back down, slightly, and change the death penalty provision to life in prison for some homosexuals. But the battle is far from over.

The naiveté of the Ugandan government and its people is difficult to comprehend. I haven't a clue how the 'homosexual lifestyle' can pose a threat to traditional family values or threaten to displace them. Homosexuality isn't exactly conducive to genetic propagation and as such is more or less isolated in its nature—homosexuals aren't multiplying and forcing their lifestyles onto other people, unlike Christians and other religious sects.

The evangelizing Christians have bit off more than they can chew and are now distancing themselves from what was arguably their exact intent. What falls on deaf ears in North America was rapidly absorbed and acted upon in an African country where superstition and Christianity have fused to create a frightening chimera. I imagine that in a perfect world their slanderous statements could at least somehow be litigated, but I know that this will likely not be the case.