Why Southeast Asia’s LGBT community is finally coming out

[reader]

From South China Morning Post

By Kok Xinghui

• Social media, K-pop, boys love dramas and gay characters on Netflix – all have played a part in bringing LGBT issues into the mainstream, activists say
• But greater visibility has also brought a backlash. On Facebook, people troll newlywed Thai men, in Indonesia, a woman was burned to death

Joshua Simon. Photo: Handout

In 2019, Simon became one of the faces for Pink Dot. That same year, he pulled out of a TEDx talk hosted by a local university after he was asked not to make “sensitive” comments about his sexuality. That made headlines in Singapore and Simon “pretty much had to then come out to the rest of the country”.

Today, he is one of three men who call themselves the SG Boys and run a podcast on gay issues, discussing everything from loneliness to what it was like coming out to their families.

Simon is not alone. Across Southeast Asia, activists are noticing people are more willing to come out, talk about and campaign for LGBT issues and right.

The shift, they say, began about a decade ago but has accelerated in the past five years or so.

Simon attributes his increasing willingness to talk about LGBT issues to a number of things: the crowds at Pink Dot showing him it was okay to openly identify as a gay man; shows on Netflix

portraying LGBT characters as regular, normal people and an increasing number of straight people in Singapore showing support.

As Southeast Asia is largely conservative, advocating for LGBT rights can be an uphill battle. 

Thailand is an exception. It is considering allowing same sex marriages and while there still isn’t full acceptance of LGBT people, a 2019 study by the United Nations.

Development Programme found that 69 per cent of non-LGBT Thais reported generally positive attitudes towards LGBT people. Thailand is also a key producer of  Boys Love dramas, a subgenre depicting erotic relationships between male characters that is popular across Asia and portrays gay relationships as normal. 

And while Vietnam has decriminalised gay marriage and allows same-sex couples to live together, homosexuality is a crime in other countries. Malaysia and Indonesia have Islamic laws that are even more prohibitive. In Indonesia’s Aceh province, gay men are publicly caned for having same sex relationships.

Continues with photos

https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/lifestyle-culture/article/3130704/why-southeast-asias-lgbt-community-finally-coming-out

[PeterRS]

I think it will be useful to explain for those who do not know Singapore about Pink Dot. For years the LGBT community in Singapore had been trying to organise a Gay Pride Parade. Several other cities in the region had been holding one for some years - Tokyo, Seoul, Hong Kong and by far and away the largest and best organised of them all in Taipei. Close to 200,000 attended the 2019 Taipei Parade which was part of a week-end of parties and other events. Taipei is not the only city in Taiwan to hold a Gay Parade. Most of the major cities have their own Parades. By comparison, attendance in the other cities around Asia is usually only a few thousand, rarely more than 10,000.

Singapore gays, like their counterparts in Malaysia, suffer from the notorious British colonial law, Section 377A. This punishes gay sex with terms in jail and sometimes a few lashes of the cane. The government of Singapore has consistently refused to remove this law (as Hong Kong did in 1990) because, it believes, it will upset the ethnic balance in a city with major Chinese, Malay Muslim and Indian communities. It also panders to the several large Christian evangelical churches that have sprung up in recent decades who are extremely vocal in condemning gay life and behaviour.

Although the present Prime Minister has said he will not repeal Section 377A, he added it will not be enacted. So entrapment by cute young police officers will no longer take place. Gays can live their lives without harassment as long as they do not upset the apple cart, as it were. Without a Pride Parade, the local gay community (which by all accounts is quite large) decided to hold an annual gathering in a local park. They encouraged everyone to wear pink and called it Pink Dot. After a few years, this became extremely popular. As the Asian base for many international companies, an increasing number sponsored Pink Dot. These included J P Morgan, Godman Sachs, Google, Visa and General Electric. But this had become too much for the authorities. In 2017 they banned non-Singaporean companies from sponsorship. The organisers had very little time to replace it with sponsorship by local companies but they succeeded. For an even longer time, they have also banned foreigners from taking part. For the government, Pink Dot is just an embarrassment.

Yet, if anyone is embarrassed it should be the Prime Minister. Not only is his nephew gay, he married his partner two years ago in South Africa. Months later the couple attended the Pink Dot event accompanied by the Prime Minister's brother and his wife.

The happy couple with their parents at the 2019 Pink Dot. Photo: Singapore Pink Dot

In the dark of the evening, all the attendees, many of whom come with family members and just people from the community who believe the law should be changed, light up the park with pink torches. These images go around the world and are a further embarrassment to the Singapore government.

Photo: Singapore Pink Dot

[PeterRS]

16 hours ago, reader said:

Thailand is an exception. It is considering allowing same sex marriages and while there still isn’t full acceptance of LGBT people, a 2019 study by the United Nations.Development Programme found that 69 per cent of non-LGBT Thais reported generally positive attitudes towards LGBT people. Thailand is also a key producer of  Boys Love dramas, a subgenre depicting erotic relationships between male characters that is popular across Asia and portrays gay relationships as normal. 

And while Vietnam has decriminalised gay marriage and allows same-sex couples to live together, homosexuality is a crime in other countries. Malaysia and Indonesia have Islamic laws that are even more prohibitive. In Indonesia’s Aceh province, gay men are publicly caned for having same sex relationships.

Since the South China Morning Post is owned by Jack Ma, former Chairman of the Alibaba Group, it is perhaps understandable that the article makes only a brief reference to Taiwan. Yet while Thailand and Vietnam have been taking baby steps on LGBT rights, Taiwan has marched forward at considerable speed. It's extraordinary to realise that until 1987 Taiwan had been under martial law for close to 40 years. Since then, it has become a rare beacon of true democracy in Asia. It has also become the regional leader in LGBT rights. I don't know enough about the history but I do think it is partly a result of a group of committed LGBT activists who decided they would not use aggressive tactics. Instead, they emphasised co-operation with local and national governments and aimed at winning over what was regarded as a very socially conservative population. The end result is that almost two years ago, Taiwan enacted laws permitting gay marriage, the first country in Asia. Discrimination within the island is virtually a thing of the past.

I believe the annual Gay Pride Parade in Taiwan had more than a little to do with this. The first formal Parade was held in 2003. Instead of being financed by commercial gay venues and associated gay products and attended only by sex workers and lardyboys (as was the case in Bangkok around the turn of the millennium - one reason why that Parade died very quickly), Taipei was organised solely by individuals. They wanted the Parades to be fun for both participants and those watching from the pavements. Each Parade also promoted a social message. The emphasis was co-operation.

Over the years the numbers attending increased. Originally it was only gay guys and gals from Taipei. Quickly they were joined by members of the LGBT community in other cities on the island. Within ten years, there were regular attenders from other Asian countries. By that time the attendance was 65,000. Now it is a truly international fun weekend with around 200,000 participants. So large has it become that the Parade route has had to be split into 3. All start and end close to City Hall where a number of gay singers and other stars entertain the crowd.

Presently Taiwan is closed to foreigners. Hopefully this will change later in the year. The 2021 Parade is on Saturday 30 October.