Happy pride month! This week’s post is all about the LGBTQ+ community in South Asian countries.
According to UNICEF, homosexuality did exist in ancient India, therefore it has always been a part of India’s history. For instance, it was represented in several Hindu temples where we could see images of same-sex people embracing each other. There is also proof of existence of homosexuality in religious books, most specifically in sanskrit religious sources such as Manusmriti and Shikhandi or even a chapter of the Kamasutra of Vatsyayana.
Afterwards, as to its perception, everyone knew about these practices, their existence, but it was definitely not accepted as it was already poorly seen. Indeed, in an article found in the newspaper called India Today, it included different types of punishments people accused of homosexuality would face : women’s hair would be shaved, two of their fingers would be cut off, and for men accused of having gay sexual intercourses, they would risk a loss of their caste.
In Ancient India, homosexuality was not thought of as a crime, but it wasn’t encouraged either. However, when the British colonists arrived in India, they gave homosexuality its known criminal perception. The one ruling that was established in India that truly reveals the impact of the colonists’ arrival is the famous section 377 of the Indian Penal Code introduced in 1861 which criminalized sexual activities “against order of nature”, these sexual activities obviously included homosexuality, but also intercourse with minors or non-consensual sexual activities.
Homosexuality was firstly decriminalized back in 2009, after a decision of the Indian Supreme Court; which invalidated the section 377 of the Indian Penal Code of the LGBTQ+ community that used to criminalize same-sex intercourses and was voted in by the British colonists. But a few years after this major law, the ISC decided to review its previous ruling: in 2013, homosexuality was a crime, once more.
In September of 2019, the Supreme Court once again decided to review this 2013 decision, and stated that homosexuality was legal again, and that discrimination based on a sexual orientation was a violation of fundamental rights.
But legalization doesn’t always equal acceptance.
South Asia is built on pride and reputation. South Asia finds others’ opinions more important than the wellbeing of their family. They don’t want to be judged, and they don’t want to be considered abnormal.
There is an unofficial list of “don'ts” in our culture, and not being straight seems to be at the top of the list. Being anything but heterosexual is considered as “not normal” and families don’t want to deal with their relatives’ unsolicited thoughts. The desi mindset makes it impossible for LGBTQ youth to accept their identities. When South Asians do come out to their families, a majority of times, their families won’t be accepting of their identity, and they’ll continue to be in denial. Additionally, many families may be okay with the concept of being gay or bisexual: as long as their child isn’t. In the end, these traditional values overpower the emotions of South Asian Children.
Because there is such a stigma around being part of the LGBTQ+ community in South Asia, there is very little Desi representation. There isn’t much discussion of sexuality in the South Asian community, so most South Asians will stay closeted. However, even though this is true this doesn’t mean that there is no representation. We wanted to highlight some LGBTQ+ Desis who have helped pave the way for others to be open about their sexuality.
Tanveer Wasim: "Tan" France, is a British-American fashion designer, television personality, and author. He is one of the first openly gay South Asian men on a major show and one of the first out Muslim gay men on western television as the fashion expert for the Netflix series Queer Eye, host of the web series Dressing Funny, and co-host of Next In Fashion.
Shonali Bose is Indian film director, writer and film producer.. She created the film Margarita with a Straw, which features a relationship between two women. And Bose herself is bisexual.
Anjali Chakra and Sufi Malik are a popular U.S. desi same-sex couple who are sharing their relationship with the world.
"The Big Day", a Netflix original series, showcases six weddings that represent the highest end of India's $50 billion wedding industry. One of the show's most memorable couples was former cruise ship captain Tyrone Braganza, who is from the Southern Indian city of Goa, and the German-born celebrity makeup artist Daniel Bauer. Viewers watch as Braganza and Bauer work to create wedding ceremonies that both acknowledge their relationship and honor the traditions of Braganza's Goan Catholic family, Bauer's German ancestry and the South Indian culture of Bauer's Chennai-born grandfather.
While same-sex marriage is still prohibited in India, Braganza and Bauer's wedding was widely covered in the Indian media, and several of Bauer's celebrity clients attended the ceremony. The show also introduces the audience to Braganza's mother and Bauer's parents, both of whom were apprehensive initially, but eventually came around to support the couple.
The Pasupu reached out to a follower and interviewed them on being part of the LGBTQ+ Community, and dealing with the stigmas of the South Asian Community. For privacy reasons, their identity will remain anonymous.
With such stigma of being gay in the SA community, how did it affect your coming out?
Initially with me, it was less of a stigma, but simply more unheard of. I never knew what gay was, my parents never talked about it with me. It made it that much harder to accept my sexuality. When someone as important to me as my parents says to me, “it’s just a phase,” I believed them because I didn't know what else to believe; these were completely new feelings. If my parents were more supportive, I would’ve spent less time being so confused. I kept thinking to myself what they said to me, that my sexuality was a phase, in order to justify these feelings because my parents were never supportive. It complicated things much more than it should’ve, and now it’s become a complicated topic for me to even discuss with my parents.
My parents are a little more progressive, and at the end of the day, they care about my happiness. It would definitely take a lot of time for them to accept me for who I am, but I think they would come to terms with it. I don’t know if they’d ever be 100% accepting of my sexuality, but they would realize that this part of me isn’t something that is going to change. The problem with the South Asian Community is that a lot of parents aren’t going to come around and eventually accept their kids. They’ll hold onto these traditional values and straight up reject their child. They want to raise the ideal child; families care more about their reputation, and having an LGBTQ child will “tarnish” that.
We have found there to be very little Desi LGBTQ+ Representation. Did you have a role model or someone you looked up to?
I didn’t. As a brown kid, there are brown actors I looked up to, and LGBTQ actors I looked up to. There was never someone I found that was both. I always felt that I was somewhere in the middle, and I was someone weird minority that would never get representation in the media. Role models, people to look up to: I had to differentiate myself. I had to split myself up and say, “you’re this minority you can look up to these people, and you’re this minority and you can look up to this group of people.” I never had someone to look up to that fit all the criteria I could relate to.
I’m glad there is more representation now, and I’ve loved seeing the media become more diverse. But, I wish I had more representation growing up so I would’ve been able to understand my feelings better.
Do you think that future SA generations will be more accepting of the LGBTQ+ Community? How can we start to create that change?
I definitely think so because all of my desi friends near me are first generation South Asians, and a lot of them have grown up with my progressive values. Living in America, they see the change around them and adapt. That means that when we become parents, we will be the accepting parents that we didn’t have. I think that the one thing we can do to really foster change is to support LGBTQ youth, and to support any type of representation we get in the media. Even if they’re not perfect, supporting them is the biggest thing that we can do.
Not being accepted for who you are by the people you love the most hurts. It doesn’t matter the scenario, but it will take a hit on one’s Mental Health. Many South Asians go into depression, and many unfortunately take their lives. The suicide rate in general for those apart of the LGBTQ+ Community is significantly higher than the average rate.
The Pasupu believes that our generation will be the change. Once we have our own children, there will be much less fear to come out; our generation has grown up with extremely progressive values, and have been taught about the importance of accepting all.
If you are a South Asian apart of the LGBTQ+ Community that needs support, https://www.deqh.org/ is a hotline for the Desi LGBTQ+ community.
Thanks for reading! Come back next week for our next post on South Asian parents’ mental health!