Lesbians, Gays, Bisexuals, Transgender: Let Them Be!
Mariam Mohsen
Editor-in-Chief
mmmohsen@aucegypt.edu
“In a world filled with straight people; I’m a lesbian, I feel completely alone.”
That’s a quote from an article we published in The Caravan last week.
All it took for me to gauge the audience’s levels of tolerance was to share the story on my Facebook page with that quote as a caption.
The article focused on a Facebook page created to push for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) rights at AUC.
When I was asked about my opinion on the matter, I said that we should just let people be and not judge them. The life decisions they make – including the romantic ones – are up to them and are none of our business.
Then all hell broke loose.
One comment said: “This is wrong on so many levels… I’m actually glad I graduated before having to be around such nonsense. Please guys, no matter how Westernized we’ve become, and no matter how open minded we’d like our country to be, do not forget that at the end of the day we are a Muslim nation and we need to respect that.”
The comment also labeled those who supported the page as “brainwashed” and “sad.”
Does one have to be “brainwashed” or too “Western” in order to support the rights and/or existence of individuals who choose to take a different path in their personal lives? How can we decide whether or not a decision a person makes is “wrong”? Is that really up to us?
Many other arguments were centered on religion, specifically Islam. However, those who made religious arguments failed to cite one of Islam’s pillars, which is not to judge others and to let people be.
All I asked was for people to set religious perspectives aside and to take a moment to judge the matter objectively.
The reason I made that request was because I knew that the religious argument would center on the LGBT individual’s damnation, and that’s all there is to it. The response was that all our arguments are based on our religious beliefs and the societies we’re brought up in.
Setting religious beliefs aside momentarily to formulate a position on a given topic is far from “improper.” As for societal expectations, I believe that if our cultures and what we were raised to believe dictate how we practice freedom, then it isn’t freedom – it’s following a set of ideals that we were raised to believe are obligatory.
