Jamaica’s first ever Pride celebrations are underway, and organisers believe the event marks a turning point in the nation with an abysmal record on lgbti rights. The events in Kingston have included a flash mob, art exhibit, performance event full of songs and poems by lgbt Jamaicans and coming out symposium. Out actress Ellen Page popped in for the flash mob, to show here support and film a series for VICE. Ellen Page at the flash mob Lgbt people have long remained underground in the nation, where discrimination and violence are rife. It still criminalises gay sex, which is punishable with up to ten years in jail. Pride’s organising group the Jamaica Forum of Lesbians, All-Sexuals and Gays, or J-FLAG, received 80 reports of discrimination, threats, physical attacks, displacement and sexual violence last year. The 2013 murder of a trans teen also remained unsolved. The 17-year-old turned up to a party in women’s clothing and was beaten, stabbed, shot and run over by a mob. But there is hope things are changing. “I think we will look back on this and see it as a turning point because many persons thought that it would never actually happen,” Latoya Nugent of the Jamaica Forum of Lesbians, All-Sexuals and Gays, or J-FLAG, has told The Guardian. Nugent says there’s an inaccurate perception overseas that lgbt people in Jamaica “can’t even walk on the streets because if you do you are going to be stoned or stabbed to death”. “What we are seeing these days is more and more lgbt people willing to be visible, to be open, and to be public,” Nugent says. “It’s remarkable.” Human Rights Watch has also noted that there’s been a “groundswell of change” in the way Jamaica is responding to human rights abuses against lgbt people. Kingston’s mayor and the island’s justice minister have even publicly supported the Pride activities. The Jamaica Observer has also run a piece from J-FLAG co-chair Dane Lewis on why Pride matters. He says the event is a time to celebrate as proud, resilient lgbt people who continue to break the rules of oppression as they strive for equality, equity and justice. “We are using the occasion to celebrate lgbt life and culture in Jamaica. The ways in which we have come together to celebrate our community has been part of the ways it survives; allowing a space for people to get away from the negatives and live. Lgbt Jamaicans are becoming bolder and braver, more visible and actively participating in different forms of advocacy in a variety of spaces all with one aim: equality for all.”
Credit: GayNZ.com Daily News staff
First published: Wednesday, 5th August 2015 - 10:44am