Every single middle-eastern bigot I seen says “these are sexual perversion invented and pushed by the west to corrupt your generation” meanwhile studying middle-eastern history always goes something like
“Despite objections from the religious class, the sultans traditionally kept a harem of young men that would be dressed in feminine clothes and made to dance, homoerotic paintings of even earlier homoerotic poems became more and more popular over certain eras, and also gay bathouses regularly showed up in tax docments, until late 19th century when westernization…”
I can recommend reading Foucault’s The History Of Sexuality. He explains how gender categories serve the exercise of power upon humans. This is particularly interesting given how important self-definition is in queer community.
Every single middle-eastern bigot I seen says “these are sexual perversion invented and pushed by the west to corrupt your generation” meanwhile studying middle-eastern history always goes something like
“Despite objections from the religious class, the sultans traditionally kept a harem of young men that would be dressed in feminine clothes and made to dance, homoerotic paintings of even earlier homoerotic poems became more and more popular over certain eras, and also gay bathouses regularly showed up in tax docments, until late 19th century when westernization…”
Tap for example wikipedia articles.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LGBTQ_rights_in_Iran
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sexual_and_gender_minorities_in_the_Ottoman_Empire
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LGBTQ_rights_in_Egypt
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LGBTQ_rights_in_Tunisia
I can recommend reading Foucault’s The History Of Sexuality. He explains how gender categories serve the exercise of power upon humans. This is particularly interesting given how important self-definition is in queer community.