AUGUST 17 — Dear Mr Azril,

I’m so pleased to make your acquaintance, even if only sekadar surat-menyurat. I do hope that our back and forth will fruitfully contribute to advancing the cause for (in your summary of what I was calling for) a more humane and compassionate populace.

Now, in my response to your initial piece, I said “As we continue to pontificate and split hairs in arguing our side as if it were a zero sum game, sentient human beings continue to be exposed to actual harm, actual injustices…”. At this point, I am painfully aware that this specific conversation has headed in exactly that direction; this in spite of your repeated invitations to engage in frank and fact-based dialogue.

This is why, in my next few paragraphs, I speak instead to the reader of this portal. And as you have made very clear in your response; where you posit thoughts driven by facts (as they rightly should be), I welcome the opportunity to examine the various points you raise against fact itself.

On sexual orientations as a ‘disorder’

In Mr. Azril’s rebuttal, he states “…the fact that embracing abnormality and psychological disorders is an odd definition of compassion.”

Under the assumption that Mr. Azril is referring to the LGBTQIA community when he speaks of ‘abnormality and psychological disorders’, I’d like to highlight the fact that the definition of non-heteronormative sexual orientations as a ‘disorder’ has been revised as early as 1973 in the American Psychiatric Association’s (APA) Diagnostic and Statistical Manual (DSM). This is of course a diagnostic standard adhered to by most healthcare authorities around the world including Malaysia. In other words, officially speaking, non-heteronormative sexual orientations are no longer regarded as a correctable ‘disorder’.

APA’s 1973 revision marked the end of organized medicine’s official participation in the social stigmatization of homosexuality. In 1990, the World Health Organization removed homosexuality from the International Classification of Diseases (ICD-10). As a consequence, debates about homosexuality were deprived of medical or scientific rationalization for discrimination and gradually shifted away from medicine and psychiatry and into the moral and political realms. This is where we currently stand.

That the mis-characterisation of non-heteronormative sexual orientations as ‘abnormal’ and a ‘disorder’ by Mr. Azril however isn’t surprising. It was also the predominant view by people actually learned in this field since times of antiquity. Even then, the male/female binary which is fervently used to drive this discourse has since undergone various shifts as more information continues to be recorded and analysed (i.e. from the gay/straight binary in the 20th century to the emerging 21st century binary of transgender/cisgender). Unfortunately, the smear of ‘disorder’ and ‘abnormal’ remains a convenient trope still rolled out today, as Mr. Azril ably demonstrates, to express his personal discomfort of the unfamiliar, of someone different. And so, as presented by the facts, Mr. Azril’s precondition for compassion (that one needs to not be ‘abnormal’ or suffer from a ‘disorder’) is invalid.

For a more thorough argument on this specific point, I urge the reader to read “Out of DSM: Depathologizing Homosexuality” 

On the concept of normativity

In his response, Mr. Azril further argues “it is a difficult argument to make to declare (sic) that everyone else’s concept of normality is wrong.” In supporting this argument, Mr. Azril defines ‘normal’ hence; “…the majority’s views, habits, customs, and sexual orientation establish what defines normality” and by extension, that the majority’s views are the only valid ones to the exclusion of all else.

This is an eerie position, that the minority should meekly accede to marginalisation by the majority as a result of numerical representation alone, given that the author went so far as to invoke the spectre of “tyrannical and fascist regimes" (i.e. Stalin, Francisco Franco, DAESH), regimes in which minority groups of all stripes have suffered immensely.

Mr Azril further goes on to state that “the LGBT community has thus far failed to offer any persuasive substantiation of (normativity)” whilst failing to note that the LGBTQIA community has never sought to challenge the semantic meaning of the word. Where Mr. Azril and his ilk argue for assimilation (i.e. do as I do, dress as I dress and all will be well), we seek inclusion. For it is a fact that normativity has been used as a justification for exclusion and marginalisation which; brings me to…

On fear mongering by misinformation

“Homophobia is not the reason HIV is far higher in the LGBT community than in the rest of the population; homophobia is not the reason there is a higher instance of mental illness and suicidality in the LGBT community,” says Mr. Azril.

Oh, but it is.

Incidents of homophobia (as with any form of discrimination of marginalised communities) have long been documented as being directly correlated with poorer social outcomes for non-heteronormative persons. Recognised as early as 1995 by researchers like Ilan Meyer, individuals who belong to a sexual minority group within a heteronormative society were found to be two to three times as likely to suffer from high levels of distress and had high negative mental health outcomes. For a more thorough read on this, I encourage the reader to read “Prejudice, Social Stress, and Mental Health in Lesbian, Gay, and Bisexual Populations: Conceptual Issues and Research Evidence” by Ilan H. Meyer (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2072932/)

That there continues to be an over-representation of poorer social outcomes (i.e. risky behaviour, substance abuse, mental illnesses, etc…) within marginalised communities as a result of systemic discrimination also reads true when you take into account the experiences of fringe communities such as ethnic minorities, differently-abled persons and economically disadvantaged persons. There is a wealth of evidence available on the Internet to corroborate this statement but the interested reader need look no further than our own Orang Asal who suffer disproportionately from economic and social marginalisation.

“The reason for these grim statistics (referring to higher incidents of poorer social and health outcomes) is homosexuality itself.” says Mr. Azril. To suggest that marginalised communities are ‘asking for it’ is ignorant at best and wilfully cruel at worst. By conflating correlation with causation, Mr. Azril provides a clear demonstration on how easy it is to demonise groups of people with misinformation.

Kindness, Compassion and Empathy

So here’s the point of it all; between Mr. Azril and myself, it is clear that there can be no conciliation on our positions. We will each be better served investing our resources into actions that truly move the needle in favour of progress, wherever that may lead. But know also that while we are all entitled to our own opinions, we will never be entitled to our own facts.

And so in closing I reiterate; the essence of our request for acceptance is that people look to the better angels of their nature - to recognise and repudiate acts of cruelty, to be kinder, to be compassionate, to be less quick to judge, less quick to bay for blood. I mean, when has the world ever been worse off were people to be kinder, more compassionate to one another, more empathetic of each other?

It really does come down very simply to that.

* This is the personal opinion of the writer or publication and does not necessarily represent the views of Malay Mail