A gay Jamaican man is planning to “aggressively agitate for change” to his country’s anti-sodomy law after allegedly being kicked out of his home because of his sexual orientation.
As the Washington Blade is reporting, AIDS-Free World filed a Feb. 7 complaint with the Jamaica Supreme Court on behalf of local lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) rights activist Javed Jaghai. The court is expected to hear Jaghai’s case on June 25, according to the report.
“It is a reminder that there is much more work to be done to achieve equality for gay Jamaicans,” Jaghai wrote on Facebook. “We can sit patiently while our humanity is denied and wait for the paradigm to shift in a generation or two, or we can aggressively agitate for change now. I choose to do the latter.”
Maurice Tomlinson, a Jamaican lawyer with AIDS-Free World, tells the Blade’s MIchael K. Lavers that the case could have a “long-term effect” on the recognition of same-sex couples not only in Jamaica but also throughout the Caribbean. Jaghai’s lawyers say it’s difficult to enforce Jamaica’s anti-sodomy law, which dates back to 1864.
Tomlinson tied the knot with husband Tom Decker in Toronto earlier this year.
Read more about Jaghai’s case here.
In January, Jaghai participated in “We Are Jamaicans,” a poignant video campaign produced by the Jamaican Forum for Lesbians, All-Sexuals and Gays (J-FLAG) in hopes of combatting local anti-gay sentiment.
Source – Huffington Post
