Pride NOT War!
Statement for Pride 2022
On June 1st this year, the US military industrial complex eagerly signaled that the military is welcoming to LGBTQ+ people and that the US State Department promotes LGBTQ+ rights. The US Marines posted an image of a combat helmet with rainbow colored bullets, seemingly designed as an allusion to the iconic poster for Stanley Kubrick’s Full Metal Jacket, a film which depicts the horror of the Vietnam War. In place of the film’s “Born to Kill,” the helmet reads, “Proud to Serve.” This was a disturbing but illustrative example of pinkwashing: when LGBTQ+ acceptance is used as evidence of democracy or progressivism to legitimize imperialism, violence, or oppressive policies.
The pinkwashing of US foreign policy is used to present US actions abroad as a harmless, progressive force of good. Under President Biden, the US has continued bombing Somalia, facilitating Saudi Arabia’s genocide in Yemen, leveling cruel and illegal economic sanctions against Cuba, Iran, Venezuela and elsewhere; and threatening or enacting regime change operations against leaders that don’t act in accordance with US preferences. As the LGBTQ+ movement in the US fights for protection from violence and discrimination along with access to adequate healthcare, Biden issued a memorandum claiming that his foreign policy will “advance the human rights” of LGBTQ+ people.
Ukraine
Mainstream media published articles framing support for Ukraine in the war against Russia as LGBTQ+ Ukranians “fighting for their culture.” These articles are designed to reinforce the Western audience’s assumptions that Ukraine is a progressive country while Russia is hateful and anti-LGBTQ+. Equaldex.com, a crowdsourced index of LGBTQ+ rights around the globe, reports that attitudes and legal protections for LGBTQ+ people are similar in Russia and Ukraine. Gay marriage is not legal in either country, and neither country bans conversion therapy. Pew research polls indicate that in Ukraine, 85% oppose and 9% favor gay marriage; in Russia, 52% oppose and 29% favor. When asked whether society should accept homosexuality, 6% of Ukranian respondents and 8% of Russian respondents said yes. These figures show us that framing support for Ukraine as aligned with LGBTQ+ rights and painting Russia as a uniquely oppressive force is not a realistic assessment. But while the US prolongs the bloodshed by continuing to send military aid to Ukraine, and officials admit that they are using Ukraine to fight a proxy war against Russia, LGBTQ+ Ukranians are being killed or displaced from their homes while LGBTQ+ soldiers suffer. It’s natural to want to prevent LGBTQ+ people in other countries from being harmed, but policies that prolong a war do the opposite.
Palestine
Israel, which receives nearly $4B per year from the US, advertises itself as the single LGBTQ+ oasis in the Middle East. But the pictures posted on Israeli social media accounts of beaches with rainbow flags don’t show us the reality of what is often described as an “open air prison” for Palestinians, who are deprived of freedom of movement, many legal rights, and adequate access to power, water, or healthcare. Israel actively generates violence against LGBTQ+ Palestinians: their secret police blackmail & threaten gay Palestinians, coercing them to become informants or work undercover for Isareli intelligence. Israel then advertises gay tourism – yet, gay marriage is not legal in Israel, and hundreds of youth each year leave their homes due to homophobia. Palestinian Queer organization Al-Qaws explains, “the promotion of ‘gay-friendly Israel’ depends on presenting Palestinians (and Arabs more generally) as the exact opposite: sexually regressive and therefore undeserving of solidarity […] The systematic erasure of progressive and politicized [Palestinian] queer voices serves the interests of the colonial [Israeli] power and its narrative.” LGBTQ+ people are simply a prop to legitimize Israel’s violent apartheid regime and strengthen support for Israel amongst U.S. taxpayers who bankroll their police and military forces.
Pakistan
The harm of a partnership of military violence with a pro-LGBTQ+ face is illustrated in Pakistan, where the US was recently accused of having facilitated a coup against the popular leader Imran Khan, which drew hundreds of thousands into the streets to support him against an unwanted US-backed regime. Soon after, the US Embassy in Pakistan’s capital, Islamabad, posted on social media about their support for LGBTQ+ activism in the country, and received a large wave of backlash, with Pakistanis accusing the US of disrespecting their laws and society. When the US government is rightfully seen as a hostile, destabilizing force abroad, efforts by the US to affiliate itself with LGBTQ+ rights will provoke backlash against the LGBTQ+ people of that country and undermine any local struggle being waged for LGBTQ+ liberation more appropriately informed by regional culture and dialogue.
Cuba
When countries are under attack or in states of crisis, social movements are delayed or stifled for the sake of focusing all resources on maintaining the country’s sovereignty; peace allows for internal movements to develop. After the Cuban Revolution, as the US attempted the Bay of Pigs invasion and numerous assassination attempts againstCastro, discrimination and the criminalization of LGBTQ+ people was widespread in Cuba. By the 1980’s, as the US attacks died down, Cuba was able to stabilize, and Cuban feminist and LGBTQ+ movements began to flourish within their newly liberated nation. Fidel Castro later stated that he now viewed the discrimination as a great injustice, explaining that defending Cuba from imperialism totally consumed his attention in those early years. This year, Cuba is expected to legalize same-sex marriage, and gender affirming surgery is free. US interventions do not bring freedom, they only create instability that affects the most vulnerable.
As members of the Anti-War Committee, we celebrate pride as a commemoration of the history of LGBTQ+ communities radically struggling for rights and acceptance. We demand the US protect the rights and humanity of LGBTQ+ people at home, and cease distorting our struggle in interests of US war-mongering and imperialism. Our humanity must not be used as a smokescreen for our government to oppress and kill people across the world. Rainbow bullets are no substitute for peace and justice.
Queer is hot. War is not.