A Struggle For Existence

Natia Givanishvili, a Georgian gender researcher, is part of the LGBT-community in Georgia and tells the story of an actively diminished and discriminated social group. With homophobia and transphobia infiltrating institutions of authority and the civil society, this is a movement far away from the moral standards which some of the most influential and visible community actors promote. In 2013, widespread homophobia lead to a violent riot, in which 50 LGBT activists faced 20,000 angry counter-demonstrators at a manifestation for LGBT rights.
Natia Givanishvili is an LGBT activist, a researcher and director of the Women’s Initiatives Supporting Group (WISG). The organisation primarily provides psychological and legal assistance to the grass-root movement by lobbying for larger inclusion of LGBT issues in Georgian legislation.

WISG recently conducted research on internalized homophobia in the Georgian LGBT community, as well as provided shadow reports for the European Union, United Nations, treaty bodies, and other institutions that the Georgian government stands accountable to. They also hold exhibitions, support social platforms and LGBT groups, and reach out to the public by providing information with regards to broadening the gender term to include the LGBT movement. During the Society of International Affairs trip to Tbilisi, Georgia, I was introduced to Natia at the ‘Trans-Narratives’ exhibition.

“This happens when I get tired of playing the role of a heterosexual man. When I can´t hold myself back anymore and become who I really am, a tall beautiful Woman.”
– Quote from the exhibition.

Below follows an interview with Natia, describing her thoughts, conclusions, and experiences regarding different aspects affecting the fight for LGBT rights in Georgia.

With respect to the historical context, how has the LGBT community been treated in Georgian society?
– When Georgia was part of the Soviet Union, Stalin (originally from Georgia), criminalized homosexuality in 1933 and intensified the hate-speech towards homosexuality. This law was used as an empowering tool in the political struggle for power; first, and foremost, it sought to exclude political opponents, dissidents, and activists, but also to denigrate Western society. The communist party was the only existing party, ruled by one strong leader. Looking at the present, this is still what Georgia as a community is striving for and expecting. A strong leader that can help us deal with the economic crisis and other crises that we are facing. This was the case with our former President Saakashvili, and the recent Prime Minister, Ivanishvili. When the political leaders have somehow not been able to fill the power vacuum that the communist party left behind, the Orthodox Church has stepped in. It is a strong actor, with one leading man – the Patriarch, who is preaching for uniformity; to think, dress and live alike, like in the Soviet Union. In this perspective, we are still struggling with our past with regards to those issues.

What is the Orthodox Church’s position as an institution and in what ways do they act to affect the public opinion?
– The Church here is a political actor, they have so much power and money that they think it is they who should make the decisions regarding changes in society. Therefore, there is an ongoing struggle for a place in the public space. For example, the International Day Against Homophobia, Transphobia and Biphobia is held on the 17th of May, but in 2013 the Patriarchate and the Church decided to celebrate the Day of Family Strength and Respect for Parents on this exact date. They celebrate by marching through the centre of the city with crosses and with priests preaching and singing.

– Furthermore, it has been decided that the world congress of families advocating “traditional family values” will be held between the 16th-18th of May next year, which again coincides with the International Day Against Homophobia, Transphobia and Biphobia. This is an American Christian organization that “defends the natural family as the fundamental unit of civilizations” and distances themselves from variations from what they define as the sexual norm, such as promiscuity, pornography, homosexuality, same-sex marriage and so on.

– We have very few dates that are important to the LGBT-community, which we want to use to be more out in the open in society, to speak about the problems we are facing and to emphasize our rights. But the Church is working against us, claiming those dates. That is one of the struggles that is going on right now.

How do the politicians act concerning these issues?
– The politicians are using the LGBT issues for their own materialistic agenda – power and wealth. There is very little knowledge in society about gender and sexuality. For example, this is not a subject that is brought up in school. Being openly homophobic is an easy way to mobilize voters and stand up against political opponents.

But if they use these issues to create a dividing line in politics, would they need to be opposed by people who disagree with them? Or is everyone on the same side?
– There are very few who disagrees, and the politicians that are not homophobic or do not phrase themselves in a homophobic way, don’t have great power within the parliament, nor the government, as they are a minority. For instance the political party: the Republicans has done a lot of work within the party to enhance the members’ knowledge about gender issues and the same goes for LGBT issues. But they would never, or at least not at the present time, use their work within the LGBT field for their pre-election campaign as something positive. They just don’t express themselves in a homophobic way, meaning they would not engage in work that openly supports LGBT groups.

Since you have been a part of planning and organizing demonstrations and manifestations concerning LGBT rights in Tbilisi, how were those events received and what was your experience like?
– The first demonstration that we organized was held on the 17th of May in 2012. We prepared it by sending letters to the police, and they assured us of their support as well as promised to protect the demonstration. But when we found ourselves surrounded by counter-demonstrators, the police were gone. After we called them, it took them about half an hour to arrive, despite the fact that we were positioned on one of the most centrally located streets in the city, and it was no traffic to talk about. Anyway, there were three different groups of religious activists surrounding us, and during this time the situation deteriorated and we got physically attacked.

– The second manifestation was held in 2013, and beforehand we were frequently in contact with the national home office as well as the police ambassador. Both parties were very eager to help and defend us – we even had a plan for security. Due to security concerns we were not marching this time, the plan was just to protest by standing outside parliament for about 20 minutes with our posters.

– Unfortunately the Orthodox Church got involved and urged “true believers” to come out on the streets of Tbilisi, and show their moral revulsion. They succeeded to mobilize around 20,000 counter-demonstrators, we were around 50 activists. Before we had even put up our posters my friend came running towards me screaming. Some priests had talked their way through the line of police officers and were now waving the big mass of counter-demonstrators into our group. Chaos ensued and we started to run towards the evacuation busses. It was a very traumatic experience having that huge, angry, screaming mass of people chasing us like that. But one group of 23 activists ended up in an even worse situation: they arrived a bit later than us on a parallel street to the main road, and the police officers refused to let them through the police
barricades. The mass of anti-gay demonstrators soon realized that this group of people were activists and started attacking them with fists and stones. A minibus managed to pick them up and evacuate them, but all the windows were completely broken when the bus managed to escape the chaos, and a couple of the activists suffered concussions. Four people were prosecuted for this violent assault. However, it was a long process and as a result all charges were dropped just last month, and the prosecuted were acquitted.

– Because of the events in 2013 we didn’t organize any public protests in 2014, but in 2015 we have gone through with three different demonstrations in a short period of time, and we had very good protection from the police. The strange thing was that there weren’t any counter-demonstrators present, not even a small group.

– That can only mean one thing, that the state is in a position to negotiate with the Church when it wants to, and those processes are absolutely not transparent. I really appreciate the state’s involvement and engagement in our work, but the part about the Church is a bit fishy. But we will see what happens next year.

 

Does this mean that the activist groups that attacked you in 2012 are managed by the Church?
– The conservative activist groups are not officially controlled by the Church, but there are priests from the Church who are members of those groups. So the Church has an indirect influence. Some of those priests have even been given awards for their achievements by the Patriarch. But the Church doesn’t take any responsibility for the acts of those organizations, and it puts them in a very comfortable position. “It’s a group of people, they do what they want, but it’s not our responsibility since it’s not coming from us.”

How does the media approach gender and LGBT issues?
– The primary media that is used here in Georgia is TV, and the TV channels are mainly controlled by the state. None of the big channels have any anti-discrimination policies, which is a problem since we then end up in a situation where the individual journalist and/or producer gets to decide the moral values of each program. The programs broadcasted by the same TV channel can therefore have very different approaches. Some of the programs are very investigative and good, and other programs can be outright homophobic and sexist.

– What you can do is to write a reprimand, that has actually helped. Nowadays the journalists are more careful of expressing themselves in an openly homophobic way, but they still invite homophobes to their talk-shows without asking critical questions.

How has the legal and social situation developed in the last couple of years?
– The legal situation has improved and become more inclusive, the problem now is to implement the latest anti-discrimination laws in practice since the implementation mechanisms aren’t working very well. Homophobia within society has on the other hand spread and worsened. One reason for this is that the politicians use these issues in order to gain votes and to promote their own interests. For example, groups that work with LGBT related questions are always connected to political parties, at least from the outside, and even if those connections are not true, it makes voters more hostile towards those political parties and towards LGBT issues.

– The artificial resistance between European values and traditional values is also something which has escalated. It is a common thing to place these values as opposites, and to focus on the extreme points, without discussing examples of European countries that are relatively conservative and at the same time more accepting of the LGBT community. The media also helps to intensify these opinions. For example, if they are reporting from a Pride Festival somewhere in Europe they would typically choose the pictures that confirms their agenda and not the pictures that, for instance, show police officers showing their support and marching together with the protesters at Pride, which would probably generate more accepting reactions here in Georgia.

– There are also voices in society that connects different sexual deviations such as paedophilia with homosexuality, and since there is no sexual health education in school, people start to mix these totally different things up that creates a lot of aggression and hate towards the LGBT community as well.

What are your plans for the upcoming year?
– As for WISG we will continue our research programs and shadow reporting. We are planning to work more with the police; we want to create a special police task force that will tackle hate-crimes. These kind of groups already exist in the USA, Sweden, the Netherlands, and Mexico etc. This is one of the recommendations that we wrote in the latest shadow report for UPR, and the Swedish response was actually one of the most tangible reactions. They recommended Georgia to create this kind of group, and for that I am very grateful, but we will see if the Georgian government will accept our request. We will also focus on the transgender group since they are the most exposed within the LGBT community; and therefore most likely to suffer from hate-crimes and physical abuse. In addition, we will most definitely have more art exhibitions!

I Seattle på USA:s nordvästra kust är situationen för de hemlösa svår. Att leva i landet för de fria, och i hemmet för de modiga, innebär inte sällan att man får lägga sig för att sova någonstans där ingen polis eller nattvakt ska kunna hitta en. I november togs ett beslut att etablera en plats för Seattles hemlösa; ett nytt Nickelsville.

Hög tid för medkänsla
I USA är det Thanksgiving och i de amerikanska hemmen bjuds det, enligt tradition under novembers fjärde torsdag, på tolvkiloskalkoner, sötpotatismos med marshmallows och det visas amerikanska fotbollsmatcher på TV. Allt till minne av sägen om de goda gärningarna och vänligheten som indianerna visade nybyggarna och pilgrimerna som var i nöd efter att de anlänt till den nordamerikanska kontinenten på 1600-talet.

I dessa givmilda tider klubbades beslutet att ett nytt läger för hemlösa i Seattle ska byggas. Lägret som kallas Nickelsville har fått sitt namn efter Seattles tidigare borgmästare Greg Nickels som förde en hård politik mot hemlösa. Han förbjöd praktiskt taget människor att sitta på gatan. Resultatet blev att hemlösa utan pengar som satt och tiggde fick dryga böter. Greg Nickels politik har upplevts som hotfull och en stor grupp hemlösa har känt sig jagade under hans år som borgmästare. Som en sorts revansch, med ett rågat mått ironi, valde organisationen bakom Nickelsville att namnge lägret efter honom.

2826 NW Market Street i Ballard
Det nybyggda Nickelsville i stadsdelen Ballard ska ersätta det tidigare lägret och består efter en knapp veckas konstruktionsarbete av ett par stugor stora som friggebodar, bajamajor och ett tiotal tält uppsatta på träterrasser. Ett av de större tälten har en kök- och umgängesdel. Området är beräknat att kunna inhysa omkring femtio av Seattles hemlösa. Invånarna i Nickelsville som kallar sig själva för Nickelodeons var redo att inkvartera sig i lägret samma dag som den första etappen av konstruktionsarbete var färdigt i mitten av november. Detta Nickelsville som ligger vid 2826 NW Market Street är det andra lägret av sin art, som till skillnad från den första upplagan vid 1010 South Dearborn Street i södra delarna av staden är uppbyggt av nyinköpt material. Seattle bidrar med omkring 150 000 kronor till det nya Nickelsvilles startbudget och kommer fortsatt bidra med ytterligare ekonomiska tillskott till de årliga utgifterna.

Förväntningarna är höga och det finns stort hopp om att Nickelsville ska kunna bli en bidragande och positiv del av Ballards samhälle. Lägret har för närvarande fått tillgång till markområdet under ett år, med chans till ytterligare ett års förlängning. Vissa av de boende i närområdet har både visat sin empati och stort stöd. En mangrann trupp har hjälpt till att bygga upp Nickelsville och donerat mat och andra förnödenheter till de hemlösa. Andra närboende har å andra sidan uttryckt skepsis och vissa närliggande affärer, restauranger och barer har visat ett missnöje och tror Nickelsville kommer påverka deras verksamheter negativt.

En hård och kall verklighet för hemlösa
För att ge en bild av den tuffa situationen som Seattles hemlösa befinner sig i: I centrala Seattle möts man i regel av någon med en pappmugg, pappskylt, munspel, levande orm eller något annat tillhygge för att åkalla ens uppmärksamhet i gathörnen. Med skyltar av wellpapp i sin famn sitter två män vid avfarten till en av stadens största motorvägar Interstate 5, som sträcker sig från Mexiko i söder till Kanada i norr, och ber om en peng vid rödljuset. Ser man förbi deras vita plaststolar kan man skymta tälten i buskaget bakom dem. Deras hem. Efter en vänstersväng ser man ytterligare två individer vid den motsatta avfarten. De befinner sig i samma sits som de två männen som precis passerades. I en annan del av staden går en man fram till bilarna som stannat vid ett rödljus och frågar om någon har växel över. Vid Montlakebron sträcks en vädjande hand ut av en kvinna som för dagen valt att använda en av det pågående vägbyggets väldiga orangea trafikkoner som en sittplats att be om pengar från. Väskan har hon hängt vant och praktiskt över en annan kon bredvid. I stadsdelen University District har en grupp hemlösa skapat något som liknar ett provisoriskt, illegalt läger vid en av de större parkeringarna nära University Way. Det är belamrat av cyklar, filtar, sovsäckar, kartonger och pappmuggar.

Sleepless in Seattle
För den gemene Seattleinvånaren är det nog svårt att moraliskt hitta rätt i denna hinderbana av efterfrågande blickar, kommentarer och öppna, vädjande händer. Vem borde man hjälpa? Hur hjälper man till på bästa sätt? Volontärorganisationer som exempelvis Sleepless in Seattle donerar sovsäckar till hemlösa runt om i Seattle och i närområden nu när kvicksilvret kryper ner mot nollgradigt. Organisationerna och initiativen är många och inte sällan imponerande innovativa. Det krävs mycket för att få människors liv på rätt köl och se en långsiktig, konstruktiv framtidslösning. De nuvarande idéerna och visionerna kombinerat med mer och hårdare arbete, inklusive en stark kollektiv övertygelse krävs för att Seattle ska kunna vända på den negativa utvecklingen och den kris som staden genomgått.

Staden har potential att lyckas
Seattle har god potential att vara en plats i USA som lyckas förändra situationen för de hemlösa. Det sociala ansvaret som många av invånarna uppvisar är inspirerande och värmande. Nickelsville är bara ett av många exempel på detta. Att Seattles nuvarande borgmästare Edward Murray introducerat satsningar för att sätta stopp för, samt vända den negativa trenden med det ökande antalet hemlösa, kommer förhoppningsvis att agera som en katalysator för denna förändring. Med sin subkultur och reaktivitet, samt sin liberala och progressiva historia har Seattle all den inneboende kraft som krävs för att förbättra den nuvarande verkligheten för de hemlösa. Dock får Seattle fram till den dagen erbjuda sina arma hemlösa en provisorisk lösning där Nickelsville kan vara en plats för givmildhet, trygghet och gemenskap för de som är långt ifrån den amerikanska drömmen, som många av de hemlösa önskat sig.

Foto: Mikael Boberg

I veckans program av Radio Utblick diskuteras de komplicerade konflikterna som präglar Mellanöstern. Hur påverkas regionen av det kärntekniska avtalet? Varför stöttar USA Israel? Och hur påverkar Rysslands förhållningssätt till Assadregimen deras pågående bombningar i Syrien? Detta är några av frågorna vi ställt till två forskare och en journalist.

Dessutom är det premiär för den återkommande serien av inslag som vi kallar “Det andra Italien”. Skapat och producerat av Rebecka Mårtenson.

Medverkande i intervjuer: Svante Karlsson (Univeritetslektor, Institutionen för globala studier på Göteborgs Universitet), Bitte Hammargren (journalist, författare och Mellanösternanalytiker) samt Rouzbeh Parsi (lektor, Historiska institutionen vid Lunds Universitet).

Du når programmet genom att trycka här!

I studion: Samuel Horgby, Egil Sturk och Sara Lindström.

Approximately 50% of South African children who enroll in grade 1 do not make it to grade 12 and only 12% qualify for university. The ’Fees Must Fall’ campaign constitutes a bigger issue than just tuition fees. The real concern is the lack of equal opportunities among South Africa´s population. While higher education is not for everyone, equal access to it should be. Merit rather than money should constitute the key to ones future.

In July 1993 Nelson Mandela addressed South Africa´s Trade Union Congress stating that: “If the ANC does to you what the apartheid government did to you, then you must do to the ANC what you did to the apartheid government.”

The latest weeks of uprisings illustrate many students’ clear and unified discontent with the ANC government, and Mandela´s message might just as well have been addressed towards them. The planned increase of tuition fees at universities has obviously proven to be the straw that broke the camel’s back. Hence, it is legitimate to pose the question if the current unrest is an analogy of the classic Orwellian story, where the liberator has become the villain.

Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan, among many, branded the ANC as a terrorist organization, undermining a rightful opposition towards a racist and oppressive regime.  However, the condemnation today does not come from right wing Western world leaders, but from the subjects the ANC once fought to  protect: the underprivileged non-white South African population. While one must remember and respect the ANC for its pivotal contribution to democracy in South Africa, one must also realize that past actions do not even up for being put on a pedestal forever. After all, in a democracy, legitimacy for political power correlates with the capability to acknowledge the needs of the people you represent. Regarding an equal opportunity to higher education, the ANC has failed its subjects. The current unrest is not simply about unreasonable tuition fees. The real issue is the lack of equal access to continuous and long-term higher education among the South African population. Black South Africans are still underrepresented within academia even though they constitute 80% of the population. The structural oppression lives on even though the ANC has had political power for 21 years.

Article 26 in the United Nation´s Universal Declaration of Human Rights does not state that higher education necessarily shall be free but that it “shall be equally accessible on the basis of merit”. The tuition fees in themselves therefore have become the cause for unequal access to higher education. Free tertiary education is not an unrealistic or utopian demand and it does not only exist in European countries like Germany, Norway, and Sweden. In both Russia and Brazil, South Africa´s fellow BRICS partners, free university education is a possibility. Even so, structural segregation determines who will be able to attend universities without paying tuition. The Atlantic´s article “Brazil: Where Free Universities Largely Serve the Wealthy” from April this year, clearly illustrates this problem.

The South African student protests of 2015 should be seen as an opportunity for the whole country. South Africa could take a leading role among the BRICS countries, illustrating that equality should be a priority, not only among countries, which is the ground on which BRICS was founded in the first place, but also among people within the member countries of BRICS.

From a budget perspective this would be feasible and the South African government is aware of this. In 2012 Higher Education and Training Minister Blade Nzimande received a report from an expert group, set up by the government, concluding that introducing free university education for the poor is realistic from a financial perspective. Therefore free tertiary education is not by definition just for countries like Germany, Norway, and Sweden. If South Africa would introduce free tertiary education, it could be a benchmark towards which other BRICS countries could be pushed to compare themselves to. With approximately 40% of the world´s university students, the BRICS countries could definitely be a major force for global change regarding tuition fees for higher education. As a member of BRICS, South Africa has the opportunity to be the country initializing this process.

However, South African´s should not limit themselves to focus only on higher education, because access to higher education in itself is preordained by money rather than merit. Further attention needs to be addressed towards the general issue of deficiency regarding the implementation of the right to education on all levels. In a report from 2013, Nicholas Spaull from the Centre for Development and Enterprise argues “that there is an on-going crisis in South African education, and that the current system is failing the majority of South Africa´s youth”. Spaull further argues that South Africa has the worst education system of all middle income countries. 50% of the students that enroll in grade 1 will not make it to grade 12 and only 12% will qualify for university.

Striving for free university education is a noble cause that needs to continue, but the 88% that never qualify for university needs to be included in the struggle. Higher education is not for everyone but the equal opportunity should be and merit rather than money should constitute the key to ones future.