We have written numerous times about the depraved “pinkwashing” narrative, that Israel must be condemned by gay rights activists for publicizing the fact that it is the only country in the Middle East where gays are not persecuted.
That simple truth is too much for the anti-Israeli activists to bear because it exposes their hypocrisy and lack of principles in joining forces with Islamists and other true homophobes:
On April 10-13, 2013, the City University of New York will again host a Conference on Homonationalism and Pinkwashing.
Understand that this is a concept born completely in academia and pushed by university lecturers and professors. From the conference website:
In keeping with the tradition of the City University, the City University Graduate Center and the Center for Lesbian and Gay Studies, THE HOMONATIONALISM AND PINKWASHING CONFERENCE is a pioneering, historic event, uniting a uniquely diverse array of speakers from many countries, ethnicities, nationalities, genders, ages, communities, universities, and academic fields in discussion around a new arena of thought. The dynamic outpouring of interest from scholars of all racial, cultural and religious backgrounds reveals that Homonationalism and Pinkwashing are pressing, urgent and inspiring topics of academic work internationally. This conference, which sold out six months before its date, is already significant, respected and pioneering in burgeoning arenas of academic study and inquiry.
While the conference purports not to be directed solely at Israel, in fact Israel gave rise to the “pinkwashing” charge and has been the focus of prior conferences. This is pure anti-Israeli agitation with an academic façade.
Andrea Weiss in The Daily Beast pretty well summed up the absurdity, A Trojan Horse in CUNY’s Center for Lesbian and Gay Studies?
First, a brief review of LGBT rights in the Middle East:In the United Arab Emirates, Yemen, Iran, and Saudi Arabia, homosexual sex is punishable by death. In Kuwait, Palestine (Gaza), and Lebanon the penalty is 3-10 years imprisonment. In none of these countries is same sex marriage or cohabitation or adoption of children legally recognized; the same holds true in Syria, Jordan, Iraq and Palestine (West Bank).In Israel, on the other hand, same sex (foreign) marriages are recognized; same sex cohabitation is recognized; same sex adoption is legal; gays are allowed to serve in the military; and there are anti-discrimination laws protecting the rights of LGBT people.
Next, a pop quiz: which of the above eleven countries is the Center for Lesbian and Gay Studies (CLAGS) at the City University of New York targeting in a two day conference next April, in order to criticize its position on LGBT rights? The four where homosexuality is punishable by death? The three where the penalty is imprisonment?No, the correct answer is the one where lesbian and gay marriage is recognized and there are laws on the books protecting LGBT people from discrimination.
Is the Pinkwashing conference anti-Semitic? Alan Dershowitz makes the charge. When anti-Israeli academics focus on the least guilty country, when they obsess only over the Jewish state, when they almost entirely ignore that their compatriots actually do abuse gays — the myopia cannot be excused. The next hate fest:
The conference’s coordinator and inspiration is gay activist Sarah Shulman. In a New York Times op-ed and elsewhere, she has argued that Israel’s positive approach to gay rights is “a deliberate strategy to conceal the continuing violation of Palestinians human rights behind an image of modernity signified by Israeli gay life.”In other words, she accuses Israel of feigning concern over the rights of gay people in order to whitewash — “pinkwash” — its lack of concern for Palestinian people.This absurd, obscene argument is nothing more than anti-Semitism with a pink face.Israel is easily the most gay-friendly country in the Middle East, and among the most supportive of gay rights in the world. Openly gay soldiers have long served in the military and in high positions in both government and the private sector.In the West Bank and Gaza, by contrast, gays are murdered, tortured and forced to seek asylum — often in Israel. Indeed, in every Arab and Muslim country, homosexual acts among consenting adults are criminal, often punishable by death.But all this doesn’t matter to the “growing global gay movement” against Israel, which (Schulman insists) regards these positive steps as nothing more than a cover for malevolent Israeli actions.Schulman makes no secret of her irrational hatred toward Israel, which she calls “a racist government” that is “cynically” pinkwashing the occupation.
Is it absurd to suggest that #OpIsrael hackers would be invited to the conference? Why would that be absurd?
Because many of those hackers are from Arab countries where gays are in hiding, in prison or in exile?
That makes perfect sense in the world of Pinkwashing conferences … whatever it takes to demonize Israel.
People who would time a mass cyber-attack on Israel to coincide with Holocaust Remembrance Day, and who would attempt to hack an Israeli children’s cancer group and the Yad Vashem Holocaust museum would fit right in at the Pinkwashing conference:
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