#gay imam | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

religion-is-a-mental-illness · 1 month

Text

By: Bari Weiss

Published: Apr 22, 2024

For a second, imagine that black students at Columbia were taunted: Go back to Africa. Or imagine that a gay student was surrounded by homophobic protesters and hit with a stick at Yale University. Or imagine if a campus imam told Muslim students that they ought to head home for Ramadan because campus public safety could not guarantee their security.

There would be relentless fury from our media and condemnation from our politicians.

Just remember the righteous—and rightful—outrage over the white supremacist “Unite the Right” march in Charlottesville, Virginia, in 2017, where neo-Nazis chanted “The Jews will not replace us.”

This weekend at Columbia and Yale, student demonstrators did all of the above—only it was directed at Jews. They told Columbia students to “go back to Poland.” A Jewish woman at Yale was assaulted with a Palestinian flag. And an Orthodox rabbi at Columbia told students to go home for their safety.

Demonstrators on these campuses shouted more chic versions of “Jews will not replace us.” At Columbia they screamed: “Say it loud and say it clear, we don’t want no Zionists here.” At Yale they blasted bad rap with the following lyrics:

Fuck Israel, Israel a bitch / Bitch we out here mobbin’ on some Palestine shit / Free Palestine bitch, Israel gon’ die bitch / Nigga it’s they land why you out here tryna rob it / Bullshit prophets, y’all just want the profit

These campus activists are not simply “pro-Palestine” protesters. They are people who are openly celebrating Hamas and physically intimidating identifiably Jewish students who came near. We are publishing the accounts of two of those students—Sahar Tartak and Jonathan Lederer—today.

Students—all of us—have a right to protest. We have a right to protest for dumb causes and horrible causes. At The Free Press, we will always defend that right. (See here and here, for example.)

It is not, however, a First Amendment right to physically attack another person. It is not a First Amendment right to detain another person as part of your protest. And while Americans are constitutionally protected when they say vile things, like wishing upon Jews a thousand October 7s, we are certainly free to criticize those who say them. We are also free to condemn institutions dedicated to the pursuit of truth who have abandoned that mission, and who stand by and do nothing meaningful to stop scenes like the ones of the past 48 hours.

The students who support terror have given in to madness. Refusing to condemn them is madness.

There are courageous students who see that madness clearly. Please read these essays by Jonathan Lederer and Sahar Tartak.

12 notes · View notes

commonsensecommentary · 1 month

Text

“For a second, imagine that black students at Columbia were taunted: Go back to Africa,” [Bari Weiss] wrote Sunday. “Or imagine that a gay student was [sic] surrounded by homophobic protesters and hit with a stick at Yale University. Or imagine if a campus imam told Muslim students that they ought to head home for Ramadan because campus public safety could not guarantee their security.”

Weiss accurately added: “There would be relentless fury from our media and condemnation from our politicians.”

But since the targets of this growing mayhem are mere Jews, the responses are crickets, handwringing, and “context.”

#extremism #save america #democrats #antisemitism #campus antisemitism #education #higher education #joe biden #columbia university #yale #harvard

9 notes · View notes

beardedmrbean · 1 month

Text

STORY: Members of Ghana's LGBT community say they are living in more fear than ever.

They're waiting to see whether the West African country's president will sign into law a bill that would further restrict their rights.

Gay sex is already punishable by up to three years in prison.

The new law would also impose a prison sentence of up to five years for the promotion or support of LGBT rights, making it one of the harshest of its kind in Africa.

Kwame already bears the scars of Ghana's widespread intolerance of homosexuality.

In 2021, the 30-year-old was attacked by neighbors over his sexuality which left him partially blind.

"You can understand how this bill is just going to be - this is just the beginning."

Kwame and his partner, who live apart for safety reasons, believe their best option would be to leave Ghana before the law comes into effect.

"To be honest, for me, I don't think there is any future in this Ghana, when it comes to this thing. There is no future for you. Because I think they just want to end everything."

Homophobia is rife in culturally conservative Ghana.

Hostility and attacks are commonplace, although few such incidents make it to the courts.

In February, parliament unanimously passed the bill but President Nana Akufo-Addo has delayed signing it - with his office citing two impending Supreme Court challenges.

Ghana is also in the grip of an economic crisis and its finance ministry has warned that the bill could jeopardize $3.8 billion of World Bank funding and derail a $3 billion International Monetary Fund loan package.

But Sheikh Armiyawo Shaibu, spokesperson for Ghana's Chief Imam, said it would be wrong for the West to restrict aid on behalf of LGBT people.

"So Islam sees it as, I mean, treats it as abominable, it's reprehensible, it's detestable, it's prohibited, in our word it's haram, it's prohibited, and something that is sinful, among all other sexual immoralities that one can practise to attract the wrath of God."

On Thursday, the High Court in Accra is due to rule on a lawmaker's petition to compel Akufo-Addo to act on the law within seven days.

Human Rights Watch has urged Akufo-Addo to veto the law and warned it could lead to "further gratuitous violence against LGBT people and their allies"

The uncertainty over what happens next is weighing on those who worry about the law's broader social impact.

Emmanuel Owusu-Bonsu is an LGBT rights activist.

"It's almost like everybody in Ghana is about to be given a gun, that's how I see it, that everybody in Ghana is about to be given a gun, and can point it at anyone and just say, 'Gay, gay, gay, gay, gay,' and they'll be taking you away. So it's very scary."

Article Link

#nunyas news #lgbt news

9 notes · View notes

lgbtqiamuslimpedia · 11 months

Text

Gender Me: Homofili og Islam (2008)

Director - Nefise Özkal Lorentzen

Writer - Nefise Özkal Lorentzen

Producer - Jorgen Lorentzen

Cinematography - Nefise Özkal,Nils Petter Lotherington,Cengiz Tanc

Animation - Morten Haslerud, Simon M. Valentine

Editor - Mette Cheng Munthe-Kaas

Sound Design - Håkon Lammetun

Cast - Mansour Saberi,Emre,Kerem, Daayiee Abdullah,Tigran,Huseyin,Kaltham, etc

Duration - 51 minutes

Languages - Turkish,Norwegian,Arabic

Year of release - 16 January, 2008

Gender Me: Homosexuality & Islam (also known as,Gender Me: Homofili og Islam ) is a documentary film directed by Turkish Norwegian filmmaker Nefise Özkal.The film was shot in Turkey and Norway.Gender Me is a part of ''A Trilogy On Gender And Islam (BLU-RAY)''

Gender Me featured an openly Gay Imam Daayiee Abdullah for turkish audiences.

Synopsis

Gender Me: Homosexuality and Islam is a road movie about a gay muslim's personal voyage into the world of full of taboos. Mansour is the central character of this film.Mansour is a Iranian gay refugee; He has been living in Oslo for 18 years.Now he wants to travel back to Istanbul, where he lived 2 years before he was granted asylum in Norway.He searches the question of faith and gender in Islam & he wants to collect the unusual stories of gay muslims.As the film unrolls, Mansour meets a range of complex individuals (who identifies them as gay & muslim).Therefore, the film language uses an experimental style,which dramatizes the dreams of the informants or the verses of Koran.It shows the ambiguity of Mansour & his inner conflict.

The film interviewed Imam Daayiee Abdullah, an openly LGBTQ+ Imam, who interprets the Koran through a different point of view;Throughout his youth,Mansour suffered from being and feeling different.He even thought that he was born with bad luck because he is a gay. Even though he is a well-established young man living in Oslo,Norway.But he cannot get rid of his former angst and shame.In the Koran there is a story that defines Islam as a religion of change, tolerance and love. It is exactly because of this text that Mansour's road movie first starts.Where should he travel to find the real Islam that he has been away from for many years? He finds many names, many web-addresses & many intellectuals who dare to interpret the Koran from a gender perspective.He has heard a lot about bitterness! In other terms, Mansour is a dream-catcher.He is like Graham in Sex, Lies and Videotapes.He wants to collect histories of other queers with an Islamic background.

20 notes · View notes

nakibistan · 1 year

Text

LGBTQIA+ Imams, Clerics & Faith leaders:

Classical Imam An-Nawabi

South Africa & World's first Openly Gay Imam Muhsin Hendricks

Algerian-French Imam Ludovic Mohamed Zahed opened an Unity Mosque in Paris

Canada's First Openly Gay Imam El-Farouk Khaki

America's First Non-binary Imama Amina Wadud

US's First Openly Gay Imam Daaiyee Abdullah

US's First Trans Male Imam Tynan Power

US's first Trans Woman Imama Mahdia Lynn

Unity Mosque's founder & Imam Frank Parmir

Queer Imam/Imama Trina P. Jackson

Black Non-binary, Queer Imam Taylor Amari Little

Tamsila Tauqir from Inclusive Mosque Initiative (IMI) lead the first Inclusive Congregation in UK. She was also a leader of Safra Project, a LBTQ Muslim support group.

Pakistani Transgender Maulvi Jameela Begum/Maulvi Jameela

Bangladeshi Gay Imam Suleman

Pakistani Gay Imam Sameer

Pakistan's Khawaja Sara/Transgender Imam Muhammad Khan

Pakistan's Islamic Transgender madrasa founder Miss Rani Khan

Indonesian Transgender Madrassa's Founder Shinta Ratri lead prayers for Transgender

Italian Genderfluid, Queer Imama Sveva Basirah

Jordanian Former Gay Imam & Sheikh Khalaf Yousef

Somali-Australian Imam Nur Warsame

Iranian Queer Mullah Taha performed Same-Sex Weddings for gays - BBC News

Tanzanian-Indian Intersex,Transgender Imam & Scholar Sheikh Hussein Mustafa Parmar

German Sufi professor & Imam Rahal Eks

German's Bisexual Liberal Imama Seyran Ates

German's Openly Gay Imam Christian Awhan Hermann

➡️ See Also :

https://www.thelocal.no/20170620/norwegian-muslim-plans-liberal-mosque-in-oslo

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-5263255/Imam-caught-trying-meeting-boy-15-Grindr.html

https://76crimes.com/2023/05/25/gay-muslim-leader-murdered-in-bangladesh/

https://minivannewsarchive.com/society/six-men-and-an-imam-arrested-for-homosexual-activity-956/comment-page-1

https://5pillarsuk.com/2019/05/02/controversial-mufti-abu-layth-mocks-classical-scholar-imam-an-nawawi-on-homosexuality/

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/muslim-worship-leader-raped-boy-at-mosque-2182791.html

https://www.channelionline.com/amp/madrasa-teacher-arrested-for-molesting-a-child-student/

https://www.khaama.com/mullah-imam-arrested-for-raping-child-in-ghazni-province-02516/

#queermuslims #lgbt muslim #queerimam #transimam #womanimam #femaleimam #queer faith #queering islam #religious queer #transmuslims

17 notes · View notes

menalez · 10 months

Note

I'm assuming you're a Muslim, and I truly apologize if you're not. But how do you deal with being a lesbian and not feeling any guilt or shame or even fear! I struggle alot. Same thing with viewing Islam as a religion when there's so many sexist and patriarchal things about it, but I can't let go because this is my religion.

im not the best to ask about reconciling religious beliefs with one's sexuality because i was never religious and was always skeptical of religion overall & in my case islam specifically. but ill share my process in hopes it will help & for those of u who come from more religious backgrounds, i encourage you to share your wisdoms with anon as i know my experience is not aligned with what anon needs.

so, i came out when i was 18 and i was very much afraid. i was mostly afraid not because i thought id be going to hell, because that idea didn't make much sense to me anyways, but because i was afraid of the reality of being gay (& especially a lesbian specifically) in my country. i literally felt like a wave of heat take over me and felt this weakness i can't even explain, its like i had a really high fever or sth. i knew i would lose the love & respect of many relatives and that id never be able to actually live a decent life in my country. we are so far behind in terms of gay rights, its not something people talk about yknow and theres no kind of community or orgs for us because its illegal to "promote" it in any way which means its illegal for such an org to even exist. theres no support for us.

at that time, i did look into more liberal & progressive interpretations of islam. it did help me a bit and it made me feel like i was doing something and promoting change that will maybe ultimately help gay muslims like myself. i thought maybe it would be possible to change how muslims view homosexuality bit by bit. so i looked into those things and surrounded myself with other gay muslims and would read about the interpretations from this one gay imam and id argue all the time about how qaum lut (people of lot) were actually not punished for homosexuality, that theres no actual mention of homosexuality, and that what is actually being criticised is them committing adultery (they were married men) & rape for power. i argued they werent even gay anyways and its been misconstrued for homophobic reasons.

i did this for a few years until i realised it was fruitless & theres no changing bigots, but looking at those interpretations at least did give me some kind of peace of mind that this idea of women being inferior and gay being a sin and all the other nonsense most muslims believe is at least not believed unanimously. so... idk how helpful it is but id recommend perhaps looking into that? it was part of my process & journey and maybe it'll at least bring you comfort and a peace of mind. the way ive seen religious muslims also think of it is like, it makes no sense to make gay people and then single us out for something we did not choose nor can change and just reaffirming the fact that if god does exist, then god would love gay people too. idk. good luck tho anon & i hope someone else has better input to provide

3 notes · View notes

patrice-bergerons · 1 year

Text

One of my favourite twitter accounts to follow is of this one Canadian gay reverend (@/revdaniel highly recommend) whether it's him posting about his day to day life with his husband and dog or eviscerating evangelicals who come at him with their queerphobia.

But I also think why don't *I* get to have the same thing, you know? Why are there no openly gay imams leading congregations that not only tolerate but embrace and celebrate queer identities? Offering readings and interpretations of the Quran that go beyond 'well you are sinning for being queer but God even loves sinners?' I haven't prayed in years but I would literally sprint to mosque if I had that. Why can't I - literally anywhere in any Muslim community??

#islam #if anyone knows of such an imam/mosque/congregation in london pls do hmu #or anywhere in the uk tbh #best ive gotten from - devout - muslims is extremely uneasy tolerance #and a *i* think what you are doing is wrong but i am not Allah and this is not for me to judge or to tell you how to live your life #and i need and i deserve more than that #😤#it's also a good thing this reverend is not local tho #bc i have the sense id find myself in his church and i have no interedt in converting to christianity rip

7 notes · View notes

voidingintotheshout · 1 year

Text

The view from my window.

If anybody needs to hear it, one of the more powerful things that I’ve allowed myself is “I know it’s a problem, but I’m not dealing with it right now.”

Hassan Minaj has a bit in one of his specials about being approached in the mosque by a white Muslim that, even as a child, he was sure was a federal agent in clumsy disguise. He later confirmed this when the “Brother” was declassified years later. I can tend to be very anxious so I got it into my head that this random dude who occasionally goes to Muslim meet ups might be a fed. The Geopolitical issues around Muslims being both victims and villains has brought out the dark side of my anxiety.

I know that it’s not good for me to try to “solve” these mysteries, and so I’m allowing myself the freedom to just acknowledge that I might have someone in my life that might be manipulating me towards their own ends, and I’m choosing to not care. I can’t prove anything and this is how people go crazy and I don’t want to go crazy. I just need to focus on my faith and I need to stop worrying about trying to “be on the right side of history.” I need to stop worrying about the fact that an Imam I respect might be both homophobic and a closet bisexual. I need to stop worrying about whether being a gay Muslim makes me stupid, naïve, or supporting some kind of “evil empire”.

I don’t like to mask off on here because it’s very depressing when I expose myself completely vulnerably and all of my deepest, darkest fears, and it gets like three notes. I’m not doing it for attention. It’s just annoying when I don’t get any at all if that makes any sense.

My point is that one of the more powerful things that I can do with mental health issues is what I called Blindspot Technique. It’s basically that you give yourself a percentage of objectivity that you have in a situation and your blind spot is the percentage that you need to adjust to compensate for what issue or trauma you have, and its power to distort your objectivity. Like if you’re very very sensitive to anyone saying anything negative about your body/weight, maybe you need to adjust down how sure you are that something was intended as insulting/offensive by maybe 30% or 40%. Maybe you’re having dinner with a friend who has never been a jerk to you in the past and you were at their place and they ask if you want some vegetables for dinner. If when you are in the heat of your issue, you are 60 to 70% sure that was a passive aggressive comment but you adjust it down by 30% and now you’re less than 50% sure. Probably best to let it go. Maybe in hindsight you put together the pieces that they just came back from a farmer’s market and so vegetables were on their mind and it was nothing about you. That’s the Blindspot Technique.

Anyway, related to my issue is that I need to accept that my blind spot in terms of objectivity on this is so high I can’t reasonably be able to tell what is my issue taking control and what is the objective truth. Like, a few days ago the synagogue near my house had a gay pride celebration get together. This happened a few days after my Imam told me that identifying as gay is “cursed” and tried to talk me out of identifying as gay at all because I’m asexual. I then saw that gay pride mixer at a synagogue, and I just felt this overwhelming ache. That I wish I believed in Judaism, so that I could be part of a religion that may be more persecuted, but at least is supportive of LGBT people. It just made me so frustrated and tired.

Mostly, it made me frustrated and tired because the honest truth is that I believe in Islam with all of my heart and soul. And I have a personal relationship with Allah that means so much to me and my religious practices makes me happier and healthier and more confident to do so many things that I would’ve never been able to do and it’s frustrating that the people at the mosque will never truly know who I am. And also that many of my non-religious gay friends will never truly understand the Muslim side of me. I might never find a lot of my people and that sucks. I may be drawn towards institutions that make it impossible for me to be fully out because I have internalized homophobia. I don’t know. I just know that I don’t have the clarity to figure that out so I am going to take my Imam’s advice and not worry about it because in his words: I’m driving myself crazy trying to figure out something that I can’t figure out. I need to just put my head down and focus on the five pillars and not really worry about the rest of it.

Thanks for reading.

Oh, and as for the brother, who might be a fed, I’m not concerned because he’s probably just a kindly pharmacist, who happens to be impossibly good-looking, blonde haired and blue-eyed, and dressed like he just came off the runway of the fashion show. He’s also incredibly successful and charming, and seems to be the exact type of person that would appeal to Muslims. I may have gender dysphoria and daddy issues but I’m not gonna let anyone make me say things that I don’t believe. If he actually started a conversation about any of that jihadist bullshit, I would tell him to go fuck himself. Hurting innocent people for your beliefs is for brutal monsters who have lost their humanity.

#lgbt #lgbtqia+#islam #lgbtqia+ muslim #islamblr #dealing with anxiety

3 notes · View notes

iamdeltas · 1 year

Text

me before last Friday: Honestly The Owl House is a good show but I think it's a little overpraised. People act like it's the greatest show ever created and it just isn't and it's got plenty of its own flaws.

me after having to listen to the local imam's extremely homophobic khutbah last Friday about the Dangers of Pride Month and The Presence of *GASP* Gay Characters In Our Precious Kids' Shows: The Owl House is the greatest show ever actually. The best show EVER created. Specifically because it would give this imam a fucking aneurysm.

#s says some words #i really really really need to meet some queer muslims honestly #islam and i are not quite simpatico at the moment and i'd love to know what gets queer muslims to stick with the faith #even though so many people within it love saying we're wrong for existing

5 notes · View notes

beardedmrbean · 2 years

Text

A school-board meeting in Dearborn, Mich. was shut down earlier this week by hundreds of protesters opposing the circulation of LGBTQ books across the city’s public-school system.

Viral videos recorded by a Detroit Free Press reporter circulated on Twitter showing pandemonium breaking out at the meeting Monday night. Many of the protesters carried signs in English and Arabic: “Keep Your Dirty Books in the Closet,” “Stop Grooming Our Kids,” and “Homosexuality Big Sin,” some read.

Tensions boiled over when Roxanne McDonald, chair of the school board, limited attendee speaking time to three minutes. The proceedings were then halted due to fears that the growing crowd violated the fire code. Shouts of “Vote them out!” broke out.

Dearborn and neighboring Dearborn Heights are overwhelmingly Muslim communities just outside of Detroit. The town elected its first Arab-American mayor in 2021 on the back of the community’s support. Rashida Tlaib’s congressional district, Michigan’s 13th, abuts the area, too.

One of the community’s prominent religious leaders, Imam Hassan Al-Qazwini urged followers to attend the school-board meeting during his Friday sermon. “Some of those books are completely inappropriate for our children to read,” Al-Qazwini said. “Some of those books promote pornography. Some of them promote homosexuality. We don’t need this.”

“What happened tonight at the school board meeting in Dearborn is very embarrassing and is totally rejected,” Osama Siblani, publisher of the Dearborn-based Arab American News and a longtime community leader, wrote in a Facebook post.

Among the book titles temporarily restricted include All Boys Aren’t Blue, The Lovely Bones, Flamer, Push, as well as Red, White & Royal Blue. Many, though not all of the books, deal with sexuality, gender, and sexual violence. Another one under review, This Book is Gay, prompted backlash because of “the explicit nature of the book alone, and not the LGBTQ+ themes,” The Arab American News reported.

The Dearborn incident is reminiscent of similar British Muslim protests against same-sex education. Weeks of protests wracked Birmingham when local schools sought to teach “LBGT-inclusive content” to young students. At one point, LGBT campaigners and their children were pelted with eggs by protesters, and about half the school’s students were voluntarily withdrawn from classes by parents.

#nunyas news #SJ fight time

34 notes · View notes

goharshahi · 1 year

Video

youtube

*** ENABLE CC FOR ENGLISH SUBTITLES ***

New Video: Imam Mehdi Aayen Gay To Kya Karen Gay? | Sufi Master Younus AlGohar | ALRA TV

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s1VEWuqXy2k

What is the purpose of the arrival of Imam Mehdi, a personality awaited for aeons, by creation and creator alike?

-----------

✅ Get the latest updates from ALRA TV on Telegram Messenger. Download Telegram Messenger from the AppStore or Google PlayStore and subscribe to: https://t.me/official_alratv

❓ Question Sufi Master Younus AlGohar directly! Text your questions to us on WhatsApp: +447472540642 or Facebook messenger: http://m.me/alratv

Watch the live recordings of these lectures every day at 22:00 GMT at: http://www.younusalgohar.com

For Izn e Zikr-e-Qalb (Permission for Awakening of the Spiritual Heart) call Shaykh Amjad Gohar on this number +44 (0) 740 1855 568 via WhatsApp.

---

📱Social Media Instagram: http://instagram.com/alratv https://www.instagram.com/younus_algohar

Twitter: https://twitter.com/AlRa_TV https://twitter.com/mehdifoundation https://twitter.com/MessiahFdn https://twitter.com/younusalgohar

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/alratv/ https://www.facebook.com/HHYounusAlGo...

Websites: http://www.goharshahi.us/ http://www.theawaitedone.com/ http://thereligionofgod.com http://www.younusalgohar.org/

*NEW URDU LANGUAGE WEBSITE* http://www.mehdifoundation.com/

#Imam Mehdi #Gohar Shahi #Younus AlGohar #Sufism #Mehdi #Mahdi #Motivation #Enlighten Heart #Spirituality #Divine Love #Inner Peace #Sufi Master

2 notes · View notes

imaminoccultation · 1 year

Text

Letter 9: The People Who Have Been Guided - Revisiting the Work of OnlyLeigh

Peace be upon those who follow the right path. Which is to say, not just the Muslims: anybody who manifests the best qualities of Imam ‘Ali by being just, generous, and kind is following the right path, however imperfectly. Anybody who has had the Record revealed to them is a follower of the right path: I am inclined to believe Fred Donner when he says the Prophet’s religious community was pluralist in nature. And so, in addition to the People of the Recitation, the Uthmanic Bible recognizes three other Peoples of the Record, or Ahlul-Kitab:

The People of the Gospel, the Nazarenes, those who follow Prophet Jesus Christ, peace be upon him (Christians);

The People of the Tawrat, those who have been guided (الذين هادوا), the children of Prophet Israel (Ya’qub), the Judaeans, the people of Prophet Musa, peace be upon him (Jews);

The Sabians, who we must discuss another day.

Fuck the state of Israel, Zionists eat shit and eat shit forever, but I’m not gonna up and pretend that anti-Semitism isn’t a problem in the Muslim world and the Arabophone world; I’m not fucking stupid. It means nothing for whether or not the Zionist occupation has the right to ethnically cleanse Palestinians and force them out of their homeland, but it’s also a fact we need to acknowledge, as Muslim anti-Semitism is also a key tool in Zionist propaganda. I want to make my stance clear on the issue before I say:

As a kid, I was the only Muslim I knew at my school. Deadass. Only Sudani I knew at my school. Deadass. Only Mahasi I knew in my whole city. Deadass. I remember one time when I was fucking ten, this Japanese kid was telling this white kid he was descended from samurai, and when I brought up that I was descended from Nubian royals (no less than that Japanese kid was a samurai descendant, anyway), the white kid was clear what he thought about that:

“Who cares?”

Yeah, living in that kind of environment does shit to you, especially if you’re also the only gay kid you know. Not that you know you’re gay: ooh, I took way too long to accept that part of myself. Thankfully, I had a portal out of the fundamentalist community I’d been trapped in by life circumstances: a window to the world beyond Orthodox Sunnism, Evangelical Christianity, and Mormon Christianity.

YouTube. Alhamdulillah for the internet.

This is where I encountered my first queer Person of the Record. I doubt they remember, but when I was in like middle school or some shit, I wrote a comment on one of their videos and totally lost my shit (or “fangirled”) when they responded. You see, I got into superheroes, fantasy, all the nerd shit that eventually led to the formation of fandoms on the 2010s internet: one of the places so many 2010s kids would find the tools to unpack and understand their own true identity. Tumblr culture, in other words. And I got into one of Tumblr culture’s golden age YouTubers: Leigh Motherfucking Lahav.

You know, as a kid, Musa was like always my favorite prophet. Got me into learning Hebrew, which, you know, pissed my Sudani fam off, and it’s not like the white people I knew were any less anti-Semitic. But for me personally, I always related to the Jewish kids: I mean, we both had to look at the pork dishes at lunch like “aww,” and we would have to step out of class when the real white people would do their Christmas shit or whatever the fuck. Also, you know, Judaism is like the fucking backbone of Christianity and Islam, and even though I prefer the latest rendition, I’ve always had a soft spot for those who have been guided among the People of the Book. I’ve never lost my interest in the histories of the Ethiopian, Mizrahi, and Ashkenazi Jews who, at various points, made parts of Sudan their home.

And so, I got into this Jewish nerd culture YouTuber, and even though I grew up around someone whose response to my saying “you can be anti-Zionist and not be anti-Semitic” was “anti-Semitic is such a Jewish word,” I related to Leigh Lahav a fucking ton. I loved that shit. So today, I’m taking a bowl of the duku, kicking back, and rewatching some classics and posting some random observations. Get tucked in, besties.

youtube

Okay yeah I’m pretty fucking basic, so what? This video is fucking superb, are you kidding me? Could a 2010s shaab-of-the-homosexual-mustaqbal/future-homosexual-of-America possibly ask for more than a parody of Mean Girls set in Lord of the Rings? By the time I’d watched that video I think I’d only seen the Desolution of Smaug because Robbie dragged me to it, I didn’t watch the actually good Tolkienverse movies till way later. But anyways, looking back, definitely parallels between the Bilbo/tall sexy elf relationship and the relationship I had with this one kid in PE class, very queer. I approve.

I mean, frankly, this is better than the Mean Girls movie. I mean, the Mean Girls movie is a classic of 2010s culture but it just does not age well, its sexual ethics (which are pretty core to its comedy) are just…weird in hindsight? Much more uncomfortable? Also sucks that Janis Ian is fucking Lebanese and it’s nothing more than a punchline.

I mean, in this trailer, there’s much more romantic tension between Bilbo and the leader of the Elf Plastics and emphasis on that, which I think would make for a much more interesting story rather than the straight mess that Mean Girls is in reality. The scene of breaking down the cliques is also just so iconic and it’s such a wonderful format, and Lahav’s version is frankly one of my favorite renditions of it: recently, I saw the Ms. Marvel show do it and while it was accurate to the Muslim-American masjid experience it was also not funny. But that’s just me. I watched the show high, anyway.

Anyways, next:

youtube

Leftist takes on the didactic closer aside, this is another fucking classic. You see, I have a soft spot for Frozen and you can all get the fuck over it, Disney fans, it is just a good fucking movie. Maybe, anyway. I only saw the first half because one of my teachers was sick of preteens that day or something (we started the movie in class and never finished it). I just didn’t care back then, I was just sick of hearing “Let It Go” because who doesn’t have that collective trauma haha. But you know, I loved learning languages growing up and one of my favorite ways to learn was by listening to translated Disney music. It’s always an interesting experience, and guys, guys: there are Singlish dubs of Frozen on YouTube, okay? And the songs I’ve heard from the movie (never listened to the full soundtrack) do indeed slap. I listen to songs from Frozen more than Moanna, I’m just saying.

Anyways, I’ve also never seen Orange is the New Black. But I fucking loved this trailer, okay, I fucking love Disney musicals, the in-jokes are perfect, Elsa and Mulan seem like they’d be a great match, it’s a cut above the endless sea of Frozen parodies that inundated the 2010s internet.

youtube

Basically me with You Will Die at Twenty, and it still was sort of underwhelming (I still think it’s one of the better Sudani movies tho, fight me). Anyways, got into OnlyLeigh during my MCU phase and man did this video hit, back in the 2010s, there was so much promise ahead of us! We didn’t even know No Way Home could be a thing yet! Back when I had something other than a dreary sense of fatigue at the MCU, finding my opinion of the older films souring now that I have knowledge of the breadth of their cultural impact. But I mean, like also, who gives a fuck it’s superheroes. This is funny, it’s charming, it’s relatable, it’s also the reason I avoid watching movie trailers now if I can help it. Spoilers don’t ruin something, but I do like to be fucking surprised.

Anyways, this video takes on a new meaning for me as an Ace Attorney fan. Maybe rewatching it high was not a great idea considering Lahav goes through what academics like to call “The 3DS trilogy AA fandom cycle,” for the five of you who know what I’m talking about.

youtube

This is really just my relationship with Jesus Christ Superstar. As much as Andrew Lloyd Webber is really really not great (to put it generously), since I was in fucking high school I was a Jesus Christ Superstar Evangelical and nobody will ever fucking take that away from me. Anyways, honestly, I love this love letter to the culture where some people were just like “okay, whatever, this is cool I guess” and some had become qualified MCU researchers (some of whom are now starring in the MCU, Iman Vellani!) Anyways, even though OnlyLeigh is our tragic villain/protagonist in this story, frankly, I think this video also serves as a decent argument for why if you’re gonna have a movie night at your house, put subtitles on and let people talk. Otherwise just go to the theatre because sitting on somebody’s couch in silence for 2 hours is boring as fuck, no matter what’s playing.

youtube

There was a time in my life where I was only friends with people who would have gotten every reference here. Frankly, some of the best friends I’ve ever had, lmao. It’s really interesting to see fandoms form as an “identity” back in that era of the internet, feels like seeing the beginnings of it all, a whole world of literature, shared narratives, and rituals people were building communities around. It’s fun to look at the parallels between fandoms and various Abrahamic religious sects: sharing principles, behaviors, rituals, and stories, but also heavily delineated by what their specific focuses were. You know, Christianity is just the Jesus fandom, Islam is the Qur’an and Hadith fandom, etc. etc. etc. I don’t mean this as an insult: actually, I strongly believe in the legitimacy of the literary culture of fucking fandom. Not to say it’s all good, or even most of it is, but it’s impact on culture is fucking immense. Just cause the adults don’t like it doesn’t mean it wasn’t fucking formative to us queer nerds who could only find people who liked what we liked on the internet, haha. Anyways, funny vid, really ironic to see the fear of the MCU fans here considering the MCU has the global cultural influence of the fucking Roman Empire at this point. Here, “fangirl” is the equivalent of mu’min, Believer: you can be a Sherlock Believer, Doctor Who Believer, you’re all People of the Record (Tumblr), who contribute to certain literary genres like scriptural exegesis (fanfiction). Sometimes there’s crossover between Peoples of the Record, sometimes there’s great animosity, both outside and within. You see what I’m saying?

youtube

Shit, this is 7 years old?? Age of Ultron??? Oh, so, so innocent. Weird, now I sympathize more with the Star Wars fans in this video than the pro-MCU headmaster is really just the CEO of the Disney corporation’s Prophet and Messenger. Like that speech freaks me the fuck out, what the hell, that’s too real, you’re right, Leigh, I had to watch Ms. Marvel! I knew I was going to hate it, I couldn’t stop myself!!

Ant-Man is still totally skippable though, really not a great MCU movie. Also, alhamdulillah the DC Universe still has not taken off, تبارك الذي بيده الملك وهو على كل شيء قدير

youtube

As somebody who’s been forced to explain Eid to every flavor of Christian fundamentalist rural white America has to offer, my sympathy for the Jewish characters here is unreal. Fuck, as somebody who’s told people they’re Shi’i Muslim and later get asked about Hinduism, this video still fucking hits. Honestly, fantastic educational tactic. Very funny, great way to demonstrate the parallels between traditional spirituality and magic (ultimately, just unregulated, forbidden, yet effective spirituality from the Abrahamic standpoint).

The content of OnlyLeigh spoke to me because Leigh Lahav was the only queer-positive non-Christian Person of the Record I knew who was also into the MCU - and even then, only as an audience member. It’s not just the humor that speaks to my pop cultural context, but also the themes that always hit for somebody who feels the alienation that’s endemic to just not being born in the best place in the traditional Abrahamic gender/sexual hierarchy. Plus, shit is funny. Animation is cute and solid, the art style is iconic, if I weren’t so into iconography right now, I’d probably let it inspire some new cartoon-style drawings.

Anyways, thanks a ton, OnlyLeigh. You really helped! Peace be upon you, and all others who follow the right path.

But not in a “can we all get along” way, more like a “isn’t the internet fucking great sometimes?” way.

#onlyleigh #queer #islam #muslim #jewish #judaism #theology #mcu #marvel #fandom #sudan #nubia #Youtube

4 notes · View notes