GBLT
Immigrants in Norway
by
LIOW-LB/Enkidu
In
the last couple of weeks, GBLT immigrants have been a major focus in
the Norwegian media. Enkidu wrote recently about the attempts of the
Norwegian Conservative Party to capture GBLT-votes in the local
elections in the capital Oslo by appearing as the gay party.
Last week,
Mohammad Hamdan
the leader of the Islamic Council in Norway expressed concern about
the new strategy of the conservative party, who also actively has
addressed non-European, mainly Muslim immigrant groups in the
Norwegian society as one of their most important target group in the
election campaign. Hamdan says to Dagsavisen (17.08.2003), one of
Oslo’s daily newspapers that it may damage the party’s
relationships to Muslim voters to focus so much on gay issues and the
many openly gay politicians in the conservative party. He explains
this with the religious interpretation of homosexuality prevalent
within Islam, making it highly problematical for most Muslim voters to
vote for politicians who openly practice homosexuality and advocate
gay rights. He emphasizes that the Islamic Council has not yet
discussed how they will react to the new strategy from the
Conservative Party. He does say, however, that personally, he would
himself vote for a heterosexual politician instead of a gay, if they
had more or less the same political views, but he would of course
consider voting for a gay candidate if he represents a better
political alternative. Not a single party suits everyone 100% and it
is necessary to get a total perspective.
For
a week GBLT immigrants were almost daily in the headlines of the
Norwegian media and received more attention that ever before. Many
commentators emphasized that this was an urgent and necessary debate
that should have entered the public consciousness much earlier.
Immigrant issues are generally expected to become increasingly
important in the next years. At the moment 10% of the voters in Oslo
are immigrants with a non-European ethnic background according to
recent statistics. However, 30% of all school children have a
non-European language as their mother tongue. Therefore, their
relative and numerical importance will increase every year. This is
also a situation, which has increasingly caught the attention of gay
activists and politicians, since soon there will be more Muslim voters
than GBLT-voters, and this may have huge implications for how future
generations of politicians will deal with GBLT-rights and issues. It
is not out of the question that soon Muslim sensitivities might be a
higher priority to politicians than GBLT – rights.
One
huge challenge for future GBLT – activists will probably be to avoid
the emergence of a situation in which one minority group feels its
rights threatened by another. It might be necessary to promote
processes and policies that may result in a better integration of the
non-European immigrant groups into the general society, and convince
them to embrace a worldview and political culture based in a Western
democratic and humanistic tradition. Policies with such ultimate
goals, however, may also have several undesired results and may lead
to an increased homogenisation of the society that hardly would be in
anybody’s interest. It has been a long and hard process to transform
Norway into a pluralistic and multicultural society and the fight for
GBLT – rights have been an essential and integral part of that
process, which still goes on. How can it be ensured that such policies
can be successfully implemented in the future without threatening the
cultural, religious and ethnic identities of the new minorities and
maintain all individuals’ fundamental right to be different on their
own terms?
On
Friday August 15th, a new survey regarding the situation of
GBLT-youth with immigrant background was presented to the Norwegian
Ministry of
Local Government and Regional Development. The survey had several
alarming conclusions and received considerable attention and interest
throughout the society. The survey showed for instance that many gay
immigrants are at high risk of being forced into arranged marriages
with individuals of another sex. Their frequency of psychological
problems and suicide attempts is also much higher than for ethnic
Norwegian young men and women. One of the most interesting, and
surprising results of the survey was that GBLT Muslims in Norway do
not seem to be more vulnerable or victimized than other immigrants
from non-European societies. The survey shows that immigrant youth in
general, Christian, Hindus, Buddhists and Muslims, are all to an
almost equal extent confronted with harassment and pressure from their
families. This new insight will have a certain importance for new
policies regarding GBLT – immigrants, since earlier discussions have
tended to focus almost exclusively on harassment of Muslim GBLT –
youth. This is the first scientific survey conducted among GBLT –
immigrants in Norway and was implemented by the Institut for Social
Research (Sosialforskningsinstituttet) at NOVA
[Norsk
institutt for forskning om oppvekst, velferd og aldring - Norwegian Natonal Institute for Social Research]. The researcher Bera
Moseng interviewed during the research process 15 men and women at
depth. She emphasizes that several gay and lesbian immigrants
expressed a real fear for the families. Many young gay and lesbians
with immigrant background feel a much stronger pressure to marry a
person of an opposite sex and have children than any Norwegian
individuals ever experience. If they are open about their sexual
orientation in their own families, they often experience harassment,
exclusion and marginalisation.
Many were daily facing the risk of being excluded from
their families but often also their ethnic communities if their sexual
orientation became known. Another interesting conclusion Moseng made
was that homosexuality as such not always is the reason for the
exclusion. Some immigrant communities may seem to have a very relaxed
and accepting attitude to homosexual actions. However, they cannot
accept permanent ways of living that do not include traditional
different-sex marriage or result in children. The real threat many
immigrant parents feel when their children out themselves, seems to be
the self-conscious GAY – ness of the GBLT ethnic Norwegian youth,
rather than homosexuality as such. Some of the closeted GBLT youth
with immigrant background even felt an additional pressure went
interacting with their ethnic Norwegian friends, who were likely to
condemn and ridicule them for their inability to be open and
self-conscious about their sexual orientation. This could lead to a
terrible double pressure that can be extremely difficult to live with.
Erna Solberg, Minister of Local Government and
Regional Development says to Aftenposten, a newspaper published in
Oslo (15.08.2003) that the ministry ordered the survey after they
repeatedly had been confronted with alarming individual cases
indicating that several gay and lesbian immigrants had a difficult
situation, and experienced social isolation and condemnation. Ms
Solberg says that the ministry needed to find out if this was true.
Unfortunately, it was true, as the survey confirms. The Norwegian
government will now consider what the consequences of the new survey
will be, and how action can be taken to improve the situation for GBLT
– youth with immigrant background.
©
LIOw-LB/ENKIDU * 23.08.2003.
* [Si
desea información sobre la fuente original favor de solicitarla a ENKIDU].
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Los
Martes de Enkidu
Febrero 2007
