Western gay agenda
When Austrian singer Conchita Wurst headlined the Mardi Gras afterparty on Saturday late hours it seemed as though all of Sydney was celebrating. Yet Wurst’s letter of “respect and tolerance” continues to be controversial.
Wurst won the 2014 Eurovision Song Contest in the wake of Russia’s annexation of Crimea. Her victory became a cultural flashpoint. While Russians booed her performance, crowds in Copenhagen jeered the Russian contestants. Russian Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin tweeted that Eurovision:
… showed supporters of European integration their European future: a bearded teen.
Under President Vladimir Putin, Russia has sought to establish leadership of the non-Western world by defending “universal traditional values” against permissiveness and immorality. Putin has criminalised LGBT propaganda, turned a blind eye to vigilante attacks and supported international campaigns against sexual rights.
Advocates of “traditional values” are also mobilising in Australia. Former prime minister Tony Abbott recently called for the Sound Schools Coalition, an anti-bullying initiative focused on LGBTI youth, to be defunded.
Meanwhile, the Australian Christian Lobby has requeste
How to spread same-sex attracted rights beyond the West
While the protest of gay rights continues across the West, in parts of the earth they are going backwards, with states hardening their repression of people on the basis of their sexuality, writes Dennis Altman.
Currently Ethiopia is tightening its laws against lgbtq+ behaviour, already punishable by up to 15 years imprisonment. It appears the government is accompanying the lead of Uganda and Nigeria, both of which have recently introduced laws increasing the penalties for both homosexual behaviour and support for any "advocacy" of recognition of same-sex identities or behaviour.
Similar hardening of repression of people for gay and transgender identities appears to be increasing across Africa. A recent documentary about Cameroon, Born this Way, highlights the violence and persecution against anyone perceived as not conforming to sexual or gender norms. Lest we believe the repression is confined to men, that documentary highlights the fear of imprisonment and "corrective rape" faced by women assumed to be lesbian.
Recent laws in Russia, supported by president Vladimir Putin, which pursue to penalise "prop
University Writing Program
Out West: The Queer Sexuality of the American Cowboy and His Cultural Significance
by Hana Klempnauer Miller
Research Sheet | UWS 53b Mythology of the American West | Eric Hollander | Fall 2021
About this paper | This paper as PDF | MLA format
Heath Ledger and Jake Gyllenhaal in a scene from Brokeback Mountain.
Ask anyone who’s seen BrokebackMountain(2005) to characterize the film in three words, and you’re almost certain to hear some variation of “gay cowboy love-story.” While many have lauded the film, directed by Ang Lee, for its nuanced portrayal of two men’s complicated romance for each other, the film was subject to scathing criticism at the time of its release. Detractors, largely spearheaded by right-wing and religious groups, quickly and fervently deemed the film’s depiction of a homosexual couple immoral, evidence of an attempt to feminize men, and even anti-American. In many cases, critics honed in on the two leads ’ occupations as cowboys, challenging the life of a “gay cowboy” in American history. One critic wrote that the film was a
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