Professor examines gay rights politics in Nicaragua

Professor Cymene Howe from the Department of Anthropology at Rice University delivered a lecture yesterday on the politics of sexual rights in Nicaragua in anticipation of International Women’s Day.

Interim Program Director of the Women, Gender and Sexuality Studies Program Sonia Hofkosh opened the presentation with a short history of the worldwide holiday, which will take place tomorrow.

“Today, International Women’s Day is actually an official national holiday in over 25 countries, and thousands of events and activities are held throughout the world on March 8 to celebrate the achievements of women, [and] to continue to advocate for gender equity and freedom from violence and oppression,” Hofkosh said.

After the brief introduction, Howe began by summarizing Nicaragua’s political history. In the 1980s, the small Central American country entered the international scene with its Marxist Sandinista revolution, and the gay and lesbian community of Nicaragua experienced a period free of repression. Around 1990, however, a new conservative government took over and instituted Article 204, an anti-sodomy law that is often considered to be the most repressive of its kind in the Western Hemisphere.

“What this law said was that anyone who promotes, propagandizes or practices same-sex sexuality is guilty of the crime of sodomy and could be prosecuted and put in jail or prison for up to four years, depending on the infraction,” Howe said.

Howe next discussed her experience as an expert witness for a Nicaraguan man named Rafael, who was detained in Texas by immigration authorities. Rafael described to her what it was like to live as a “very feminine homosexual” in Nicaragua, explaining that he had been sexually assaulted multiple times as a child by adult family members and again as a young man by police. Howe, along with Rafael’s attorneys, hoped to win sexual asylum for Rafael, who feared that he would be abused and tortured if he returned to his native country.

Howe also examined the country’s complex perspective on gay and lesbian sexuality. In Nicaragua, she said, dominant, macho men can engage in homosexual activity without being considered gay. However, “passivos,” or more effeminate males, are often targets of prejudice and are labeled with the derogatory word “cochone.” Similarly, more masculine lesbians are often disparaged with the word “cochonas,” while “femininas,” or more womanish lesbians, are often subject to less ridicule.

As of “el boom,” the sudden influx of activist organizations and non-governmental organizations into Nicaragua since the conservative party takeover, many new words such as “lesbiana,” “gay” and “homosexual” have become more pervasive, Howe said.

“It is not simply that a new, more positive term like ‘lesbiana’ is being affixed to an older and more familiar and negative term, like ‘cochona,’” Howe said. “Rather, a more expansive sexual category is being created that is populated not only with [‘cochonas’], but with their ‘feminina’ partners and lovers.”

Activism for gay and lesbian rights in Nicaragua has been mainly championed by two distinct movements, according to Howe. The first, called the Sexuality Free from Prejudice movement, hosts the largest and most well-attended events. Unlike the second movement, the Lesbian and Gay Pride movement, Sexuality Free from Prejudice receives much of its funding from outside activist organizations. Both groups challenge Article 204, but have distinct ideological differences, Howe said.

“The criticism often levered against Lesbian and Gay Pride is that, while it offered an overt critique of the law, its formula of minority rights failed to appeal to a larger population — an important audience for those who hope to change the country’s moral climate,” she said. “Activists committed to the politics of Pride, however, often claim that the [Sexuality] Free from Prejudice approach was too conciliatory.”

According to Howe, the sexual rights community has made extensive use of the media as an impetus for social change. One of the most successful examples is the telenovela series “Sexto Sentido,” a show similar to the American program “Friends,” which examines controversial issues such as discrimination and abortion. The series, which features two homosexual characters, was the first television program to be filmed in-country and quickly became the most popular show among young Nicaraguan viewers.

“The telenovela treated almost every ‘-ism’ imaginable in Nicaragua, but it managed to do that without sacrificing entertainment value,” Howe said.

Though activists have made great strides in securing gay and lesbian rights, homosexual Nicaraguans still face many challenges, such as high rates of unemployment and large-scale anti-sodomy outcry from religious communities, Howe said. All gay and lesbian participants in one survey reported harassment and discrimination in the Nicaraguan school system, and some reported being victims of police brutality on the street. Last year, the country also saw a 50 percent increase in homophobic violence.

The lecture ended on an upbeat note, as Howe announced that Rafael was eventually granted asylum in the United States.

“He did win his case,” she said. “He did go free from the jail cell in Oslo, Texas. Whether he will ever return to his native Nicaragua, I do not know.”