Title: "Sex, Lies and Rights"
Producer/Director: Jamaica Coalition for Healthy Society
Length: 54 mins
Genre: Propaganda
Batshit rating: 6 out of 5 buckets (not a typo)
Every now and again you come across something on the internet which forces you to ask yourself "what the fuck did I just watch?" You wonder to yourself, or perhaps even loudly at the computer screen, how it is that persons could so freely and enthusiastically put their stupidity on display for the entire world to access at the click of a button. When you come across material like this you're instantly struck by the harrowing reality that there are persons out there who take this sort of stuff as unquestionably true. Such is my reaction to the recently produced DVD "Sex, Lies and Rights" by the Jamaica Coalition for Healthy Society (JCHS).
The DVD features an amateur produced "documentary" designed to sensitize (actually scare) the Jamaican public about the apocalyptic dangers of repealing the buggery law found in the Offences Against the Person Act. The JCHS essentially believes that allowing gay persons, men in particular, to have consensual sex would detonate a time bomb causing Jamaica to spiral into a hell-hole of sexual depravity, spiritual anarchy, legal upheaval, and all round societal meltdown. If gay men are allowed to fuck, we all get screwed. Surprisingly, the production was launched with much fanfare at a cinema in Kingston; not surprisingly the attendees included members of the homophobic top brass of Jamaica.
The entire feature is a celebration of fear-mongering and misrepresentation of the facts: it starts out with misconceptions of biblical proportions - human rights are granted by "God," and ends with nonsensical assertions about what is best for ALL Jamaicans - the Judeo-Christian worldview is the "safest" one for persons to "thrive." The film is divided into three main sections; a skit involving two males pretending to be students of philosophy, and then one monologue a piece from Dr. Wayne West (chairman of JCHS) and Shirley Richards, former president of the Lawyers Christian Fellowship. Dr. West dazzles us with his expert knowledge of gay sexual practices and misuses medical statistics to scare the audience to high heavens about the dangers of HIV (I Googled chariot racing and Dr. West's picture appears at the top of the page in images - I shit you not), while Richards comes in for the deathblow with her description of the impending global police state if gay persons are given the same rights as everyone else. These sections are interspersed with footage of vox pop interviews done on the streets where unsuspecting passers-by are asked loaded questions like "Would you like your child taught that anal sex is ok?" The propaganda style of the film is made all the more forceful by the complete absence of views by a single neutral expert in either the areas of philosophy, law, or medicine. There are calls throughout for the viewing public to sign a petition to keep the law superimposed on a quasi-reggae soundtrack declaring "no touch it." Yes, it's as painful as it sounds.
If you're able to make it through this shit storm in one sitting, good for you. It took me close to a week. The producers have smartly disabled comments on the YouTube video since all the comments were blasting the film to kingdom come - very similar to what happened with the embarrassing "Harlem shake" video produced by the Love March Movement (LMM), for which they offered a half-assed apology. Not to be left out of the idiocy, a couple representatives from the LMM (apparently the youth arm of the JCHS) also make an appearance in Sex, Lies and Rights towards the end. The film demonstrates just how dangerous religious fundamentalism can be, and like all true propaganda material, for the ignorant among us it as delectable as it is dangerous. I'm optimistic that the ideas found in the film will find their way into the dustbins of the future, but given the state of things I'm worried I may not be able to see it happen.
Cool Dude.
