2013 HEROES AND ZEROS OF THE YEAR

Here is the expanded version of my 18th annual column of the past year’s heroes and zeros which originally ran in Fugues magazine.

Zero Lebanese security forces, for using discredited “anal probe” exams to test for proof of men being gay. The doctor checks for traces of sperm, and takes a picture to ‘study’ the shape of the hole – the larger the width the more ‘likely’ the person is gay. Human Rights Watch says the tests amount to humiliation and torture.

Zeros The Gulf states of Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar, Oman, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, who are developing a medical test to “detect” homosexuals. Yousouf Mindkar, director of public health at the Kuwaiti Health Ministry, told the Kuwait newspaper Al Rai in October, “Health centres conduct the routine medical check to assess the health of the expatriates when they come into the Gulf Cooperation Countries. However, we will take stricter measures that will help us detect gays who will be then barred from entering Kuwait or any of the GCC member states.”

Zero Greece, for reinstating laws to arrest anyone suspected of having HIV. The law also allows authorities to publicize the names of HIV-positive people, and have them evicted from their homes.

Zeros The 1,000 people who protested same-sex marriage in Haiti (which currently bans SSM). Days later, across the Caribbean nation, Haitian gangs beat 47 gay men with machetes, sticks and iron bars, then looted and burned down many of their victims’ homes.

Zeros The 1,500 extremists who firebombed police protecting 150 LGBT activists taking part in an Oct 20 Gay Pride march in Podgorica, the capital of Montenegro. 

Zero Pakistan, for blocking that country’s first gay website, Queerpk, deeming it “against Islam.” Homosexuality is illegal in Pakistan.

Zero Tumblr, which in July banned the tags “gay,” “lesbian” and “bisexual” on mobile apps.

Hero McGill University’s Dr. Nitika Pant Pai and her team, who in October received a $30,000 award from the Accelerating Science Award Program in Washington, for creating a mobile app called HIVSmart to assist people as they take a home HIV test. Users are guided through a confidential process of self-testing, which contains information, instructional videos, a 24-hour help line and confidential linkages to care and counselling. 

Hero Vancouver’s Dr. Julio Montaner, a global leader in the fight against HIV and AIDS, who on Aug 21 was presented with the prestigious 2013 Frederic Newton Gisborne Starr Award by the Canadian Medical Association.

Zero Pope Benedict XVI, whose virulently anti-gay papacy ended on Feb 28. The former pope’s staff declined to confirm or deny La Repubblica claims that Benedict’s resignation was over the discovery of a network of gay prelates in the Vatican, some of whom – the report said – were being blackmailed by outsiders.

Zero Pope Francis, “Person of the Year’ for both Time and The Advocatemagazines and whom I originally ranked as a “hero” for stating in July, “If a person is gay and seeks God and has good will, who am I to judge him?” But one line does not make a man, nor does it reverse the Roman Catholic Church’s still-operational anti-gay policies.

Zeros The mob who attacked 17-year-old cross-dressing Dwayne Jones in St. James, Jamaica, on July 22. Jones was “chopped and stabbed” to death, the rest of his body dumped in the bushes. 

Zero Jodie Foster, for finally coming out, but in a passive-aggressive speech at the 2013 Golden Globes, in which she also defended noted homophobe Mel Gibson, rumou-red to be the biological father of her two sons.

Zero Alternative singer-songwriter Michelle Shocked, who lived up to her name when in March she said onstage in San Francisco, that same-sex marriage will be the “downfall of civilization.”

Hero Vienna’s Leopold Museum, which presented its hugely successful Nude Men from 1800 to Today exhibition, despite a massive public outcry over its Vive La France promotional poster by French artists Pierre & Gilles which depicts three footballers wearing nothing but blue, white and red socks and soccer shoes. So posters of the three men were covered with lines of red tape to hide their crown jewels.

Zero Charles Lapointe, former head of Tourism Montreal who was heavily criticized in a Quebec auditor-general’s report for lavish spending at the taxpayers’ expense. Then in November, Lapointe – who helped put Montreal on the international gay map and received the Hanns Ebensten Hall of Fame Award from the International Gay and Lesbian Travel Association in May – heeded calls for his resignation as president of Montreal’s arts council.

Zero Russian President Vladimir Putin for signing and enacting anti-gay laws in Russia on the eve of the 2013 Sochi Winter Olympic Games. Calls for protests and boycotts have fallen on deaf ears in the head offices of Sochi’s corporate sponsors and TV broadcasters, as neo-Nazis continue to bash, torture and kill LGBT people across Russia with impunity. 

Hero Billie Jean King, appointed by President Barack Obama as the LGBT spiritual leader of the American delegation to the Sochi Olympics. Obama himself will not attend the Sochi Winter Olympics. The presidents of France and Germany, as well as the prime ministers of Belgium and Canada have also declined to attend the Sochi games.