Around this time last year the media in the UK was awash with stories of ‘intolerant Africa’ – the backlash in Malawi and Uganda to a set of gay couples in both countries was taken as evidence of the apparently enduring homophobia of African people in general. Certainly, the reaction by certain segments of the populations in those countries was cause for great concern, notably the horrific murder of activist David Kato in Uganda. In one of those unfortunate cycles in which those who know better do or say nothing, extremist voices were allowed to dominate the storyline and paint a picture of Africa that grossly misrepresents the various communities’ interaction with homosexuality, and the story was told of ‘homophobic Africa’, intolerant enough to advocate or support the violent murder of a young man in his prime on the basis of his sexual orientation.

The word tolerance comes from late Middle English and denotes a capacity to bear hardship or pain. Today we use it especially to indicate an ability to put up with ideas or the existence of ideas that we do not necessarily agree with. In the language of rights and equality, the notion of tolerance is central the idea being that we ‘the majority’ need to increase our capacity to tolerate those on ‘the fringe’ whether they be racially, socially, or by sexual orientation different from us – the norm. It strikes me that tolerance implies a begrudging acceptance or acknowledgement rather than a wholehearted respect or acceptance. You tolerate something if you still believe it to be inherently wrong, implying magnanimity on your part but by extension fallibility or shortcoming in the behaviour or person that you are tolerating. You tolerate an annoying younger sibling, you tolerate a noisy neighbour but do you tolerate people that you value or respect? Regardless, we are told that tolerance is the glue that holds multicultural societies together. A ‘phobia’ on the other hand is an extreme or irrational fear of something. In the context of gay rights however, homophobia is – I believe incorrectly – used to denote a broad spectrum of reactions from genuine incomprehension to the poisonous ramblings of politicians in Malawi and Uganda last year, to the despicable violence of Mr Kato’s murderers.

The trouble with defining such a key term so broadly is that it alienates a broad spectrum of reactions that lie somewhere between the extremes. I would argue that African societies are neither ‘tolerant’ nor ‘homophobic’, in part, because ‘phobia’ and ‘tolerance’ are not logical binaries; neither adequately resolves the tension in the other. Tolerance does not explain away fear nor does a phobia describe an incapacity for dealing with hardship or pain. In this breath, I don’t believe that most Africans are ‘extremely or irrationally afraid’ of homosexuals or homosexuality, nor arguably, are African societies in general ready to put up with a lifestyle that remains for many, foreign and unusual. Rather, I would argue that the silent majority in many African communities is struggling to articulate its position on a phenomenon that is consistently presented in extreme, all-or-nothing language, with limited patience or understanding of the sociological framework of the societies in question.

Allowing myself a series of broad generalisations, I would argue that the average African’s interaction with homosexuality has been informed by many of the forces that have fed into other present day contradictions. In many ways, traditional societies across the continent were more liberal, especially with matters of sexuality, than their present day variants. Pre-marital sex for instance, even where marriage is defined in its broadest sense was encouraged in many groups (outside Islamic communities) as a method of establishing fertility. However, with the spread of puritanical Victorian standards during the colonial era, and the coupling of an embrace of ‘Christian values’ with the opportunity to gain an education and make a living in an increasingly monetised society, we witness a dramatic shift in the other direction. Sex becomes a taboo subject and rather than grapple with the complex elemental forces that keep societies alive, people are encouraged to regard them as base and sinful instincts.

As this process of ‘Victorianisation’ made a taboo of heterosexual interactions, it criminalised and stigmatised anything outside them. However, as with many other facets of the colonial experience, rather than a wholesale rejection or acceptance of values, we witness a superimposition, and the emergence of the ‘double life’ that characterises many African communities today. There is a gay scene in just about every major town in African, and for all their empty posturing, neither Banda nor Museveni can shout away the gay scene in either of their countries. Trying to negotiate the complexities of modern societies, many individuals find themselves keeping up the appearance of a wholesale embrace of either ‘Western’ or ‘traditional’ values while dipping in and out of the other at will. This isn’t by any measure a bad thing. It’s a reflection of the incredible capacity of individuals to make sense of life at it’s most complex. The point is that as in many other ways, ‘Africa’ is a complex place, and when trying to get a handle on the status of various phenomena across the continent, it is important to take a more longitudinal view.

The struggle for African societies is that we want to do more than just tolerate; we want to understand. At the same time, it is not unfeasible that homosexuality is in fact external to many African societies, and this does not make the societies themselves inherently ‘phobic’. It makes them societies – aggregates of people whose broadly held values on various issues reflect the average of all individually held beliefs. There are most certainly homophobic people in many African societies, but there are also a good number of people who just need time to make sense of rapid changes in their communities. It would be a great tragedy would be to restrict the room for such constructive engagement by painting an entire continent of people with the negative brush of homophobia.

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