Egyptian Police Obliterate LGBT Pride with Entrapment Arrests and Raids
There are a lot of countries in the world with anti-LGBT laws and statutes.
These are laws that criminalize the LGBT identity. Such laws presuppose that the LGBT sexual identity is a choice and that engaging in non-heterosexual intercourse is a conscious act.
A criminal act.
A lot of countries, like Pakistan, Afghanistan, Mozambique and Indonesia have such laws in the books. Also, these are not new laws. Many of these countries have had such anti-LGBT laws since the mid-19th century.
Except for Egypt.
Egypt has no such anti-LGBT or anti-sodomy laws. There are no laws in Egypt that specifically criminalizes the LGBT sexual identity.
While there are no specific anti-LGBT laws, there is a, “habitual debauchery,” legal statute that is used to punish prostitutes with up to 12 years in prison.
Yet, it is still extremely illegal to be a non-heterosexual personal in Egypt.
President Hosni Mubarak ruled Egypt from 1981 to 2011 and was ousted in the media-coined, “Arab Spring,” a short lived period of openly public demonstrations and rebellion of the Egyptian people against Mubarak’s authoritarian rule and corrupt security forces.
During this period of chaos, it was impractical for Egyptian security forces to focus their attention on the Egyptian LGBT community.
There was a short time when Egyptian LGBT people could express themselves openly in bars and restaurants during this period.
However, most LGBT social gatherings, meetings and hookups have occurred clandestinely or via gay-dating social media apps like Grindr.
As the country is now being ruled by president and general Abdel Fattah el Sisi, a return to criminalizing LGBT people has begun in earnest.
Egyptian police are raiding and closing any and all LGBT-friendly businesses and establishments.
Police are particularly targeting gay men and transgender woman. In the Egyptian legal and authoritarian mindset, no discernment is made between transgender people and gay men. There are only straight men and women in Egypt, according to authorities.
Egyptian LGBT people are being driven underground or to leave the country altogether due to the newly initiated LGBT crackdowns.
LGBT Egyptians are being stalked and entrapped by Egyptian police on social media and on gay dating apps like Grindr.
Police are posing as potential dates, asking for information and pictures and then using the info to arrest and incriminate gay men.
Presently it is the biggest crackdown against LGBT people in Egypt in decades.
The only options left for LGBT Egyptians is to avoid LGBT-oriented social media and dating apps.
Or to flee the country.
And to wonder what will come next.
