HOMOSEXUALITY AND LITERATURE: CHIMAMANDA ADICHIE AS OXYMORON

I'm forced to put up this piece for two reasons. A recent note from an American Facebook friend accused Nigerians of mass homophobia for disagreeing with the opinion of Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, the celebrated Nigerian born, United States based novelist. Chimamanda in an interview had professed being “horrified” at Nigeria's Same Sex Marriage {Prohibition} Act 2013. This good natured westerner whose ignorance of the Nigerian society overflowed in his write-up gave me an honour I don't deserve: My authorship of The Intercourse of Troubled Thoughts, my tome on homosexuality that is still not available on our shores “places you at the head of the homophobic brigade.” Though I have dictated overzealousness on the part of some of my compatriots especially in the North to run ahead of the law in matters relating to homosexuality, that doesn't make Nigerians homophobic as a people. The bill that came out of the National Assembly and was subsequently signed into law by President Goodluck Ebele Jonathan, GCFR, has no homophobic content. It recognized marriage “as a union between a man and a woman” be it performed under the authority of the state, Islamic law and customary law.

The context of human rights is situated properly by the cultural norms and nuances of the defined society. Experiences show that morality is cultured specific and aligned with geography. Law reflects the religious, political, cultural and social ethos of any given society. It shows its prevalent moral compass. Nigeria's anti-same sex marriage bill bans “acts of gross decency and exhibition of sexual behavior between and among men in private or in public.” In the west, polygamy is by law illegal whether practiced privately or publicly. No African or Asian man intent on a polygamous life openly in the west will find the law on his side. Even Westerners converted to the African traditional religion or the Islamic faith, are not exempted from this rule. It's not a human rights issue as far as the rule of the laws that regulates the west is concerned! As befits strangers, African and Asian men in the west align themselves to the monogamous marriage idea of their host communities. They have not tried to impose polygamy there in the guise of human rights. In their homelands, Bible believing African and Asian Christians largely stay away from polygamy in line with biblical tenets. The concept of human rights is a basic societal obligation in line with any given environment and its history which returns fair treatment to its citizens. Nigeria's anti-same sex marriage bill prescribes lengthy jail terms for practicing homosexuality, running gay clubs and engaging in same sex marriage anywhere in our land.

Some European countries like Britain, Sweden, Spain, the Netherlands and Luxembourg are constitutional monarchies, but it is not a general human rights fountain from which every westerner wants to drink from. The United States constitution limits presidential terms to two terms, but European, Japanese, Australian, Canadian and New Zealand prime ministers have no term limits. The French presidency is for seven years with no limits while the American variety is four years of two fixed terms. Male circumcision is an article of faith in the Jewish religion and the west has not hounded and harried the state of Israel to stop it on the altar of human rights violations. The same goes with kosher foods. Western military, police and security personnel adhere to a recommended uniform dress code. No human rights plea negates this compulsion. The same regime applies to arms, ammunitions, trainings, discipline, promotions and dismissals. Human rights considerations don't arise in these professional engagements. Thousands of US soldiers died in European, South East Asian, Iraqi, Afghan and other battle fields and their families can't sue any US president for their deaths. The only obligation of the US government to them is honorable burial for their fallen heroes and payment of their entitlements to their dependants.

As reprehensible sinners; tax evaders, pedophiles, rapists, spies, murderers, arsonists, traffic violators, alimony dodgers, sexual offenders, domestic abusers, child and women traffickers, military deserters and Holocaust deniers {in many European countries and Canada} cannot fall on the human rights highway to escape justice and punishment before the law. On the contrary, the police and justice systems – moral and legal policemen – of these societies punish such offenders without mercy. Whistle blowers of official malfeasance in security matters like WeAKILEAKS founder Assange and Edward Snoden are treated as pariahs officially. President Barack Obama does not see it in the context of human rights for Snoden to cry out against blanket electronic eavesdropping on the mails and conversations of Americans and foreigners by the National Security Agency. This super secret organization semi-officially goes by the alias No Such Agency. Nurture, not nature, brings to fore the overwhelming characteristics we surrender to – whether it be homosexuality, domestic violence, drug abuse, drunkenness, racism, sexism, surfeiting, naked dressing and sexual immorality. In a demonstration of extreme carnality and zenith of moral rottenness, yesterday's promiscuous person is now hailed as being sexually active! Four decades ago, America's Psychiatric Association deemed homosexuality to be a mental disorder. Today, gay propaganda and Chimamanda labels Africans as intolerant and homophobic.

Men are nurtured by family, friends, the media, Hollywood, Tinsel Town {and their local offshoots like Bollywood and Nollywood}, sports stars, schools, the environment, governments, society, business angels, political gurus and the law. No man is born with racist, lying, wicked, sexist, homosexuality or drug abuse genes. Mercy and generosity lies embedded in every man, same with right and wrong. Emilie Buchwald is definite that “genetic inheritance determines a child's abilities and weaknesses. But those who raise a child call forth from that matrix the traits and talents they consider important.” We are addicted here on earth by the above factors and influences. Dr {Mrs} Princess Olufemi-Kayode, activist and advocate against child sexual abuse agrees. “It is not my belief that children grow up wanting to be gay. But a large percent of children and adolescent who have some sort of same sex orientation were themselves molested by adults or older children. That's why when they go to school, they introduce younger kids into it,” she told a press interviewer. Western embassy staff and NGOs that form and fund gay clubs for Nigerian homosexuals are law breakers and should be punished by our justice system.

The fate of thousands of children in 115,000 American same sex marriages is surely tilted towards every deviant behavior associated with homosexuality. As evil influences nudge one towards certain abominable behaviours, the spirit of God will warn him of the element of wickedness embedded in the act. However, certain inducements can also edge him to kill the warning voice of his conscience. In the words of Nelson Mandela, “people must learn to hate, and if they can learn to hate, they can be taught to love, for love comes more naturally to the human heart.” Homosexuals can be taught to be sexually expressive normally: Man with woman according to creation ordinance and the norms of right thinking members of moral society. This is the human right of way sexually. This is the moral majority. If Mandela is right that “man's goodness is a flame that can be hidden, but never extinguished,” then the flame of natural love of women by men and vice versa can be re-kindled in gays and lesbians under the right atmosphere of nurture and correction. Every man is born free to naturally love a woman. Every woman is born free to naturally luxuriate in the affections of a man. But by contrived twist, fashion imagery, media propaganda, false human rights bottom, pressure from liberal Think Tanks, NGO blackmail, cooperating legislative and executive conspiracy, activist judiciary and internationalist networks, this natural balance is toppled and replaced with perversions, abominations, indecencies, ungodliness, deviancy, desecrations and idolatries like homosexuality, legalized prostitution, incest, bestiality, pedophilia, free narcotics, mercy killing, wholesale abortion globally {this is the specialty of the disingenuously misnamed Planned Parenthood Federation of America} and other contaminations dreamt up by reprobate hearts.

Homosexuality robs people of their humanity, defrocks them of their dignity, rubbishes their spirituality, reduces them to the level of animals, and gives them the name tag of dogs! Even this classification is too fair because dogs don't practice homosexuality! This is the spirit behind the over 40 American state legislatures that have not approved homosexual marriage, the loud insistence of Obama notwithstanding. It is therefore gross wickedness, opportunism, error of judgment, executive lawlessness and indecency for the Obama administration and the European Union to hector and harass hapless Third World governments to legalize homosexuality. Miss Julian Gillard, the ex-Australian prime minister resisted such move from Barack Obama, reminding him that Australia was not a beggarly nation, but a First World economy. Contrary to the purposeful propaganda, lies, deceptions and false horror of Chimamanda Adichie and company, every society that refused to surrender to the homosexual armada led by Barack Obama and UK Prime Minister David Cameron is not being homo-phobic, but homo-painstaking. In truth; these nations recognized the human rights of gays and lesbians fraudulently taken away from them in error by western propaganda and seeks to return them to right behavior via correctional legislations. The prison system in the west is termed “correctional facilities” and Nigeria's anti gay law is correctional in intent.

As enunciated, Nigeria's anti-gay law unanimously approved by both Houses of Parliament and properly accented to by President Goodluck Jonathan on January 7, 2014 is a long moral and spiritual walk to freedom for gays and lesbians. The tentative steps have been taken today, western ululation and the dirge of Chimamanda notwithstanding. Homosexuality should not be worn like a pendant, but served as a penance! The word of God – the Holy Bible – wholeheartedly prescribes the right penance for all who were duped into homosexuality by the devil to joyfully serve and be free indeed – forever! In the words of Confucius, “faced with what is right, to leave it underscores a lack of courage.” When you cease to condemn an immoral behavior, you begin to condone it! And Nigerians don't want to condone homosexuality. In the west, people privately and publicly cuddle, kiss, sleep with and now marry cats, dogs, monkeys, snakes and pigs. Ungodly westerners have left great inheritance for animals. Nigerians agree with the opinion of Professor Akin Oyebode of the department of law and jurisprudence at University of Lagos, that “western countries civilization is on the downward spiral and it intends to take people along its doom.” To majority of Africans, 21st century Caucasian culture is largely aberrant and deviant.

It seems to Nigerians that Chimamanda forsook what is moral, natural and right because of western awards, prizes, soothings, media approvals, book marketing endorsements and cash grants from Think Tanks and foundations. She threw away what is precious to Nigerians and that is why she has attracted wide opprobrium from every strata of our land. An anachronism today, Chimamanda is in a blind alley. The signature girl of literature has become the bogey girl of infamy. Attired in literature glory, she's gorged by moral garbage. Serenaded in the west, she's sacrilegious at home. A wise man said: “Do not close your eyes to your flaws; it only makes you more ugly. Acknowledge them for a change.” Chimamanda is so ugly now in the visage and consciousness of Nigerians. Coming to terms with this reality can return her to the high firmament she once occupied in our hearts. She needs a heart cleaner and God is the best heart cleaner – PSA. 51:10. Chimamanda's social intercourse with her fellow country men and women is greatly troubled this day and she needs to pray: “Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew the right spirit within me.” She may be a Goliath of literature, but she has an unprotected forehead that will surely kill her morally in no time. He who applauds a lunatic is not far from the state of madness!

Historian, freelance journalist and writer, Pastor Joseph Emeka Anumbor is the author ofThe Intercourse of Troubled Thoughts, a critically acclaimed discourse on homosexuality published by Author House Inc, Indiana, USA.