If not death, the punishment for homosexuality in Iran is forced sexual reassignment surgery.

I unironically look forward to the day when the nation of Palestine competes and every keffiyeh-clad Seattleite leftist dumbass is forced to consider that the world is actually more complicated than they think it is. Palestinians deserve statehood, but whatever state they create is likely to really suck for gay people—just like Egypt and Iran.

@2: "...when the nation of Palestine competes and every keffiyeh-clad Seattleite leftist dumbass is forced to consider that the world is actually more complicated than they think it is."

Please, they already found a way around that pesky little problem. They simply declared a false equivalence between an ethnically-diverse, queer-friendly democracy, and its neighboring brutal jihadi dictatorship:

'Arguing that queer people are only safe in Israel perpetuates “racist, anti-Palestinian and Islamophobic tropes, that insist Palestinian culture is somehow backwards and intolerant,” Yousef said. The sentiment helps to justify Israel in conquering Palestine as though “if given their denied right to self determination, Palestinians would somehow be unable to create a just society,” Yousef said.

'Of course, homophobia exists in Palestine. As Dave MacBale, a queer Palestinian Washingtonian, said, “There’s homophobia in Palestine because Palestine is on planet earth. If you ask any woman or queer person or trans person if they feel like they have full rights or full liberation anywhere in the world, they will all tell you no.” That includes the United States, MacBale added.'

(https://www.thestranger.com/news/2024/06/28/79578010/congressional-candidate-emily-randall-loses-the-left-after-taking-a-pro-israel-stance)

I sure hope they don’t ask Egypt how they feel about Palestine… awkward.

“They couldn’t have known which countries Seattle’s game would feature”

FIFA literally set the matches (it’s not some blind, random selection process). Not only did they know but intentionally created this particular matchup in Seattle. The only question is who were they trying to troll.

@5: "The only question is who were they trying to troll."

Hey! FIFA is a classy outfit! They weren't trying to "troll" anyone! They were merely ensuring that the president of Iran's Football Federation, Mehdi Taj, enjoys his usual comfy stay at Z Clu-- THE WESTIN! HE LOVES TO STAY AT THE WESTIN!!1!

;-)

Considering how virulently conservative, misogynistic, and homophobic Islam is I've always been fascinated with the Left's infatuation with it.

Even the most "liberal" sects of Islam make the Westboro Baptist Church look like a bunch of free love hippies.

A week or two before the November 2024 elections I remember listening to an Imam from a large congregation in Michigan endorsing Donald Trump. Surprise, surprise, surprise, a religious leader from a conservative, misogynistic religion endorsing a conservative misogynistic candidate to be president. Who woulda thunk it?

@7 Well that's simply not true. In the country with the largest Muslim population in the world there is a large and out gay population. Yes, they face discrimination but not the kind of state-sponsored repression as most other places with Muslim majorities. But I'm guessing someone with a pretty narrow and limited view of Islam wouldn't know that. Most people there would be shocked at the hate that Westboro spouts in the name of religion.

@8 I don't think life is good for gay and trans people in Indonesia. Or Turkey, Iran, and Pakistan. Maybe you know of some other heavily Muslim populated country?

This stupid fight is so on-brand for Seattle. If the organizers HADN'T designated one of these games a "Pride Match" during Pride Week, they'd have been screamed at, too.

They should have refrained, or FIFA should have made them, but they didn't, and here we are. Everyone gets to be angry, the intertubes get content, and everyone gets to lose.

@7, You’re literally commenting on an article where one of the most left-leaning cities in the country is spitting in the face of two Islamic regimes and yet you still fall for this dumb conservative talking point that the left is infatuated with islam. Incredible stuff.

@11 that is simply not true. Seattle had no idea which countries would be in that match when they designated it. I wouldn't say the left is infatuated with Islam but they do have a history of downplaying / ignoring atrocities and human rights violations driven by extreme ideology due to their warped world view of oppressor / oppressed people. It will be interesting to watch these competing viewpoints collide in June. I completely expect the city will back down and the area around the stadium will not host any events related to pride.

Islam is not compatible with western civilization.
Better a Christian nation than an Islamic nation.

@12 i know they didn’t know about which countries would be playing but the city is pointedly not backing down once this became known. There are definitely instances of the far left excusing/ignoring atrocities but even the center-left is accused of being pro-islam for opposing our government’s various excursions in the region.

@13 religious nationalism of any kind is not compatible with western civilization

@8: this Indonesia? “In the 21st century sharia-supporting fundamentalist Islamic groups have gained increasing support.[5] As a result, LGBTQ people have faced growing hostility and intolerance, including attacks and discrimination.[6] In early 2016, LGBTQ people and activists in Indonesia faced fierce opposition, homophobic attacks and hate speech, even launched by Indonesian authorities.”

Bali is generally safe for LGBTQ people but Aceh is not.

@3 what a remarkable false equivalence from Han-Han in that article: “Despite this, queer people find ways to live open, joyful, fulfilled lives under oppression all across the world—in the United States, in Israel, and in Palestine, queer Palestinians insisted”

The lived experience of being LGBTQIA+ in rural Alabama, Seattle, Gaza City, Tel Aviv, and Hebron is exactly the same!

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-63174835.amp

@10 host cities can do whatever they want. In Qatar teams weren't allowed to wear rainbow armbands and the stadiums didn't serve alcohol. These countries can deal with our customs like everyone had to deal with Qatar's. I hope the organizers make the area around the stadium extra gay. Maybe those weird Christians who had an event in Cal Anderson can join forces with the mullahs to denounce godless Seattle: strange bedfellows against same-sex bedfellows.

@17

Not so strange bedfellows. Islam and Christianity are two of the main 3 sects of the Abrahamic religion.

Hating on women is a bedrock principle of Abrahamism, so hating the gays is a pretty short trip.

'... football had “a unique power to unite people across borders, cultures, and beliefs."'

Well, that's great! I'm sure Seattle will soon feel this unique pow--

'...Neither are happy. Earlier this week, the Egyptian Football Association sent a formal letter to FIFA “requesting LGBTQ+ ‘Pride Match’ celebrations at one of their 2026 World Cup matches do not go ahead.”

'The letter stated that “information had been circulating indicating the local organizing committee’s decision and plan to hold some activities related to supporting (homosexuality) during that match, and that it completely rejects such activities, which directly contradict the cultural, religious and social values in the region, especially in Arab and Islamic societies.”'

Oh well. Match goes to the bigots, methinks!

@16: "...what a remarkable false equivalence..."

And in the context of an openly gay woman running for Congress! Imagine a woman being openly gay and merely alive in Gaza, the West Bank, any Arab country, or any other country with an Islamic majority (Iran, Indonesia).

The Stranger's willingness to excuse murderously bigoted regimes of culpability for the needless suffering of LGBTQIA+ persons ranks as one of the lowest points in the entire undignified All Gaza All The Time frenzy which gripped the Stranger back then.

(And finally, despite the Stranger's headline, Randall easily won both the primary and general elections, and now represents Washington State's 6th District in Congress.)

@15, @9 You don't think? Or you know? There are no laws criminalizing homosexuality in Indonesia, although Aceh, as a special autonomous area that has its own version of sharia law -- frequently corrupt -- it is. Indonesia is huge with different cultural norms throughout the country, in the same way that -- get this -- the USA is huge with different cultural norms throughout the country. Being LGBTQ in Seattle or San Francisco is very different than rural Mississippi, as you can imagine. Being LGBTQ in Jakarta or Surabaya or Waingapu is very different than Meulaboh or Tanggerang. There are thriving and supportive LGBTQ communities throughout most of Indonesia, and organizations such as Dede Oetomo's Gaya Nusantara that lobby for rights and visibility (in the same way the groups in the USA lobby). Random acts of violence against the queer community happen, but they happen in the USA as well -- bigots can be found everywhere. In fact, if we change this quote a little it seems pretty on-brand: “In the 21st century fundamentalist Christian groups have gained increasing support.[5] As a result, LGBTQ people have faced growing hostility and intolerance, including attacks and discrimination.[6] In 2024, LGBTQ people and activists in The United States faced fierce opposition, homophobic attacks and hate speech, even launched by US authorities.”

What is laughable to me is Christian fundies condemning all of Islam for its (supposed) treatment of the gays, when they are equally or more so homophobic and terrible. It's not Islam, it's some awful Muslims, just as it's not Christianity, it's some awful Christians.

Seems like the perfect venue for Seattle's "Queers for Palestine." The US isn't accustomed to football stadium violence, so here we have a rare opportunity. TS needs to pump the event and lean into maximizing visibility on game day! I'll treat myself to truffle salt popcorn.

@14: "...the city is pointedly not backing down once this became known."

As the headline post noted, "Both countries plan to complain about the Pride Match at a FIFA Council meeting in Qatar next week." We'll see what Seattle does if FIFA decides to pressure it to de-link Pride from FIFA soccer, just as @12 suggests will happen.

"There are definitely instances of the far left excusing/ignoring atrocities but even the center-left is accused of being pro-islam for opposing our government’s various excursions in the region."

Oh, puh-leeze. The Stranger (and supportive commenters) just spent two solid years constantly harping over every casualty count from Gaza, insisting every last death was a civilian intentionally killed by Israelis. Then the cease-fire came, the fog of war lifted, and lo and behold, Hamas was seen executing Palestinians en masse, in public, in broad daylight. The instant expressing concern over deaths in Gaza meant criticizing Hamas, the Stranger went completely silent.

@22 -- yet another thread, Hijacked
to spread even more AIPAC
Propaganda:

"Then the cease-fire came, the fog of war lifted, and lo and behold, Hamas was seen executing Palestinians en masse, in public, in broad daylight."

--@The Wormtongue,
Lecturing the Stranger (surprise!)
for Not properly bowing down to the
'peace plan' that Isn't, the 'ceasefire' that Won't

force-feeding Us
AIPAC's narrative for
the second straight Year,
so far, anyway, going on Three.

here's a Different Take on bibi's little
Keep outta prison scheme
cum Genocide:

First, it was Israel’s right to defend itself. Then it was a war, even though, by Israel’s own military intelligence database, 83 percent of the casualties were civilians.

The 2.3 million Palestinians in Gaza, living under an Israeli air, land and sea blockade, have no army, air force, no mechanized units, no tanks, no navy, no missiles, no heavy artillery, no fleets of killer drones, no sophisticated tracking systems to map all movements, or an ally like the United States, which has given Israel at least $21.7 billion in military aid since Oct. 7, 2023.

Now, it is a “ceasefire.” Except of course, as usual, Israel only abided by the first of the 20 stipulations. It freed around 2,000 Palestinian captives held in Israeli prisons — 1700 of whom were detained after Oct. 7 — as well as around 300 bodies of Palestinians, in exchange for the return of the 20 remaining Israeli captives.

Israel has violated every other condition. It has tossed the agreement — brokered by the Trump administration without Palestinian participation — into the bonfire with all the other agreements and peace accords concerning Palestinians.

They are pushing a bill through the [Israeli] Knesset [Parliment] which seeks to mandate the death penalty for Palestinians who “intentionally or indifferently causes the death of an Israeli citizen,” if they are said to be motivated by “racism or hostility toward a public,” and with the purpose of harming the Israeli state or “the rebirth of the Jewish people in its land,” the Israeli human rights group Adalah explains.

More than 100 Palestinians have been killed in Israeli jails since Oct. 7. If the new bill becomes law — it has been cleared through its first reading — it will join the wave of more than 30 anti-Palestinian laws enacted since October 7.

The message the genocide sends to the rest of the world, more than a billion of whom live on less than a dollar a day, is unequivocable: We have everything and if you try and take it away from us, we will kill you.

This is the new world order. It will look like Gaza. Concentration camps. Starvation. Obliteration of infrastructure and civil society. Mass killing. Wholesale surveillance.

Executions. Torture, including the beatings, electrocutions, waterboarding, rape, public humiliation, deprivation of food and denial of medical care routinely used on Palestinians in Israeli prisons.

Epidemics. Disease. Mass graves where corpses are bulldozed into unmarked pits and where bodies, as in Gaza, are dug up and torn apart by packs of ravenous wild dogs.

We are not destined for the Shangri-La sold to a gullible public by fatuous academics such as Stephen Pinker. We are destined for extinction.

Not only individual extinction — which our consumer society furiously attempts to hide by peddling the fantasy of eternal youth — but wholesale extinction as temperatures rise to make the globe uninhabitable.

If you think the human species will respond rationally to the ecocide, you are woefully out of touch with human nature. You need to study Gaza. And history.

If you live in the Global North, you will get to peer out at the horror, but slowly this horror, as the climate breaks down, will migrate home, turning most of us into Palestinians. Given our complicity in the genocide, it is what we deserve.

Empires, when they feel threatened, always embrace the instrument of genocide. Ask the victims of the Spanish conquistadors. Ask Native Americans. Ask the Herero and Nama. Ask the Armenians. Ask the survivors of Hiroshima or Nagasaki.

Ask the Indians who survived the Bengal famine or the Kikuyu who rose against their British colonizers in Kenya. Climate refugees will get their turn.

This is not the end of the nightmare. It is the beginning.

--Chris Hedges

oodles:
https://chrishedges.substack.com/p/rebranding-genocide