Hillary Clinton: The U.S. Will Fight Global Homophobia

by Michael Jones · 2009-11-30 19:32:00 UTC
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Hillary ClintonRick Warren might be happy to ignore the criminalization of homosexuality around the world, but U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is speaking out, and speaking out in bold ways. In marking World AIDS Day 2009, Secretary Clinton said that the U.S. would not sit idly by while LGBT people are criminally penalized. Here's looking at you, Uganda.

"We have to stand against any efforts to marginalize and criminalize and penalize members of the LGBT community worldwide," Clinton said, speaking at a press conference where it was announced that the United States would host the International AIDS Conference in 2012 -- the first time the conference will have been held on U.S. soil since President Barack Obama was a second-year student in law school.

Clinton's words are being seen by many as a rebuke to Uganda, which is currently debating fiercely anti-LGBT legislation that would imprison gay people, and create a new class of "aggravated homosexuality" that would sentence HIV-positive people to death if they're caught having consensual sex. Given that the U.S. has pledged upwards of $250 million in development assistance to Uganda, it's a hopeful sign that the Obama administration won't let those funds go free without a promise from the country to nix homophobic legislation.

Clinton's comments are also the latest in a series from her showing that the Secretary of State's office has an eye toward global LGBT concerns. One example came on the anniversary of September 11 this year, with Clinton speaking in New York about the importance of fighting global homophobia.

"(We) must condemn violence based on sexual orientation and gender identity," Clinton said. "In country after country after country, young men and women are persecuted, are singled out, even murdered in cold blood, because of who they love or just based on claims that they are gay."

That's a message that is all the more timely on World AIDS Day. There's no other way to say it: criminalizing homosexuality hinders HIV/AIDS prevention. Pushing people underground makes it harder to provide public health resources, harder to diagnose HIV/AIDS, and harder to stop the spread of HIV/AIDS.

How nice it is to have a Secretary of State who gets that, as opposed to the sound of crickets that came with the Department of State's office during the first eight years of this decade. Hillary Clinton is a lot of things to a lot of people. Let's give her one more title: the highest profile advocate for international LGBT rights our country knows.

(Photo courtesy of Marcn's photostream on Flickr.)

Michael Jones is a Change.org Editor. He has worked in the field of human rights communications for a decade, most recently for Harvard Law School.
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