Tribute to Alex Au & his ’05 talk at AWARE’s HIV forum

I wrote the letter below to Alex Au, in response to his latest article (24th Apr).  It is a tribute to him, because THAT talk, was one of the major reasons why I am AWARE’s CSE trainer today, and the biggest influencer on the message I bring out to the girls. Please read.

 

(Background:
Alex Au’s article:
 ”Pirate mother ship appears on horizon, guns blazing”   ( http://yawningbread.org/arch_2009/yax-1011.htm ), in particular the part in the pink box which goes

“Among the “proofs” the new exco put to the media that AWARE had adopted a mission to promote homosexuality, was this:
When Aware wanted to conduct health education courses, it invited Alex Au, ‘a famous homosexual activist’, to talk about HIV.– Straits Times, 24 April 2009 ( http://www.straitstimes.com/Breaking%2BNews/Singapore/Story/BgSty_367873_1.html ), 
.

 20 August 2005 talk at the forum on HIV and women titled “Playing it Safe – Keeping HIV at Bay”

Title [of the talk]: Relearning the alphabet:  A is for Abstinence, B is for Be faithful and C is for Condoms. It’s a message that covers all bases, and yet may not work. Why? Alex Au argues that to understand HIV, we have first to understand people.   The essay When sex, condoms and HIV remain unspeakable ( http://yawningbread.org/arch_2005/yax-475.htm ) refers to this talk I gave.)
 

 

Hi Alex,

Thought I’ll let you know that it was YOUR particular talk back in 05 at that HIV forum, that made me realise how the “ABC” message was not enough, and could even be dangerous at times.

I was that member of the audience who related her friend’s story you mention here http://yawningbread.org/arch_2005/yax-475.htm . (She’s now married and pregnant with the same guy by the way = )  )

Your message at that particular forum was one of the major factors why I decided to sign up with AWARE’s HIV subcom, on that particular day. That was the first step I took to the journey that led me to being AWARE’s Comprehensive Sex Ed trainer that I am today.

Funny how things come around eh?

The other factors that contributed to my decision that day : The appalling state of Singaporean womens’ knowledge ( eg. the nurses at the polyclinic!) , the abortion statistics and HIV statistics — There was just that obvious need for something to be done!

And the final factor that contributed to my decision — my Christian belief that meeting people’s needs were part of social justice, and that it was a worthy cause to work towards.

It’s such an irony that today, my work with AWARE and CSE is coming under fire by Christians. It’s even more ironic, because the Christian verses that inspired me to join AWARE’s HIV-subcom and later to do CSE, are the  very same ones Thio, Josie et al. are hiding behind.

They wave Sodom and Gomorrah, but
“Sodom’s sin were pride, laziness, and gluttony, while the poor and needy suffered outside her door. She was proud and did loathsome things, so I wiped her out, as you have seen  (Ezekiel 16 : 49-50)”

And in the same Proverbs 31 where the supposed perfect biblical woman is described,
“Speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves, for the rghts of all who are destitute. Speak up and judge fairly; defend the rights of the poor and needy”
I believed that society was doing STI/HIV patients, single mothers, women who had abortions (more than 10,000 each year in Singapore alone!)  such a great injustice by not equipping them with the info they needed to help themselves, and then by further unjustly victimising them with unfair laws and policies. These “poor and needy” were the product of social injustice, and I wanted to be part of the solution, not the problem.

I think your talk that day showed me the message I needed to bring across, and AWARE showed me the platfrom from which I could speak.
Thio was absolutely right — Having the  ‘famous homosexual activist’ Alex Au speak at AWARE’s event clearly did influence young girls present. But you know what? I think that is something that both you and AWARE can be really really proud of.

I think Dr Thio Su Mien might be Bi-Sexual , and Blasphemous

 

 

Thio might be Bi-sexual

i really wonder if Dr Thio Su Mien realises the implications of her beliefs.

Based on her claims that homosexuality is a CHOICE, and so homosexual people can CHANGE, it follows too, that Heterosexual people can choose and change — and be externally influenced to turn gay.

 

You know what that means? That means Dr Thio is saying everyone’s a bisexual , having the potential to be attracted to both male and female.  And so as bisexuals we can choose and pick either male or female lovers, but that from a religious perspective we ought to pick the opposite sex as lovers.

So what does that say about Dr Thio herself?  ; )

Make sense?

And meaning that Dr Thio agrees with Alfred Kinsey’s theory.

 

Alfred Kinsey rated the degree of sexual orientation in humans on a scale of 0 to 6 – 0 for strictly homosexual and 6 for strictly heterosexual (Kinsey, 1948). From 1 to 5, the frequency of homosexual encounters as compared to heterosexual encounters, fall. He found that while only 4% of the American male population fell into category 0, about one in three males had sexual experiences with another male, leading to orgasm.

 

When I was in the university, I was intrigued with this question. Does homosexual behavior actually confer an advantage on an individual in certain environments? This is often hard to imagine as the persistence of homosexuality defies the central dogma of natural selection: the continuance of individuals with traits that enable maximum reproductivity of viable offspring so that their genes would be represented in future generations.  So I did some research, and wrote this paper:

http://www.geocities.com/mathia_lee_yu_chun/EvolutionHomosexuality.pdf

 

Anyway, that question only makes sense if homosexuality indeed had a genetic/biological component. So that’s what I set out to determine first. And I’m convinced. I’ve put down the evidence for it in the first part of the paper.

 

What’s really fascinating is this:

Homosexual behaviour has been observed in more than 450 kinds of animals, across every major animal group, across every major geographic location.  Mammals such as lions, mountain sheep, bats, dolphins, even primates engage in erotic same-sex grooming and rubbing against each other. Birds beak peck, macaques stimulate each other’s genitals, African elephants engage in erotic fights. In these encounters, the animals are visibly sexually aroused and in many cases copulate with their same-sex partner. There are also birds that build nests and raise young with same-sex sexual partners, animals who practice same sex courtship, pairbonding and others, like chimpanzees, who form communal groups where sexual activity takes place promiscuously, both in homosexual and heterosexual forms. In many animals such as deer, elephants, goats, homosexual behavior is widely practiced out of the breeding season and they switch to reproductive heterosexual behaviour during the breeding season.

In fruitflies where there’re no ethical issues with doing genetic experiments on them, a genetic component of homosexuality is arguably elucidated. ( Type in “Drosophila homosexuality” at http://www.pubmed.com )

So much for homosexuality being UNNATURAL eh?

 

Thio and Blasphemy

 

Another thing about Dr Thio Su Mien and the people like her: I don’t think they realise it, but they’re being downright blasphemous — by the Christian definition!!!

What do I mean?

 

I think it’s safe to say that Christians would agree we can’t understand God, can’t understand God’s thoughts and God’s wants. Not fully anyway. How does one ever know that you have got your interpretation and understanding of God’s word absolutely spot on correct, when all the theologians are still arguing till the cows come home (See Endnote #1, 2)?

 

And I think Christians would also agree that judgement is something humans shouldn’t be doing, but should be the prerogative of God only (See Endnote #3).

 

When people like Dr Thio invoke God’s name and God’s WILL, they are really presuming that

1.      They actually know and understand God (oh the arrogance!)

2.      They have the right to act on behalf of God in meting out and imposing God’s judgment (playing God!)

 

That’s just blasphemous! (But of course, I might be wrong too ; )  )

 

I was really sad to hear what one pastor friend of mine told me. He said that he knew many pastors actually are very pro-homosexual rights and even have doubts on interpreting the bible to mean than homosexuality was wrong. However, most churches are afraid to take that stand because they don’t want to be outcasts, they don’t want the backlash from their parishes. And so most pastors also won’t take this stand publically because they wanted to keep their jobs. So in public, most pastors would still repeat the part about homosexuality being wrong, and only confess otherwise in private conversation.

 

I understand why they are pressured to do so, but it makes me sad. It also makes me sad to hear not a single official Christian voice (as private indv there are many, but no CHURCH has made a stand) , or the National Council of Churches making a statement about this whole AWARE saga. At least say something about how we should put forth our views in civil society!

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EndNote

#1

“For as the heavens are higher than the earth, So are My ways higher than your ways And My thoughts than your thoughts.” Isaiah 55:9  ; Then Job replied to the LORD : “I know that you can do all things; no plan of yours can be thwarted. You asked, ‘Who is this that obscures my counsel without knowledge?’Surely I spoke of things I did not understand,  things too wonderful for me to know. Job 42: 1 – 3

 

 

#2

(A pastor of a conservative church with postgrad theology degree helped me with this):

The sin of Sodom is usually taken to be that of homosexuality (Sodomy)
But if you read the interpretation of it here, you’ll realise what it was:

Ezekiel 16 : 49-50

“Sodom’s sin were pride, laziness, and gluttony, while the poor and needy suffered outside her door. She was proud and did loathsome things, so I wiped her out, as you have seen”

 

 

#3

It always strikes me, how people selectively read and enforce the Bible:

Romans (Remember that the authors of the biblical books did NOT write with the chapters in place. They were continuous letters; the chaptering was done in later centuries for easy referencing only):

18 The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of men who suppress the truth by their wickedness, 19since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. 20For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse.

 21For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened. 22Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools 23and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like mortal man and birds and animals and reptiles.

 

 24Therefore God gave them over in the sinful desires of their hearts to sexual impurity for the degrading of their bodies with one another. 25They exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator—who is forever praised. Amen.

 26Because of this, God gave them over to shameful lusts. Even their women exchanged natural relations for unnatural ones. 27In the same way the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another. Men committed indecent acts with other men, and received in themselves the due penalty for their perversion.

 

 28Furthermore, since they did not think it worthwhile to retain the knowledge of God, he gave them over to a depraved mind, to do what ought not to be done. 29They have become filled with every kind of wickedness, evil, greed and depravity. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit and malice. They are gossips, 30slanderers, God-haters, insolent, arrogant and boastful; they invent ways of doing evil; they disobey their parents; 31they are senseless, faithless, heartless, ruthless. 32Although they know God’s righteous decree that those who do such things deserve death, they not only continue to do these very things but also approve of those who practice them.

1You, therefore, have no excuse, you who pass judgment on someone else, for at whatever point you judge the other, you are condemning yourself, because you who pass judgment do the same things. 2Now we know that God’s judgment against those who do such things is based on truth. 3So when you, a mere man, pass judgment on them and yet do the same things, do you think you will escape God’s judgment? 4Or do you show contempt for the riches of his kindness, tolerance and patience, not realizing that God’s kindness leads you toward repentance? (Did anyone read on to this part?!?! Why are they passing and imposing judgement?)