The United Nations announced plans to release a report in June regarding “perceived contradictions” between “the right to freedom of religion or belief (FoRB)” and “sexual orientation and gender identity (SOGI).” The report aims to push governments to “fully comply” with international human rights law to “protect and empower” the participation of LGBT+ people in religious communities, the Daily Caller News Foundation reported.

Comment:
The push for acceptance of LGBT+ is rapidly spreading around the world. Unlike the emancipation movements in the late 1900, who championed for the acceptance of lesbian and gay rights, the LGBT+ and especially the idea of transgenderism is of another calibre. Where the first were movements with a bottom-to-top approach the latter is a movement with a top-to-bottom approach. Today Western states have adopted the issue of LGBT+ acceptance and LGBT+ rights, they promote it and propagate it.

In order to propagate the idea of LGBT+ beyond the borders of their nation states, the United Nations is used for the purpose of systematically spreading it to all corners of the world. The primary target is the “religious communities” as labelled by the UN report due to their opposing opinion against LGBT+. However, the religions who uphold the idea that LGBT+ is against their moral code and understanding have been intensively secularised by the liberal worldview which forms the foundation of their nation’s states, organises their societies, sets the norms and values. So even though they are against the idea of LGBT+ they will use the premise of the freedoms of the liberal thought as criteria in approaching the issue of LGBT+. So, their idea of LGBT+ has been diluted, influenced and shaped by the liberal thought. This means that the arrows are specifically directed towards the Muslim world due our adherence to Islam and our clear stance against LGBT+.

Even though secularism and the liberal thought has been forced upon the Muslims and it is implemented in all layers of the society some areas related to the organisation of men and woman was left relatively untouched. That’s why, issues related to honour, marriage, divorce, duties and responsibilities of men and woman are still mainly taken from Islam.

In order to take that bit away the UN deliberately emphasis on these freedoms and the “international human rights law”. They are presented as if these ideas are universal ideas and criteria. While, the freedoms as well as the “international human rights law” are defined by the secular liberal thought and are thus not universal. Accordingly, the good and the bad, moral code and conduct, the rights of humans. All have been defined by this failing secular ideology.

The report shrewdly focuses to reconcile between “the right to freedom of religion or belief” and “the freedom of sexual orientation and gender identity.” By doing this it limits the solution based on these secular liberal criteria. So, the report seeks to set a framework of a specific way of thinking and seeking for solutions based on the secular liberal thought. The Muslims should be aware of this rhetoric and should not only fiercely criticize the idea of LGBT+ but especially the secular liberal thought where these ideas sprung from.

Okay Pala
Media Representative of Hizb ut Tahrir in The Netherlands