Where Can Queer Muslims Go to Pray?

Atlantic ^ | October 31, 2015 | Jordan Alam

[lbryce]

Safe Places To Pray For Gay Muslim American. The title asks where can queer Muslims go to pray

In the media, being queer and Muslim often seems to amount to being a victim. In articles on violence against LGBTQ people in Muslim-majority countries, or pieces on the challenges of coming out, the queer person’s connection to Islam is often used to imply that these cultures are especially intolerant. With this narrow focus on tragedy, it can be hard to understand the day-to-day lived experiences of queer people who identify religiously or culturally with Islam—particularly the difficulty they face in trying to find communities that embrace their multiple identities.

Even within the gay community, “I am markedly different in these spaces and unable to hide the difference that I wear on my body: My brownness, my hijab, my not drinking are lightbeams signaling my otherness,” writes one queer South Asian writer in an essay for the online magazine Black Girl Dangerous. She describes feeling “saved” by groups like the NYC queer Muslim book club, where she does not have to make compromises. “I think it’s less about a similarity of experience and more about supporting each other,” she said in an interview. “To be able to talk about these things without feeling defensive or without feeling like I need to explain things ... was really important to me. To have space to talk ... without feeling ‘too Muslim for the queers’ or ‘too queer for the Muslims.’”

[lbryce]

Ain't it the truth? Ain't it the truth?....
and sadly, hilarious at the same time.