Venezuela: Homophobes deface mural, LGBT advocates push back

This comes from our friends at Venezuela's Union Afirmativa and at Spain's Dos Manzanas - and has a somewhat happy ending:

Earlier in the month, the locality of Chacao in Venezuela celebrated the annual "Cooltura Hip Hop" festival with full support from the Chacao Mayor's Office.  The event drew hip hop artists throughout Venezuela and, as part of the festival, a number of local street graffiti artists were also granted permission to design street murals that promoted a better living environment for the residents of Chacao.

The concept chosen by graffiti artist Darient was "tolerance" and, with that in mind, she painted the mural pictured above in which a woman of Afro-Venezuelan background asks "Tolerate?" and a pink sign below the image of two men kissing states "Tolerate!".

Reaction against the mural came fast: According to Dos Manzanas, local church leaders spread rumors that the Mayor's Office had asked the artist to come up with a new concept and to remove the image.  Darient, the mural's author, denied any of this was true but joined local LGBT organizations and leaders in asking Emilio Graterón, the Mayor of Chacao, to publicly back the mural.  "The situation represented an enormous challenge for the Chacao Mayor's Office," said Dos Manzanas, "It would be paradoxical not to tolerate a mural that precisely promoted the value of tolerance".

The Mayor's Office responded on November 19th and said that the mural would remain standing as it was created. It was exactly the next day that the mural was defaced with black spray paint covering the image of the two men kissing and black lines covering the pink sign that says "Tolerate!" (see above).

Near the mural, a wall was also spray-painted to deliver a clear message: "Muerte al Maricón" (Death to the faggot).

This elicited the first public response by the Chacao Mayor... through Twitter: "I reiterate my position" Mayor Graterón twitted, "I condemn the vandalism to which the mural of tolerance was subjected; Dialogue is the medium, it's [about] respect for one another".

The next day he released a lengthy statement on the issue titled "Public Morals and Tolerance" in which he defended the mural. Unfortunately, perhaps in an attempt to assuage critics from the fundamentalist religious rights, in the statement he also urges people to respect homosexuals in the same way Christ had extended his charitable love towards Mary Magdalene, "the most famous prostitute in town", and also invokes John Paul II in stating that the Vatican leader did not consider homosexuality in itself to be a sin - just the sexual acts between members of the same gender.

Sigh. So much for mayoral valor.

Anyway, DARIENT herself went back to the mural she had created and wrote "Su amor no daña, your hate does!!! - EN RECUPERACIÓN" (Their love doesn't create damag, your hate does!!! - IN REPAIR).

Sunday, a group of LGBT rights organizations and advocates, led by Unión Afirmativa, called for a community gathering to accompany DARIENT as she repaired her mural.

This time the graffiti artist didn't write the word "Tolerate!" on her mural.  Instead, she expanded the image of the two men kissing and wrote "Respect!" under it.

No word on whether the Office of the Mayor is pursuing any leads on those who might have defaced the mural or wrote the death threats on nearby walls.

Below, an image of Darient with a friend next to the repaired mural. Thank you DARIENT!

Other sources:

• LGBT Support for DARIENT Facebook photo album #1 here
• LGBT Support for DARIENT Facebook photo album #2 here

NOTE: According to Wikipedia, Chacao is one of five municipalities that make up the Venezuelan capital of Caracas.

Venezuela: Rex Wockner & Unión Afirmativa on Court's same-sex marriage ruling

In his current syndicated column (International News #724, March 10, 2008), journalist Rex Wockner takes a look at a March 4th decision by the Venezuelan Supreme Tribunal of Justice in which they ruled against the right of same-sex couples to marry (we were first to cover the news last Wednesday).

With the assistance of Bill Kelley, Rex has included a lengthier translation of the top court's decision than I originally provided. I am including excerpts here with the full permission of the author (please do not reproduce elsewhere unless you are also granted permission by Rex).

From the column:

The court said, "If the 1999 constitutional body opted to protect monogamous matrimony between a man and a woman as the essential nucleus that gives origin to the family in the Venezuelan historic and cultural context, the extension of its [marriage's] effects to common-law unions ... should require, at the least, that these [unions] fulfill the same essential requirements -- that they are stable and monogamous unions between a man and a woman who have no marriage impediment ... and that the union is based on the free consent of the parties."

But the tribunal added, "The court wants to emphasize that the constitutional norm does not prohibit or condemn common-law unions between persons of the same sex, which find constitutional cover in the fundamental right of free development of the personality; it simply does not grant them reinforced protection, which does not constitute a discriminatory act in regard to sexual orientation."

Judge Carmen Zuleta de Merchán dissented from the decision, arguing that the Constitution grants implicit rights to same-sex couples, and that the other justices were influenced by ingrained social and religious prejudices.

The gay group Affirmative Union of Venezuela commented: "We see this decision as an advance with respect to the previous situation in which we had no legal existence, we were invisibilized and our human condition was negated in this society. ... We commit ourselves to continue fighting, with all legal means within our reach, to obtain what should be common sense: the overcoming of discrimination in Venezuelan society."

That last statement from a press release sent out over the weekend by Unión Afirmativa (Affirmative Union) in response to the ruling.

In the wake of the decision, we also reached out to Unión Afirmativa and asked them whether the court's ruling would derail ongoing legislative efforts to recognize rights for same-sex couples.

José Ramón Merentes, General Coordinator of Unión Afirmativa, replied and told Blabbeando:

"Hi, Andrés. Thanks for your inquiry. Notwithstanding having solicited a clarification from the constitutional wing, in the terms stated by the dissenting vote of Justice Zuleta, we believe that said vote allows the National Assembly the possibility - even if not the 'responsibility' - of acting to protect [the rights of] homosexual couples, who cannot call themselves equal to heterosexuals, thanks to the alleged 'substantial difference' between homosexual and heterosexual partners.

What the ruling indicates is that the Venezuelan state is not obliged [to meet] the rights of gay partnerships, as they are when facing heterosexual partners, but if the legislative body so desires, it can address the issue. We feel calm and optimism in that this sentence can be 'dismantled' based on international measures and that it gives us the possibility of reaching out [to the international courts] immediately - without waiting a second longer - since we have run out of internal arguments."

We agree with Unión Afirmativa and wonder where defenders of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez supposedly gay-friendly government stand tonight.