LGBTQ+ and Muslim?

Illustration by: Jishnu Bandyopadhyay (@jishyouwish)

“Being raised with the tenets of Islam, my faith always provided the bedrock for my queerness instead of being antithetical to it. During my teenage years, I embarked on an impossible odyssey to find pieces of evidence across pop culture and history to support living authentically—to know that being queer and Muslim was not a paradox or a laughable hypocrisy.”

During #Pride Month, a queer writer reflects on how his faith and his sexual identity were never mutually exclusive.

Words by: Arman Khan (@arman.gif)

You know I teared up reading this.  The world is against you  and still you chose to wake up and face the day. God bless you, even when the harsh reality doesn't. Living in the west, we have it so much easier, if you live in "the axis of evil" coming out is a death sentence. I count my blessings - and my luck - every day. That my family moved out of the region decades ago. I'd have been hung or thrown off a building years ago... 

Zaalim duniya tu kya jaane mere dukh ki khabar, 
Chaar log mujhe uthane roz darwaaje ke bahar kahde hain
Be irada yeh zindagi kya paa li
Tanha dil kabke mar chuka hai.