This week read about Susel Paredes vowing to boost LGBT rights in Peru, and YouTube blocking Nigerian pastor Ty Joshua over allegations of hate speech toward homosexuals.
First Lesbian Lawmaker in Peru Vows To Boost LGBT Rights
As two social conservatives face off in a presidential run-off vote in June, the first lesbian elected to Peru's Congress has vowed to fight for LGBT rights in the Andean nation.
According to Reuters, Susel Paredes was elected following two previous unsuccessful congressional runs, and she will become the county’s only openly LGBT lawmaker.
In comparison to other South American countries such as Argentina, Uruguay, Brazil, and Colombia, which have recently legalized gay marriage, same-sex couples are not permitted to marry in conservative Peru.
Paredes achieved the most votes of any female candidate, but she was cautious about the chances of broader LGBT gains following the presidential election, which pits socialist candidate Pedro Castillo against right-wing Keiko Fujimori in a second-round decider.
“We’re in the middle of a crossfire between right-wing and left-wing fundamentalists,” said Paredes to Reuters.
YouTube Blocks Nigerian Pastor Who Claims to Have Found a Cure for Homosexuality
Ty Joshua. Photo via Facebook.
Following a complaint from a rights body, influential Nigerian TV evangelist TB Joshua has been suspended from YouTube over allegations of hate speech.
According to BBC News, seven videos, uploaded on TB Joshua Ministries' YouTube channel between 2016 and 2020, show the preacher leading prayers to "cure" gay people.
The video is an update of a woman named Okoye's prayer session, which was first broadcast in 2018.
The footage, which had over 1.5 million views before being pulled down from YouTube, later shows her testifying in front of the church that "the devil of women" had been ruining her life but that she had been saved after the preacher's prayers.
According to a YouTube spokeswoman, the channel was shut down because its policy "prohibits programming that alleges that someone is mentally ill, diseased, or deficient because of their membership in a protected category, like sexual orientation."
