Nobel Peace Prize winner defends anti-gay laws

Liberian President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf waves at her home in the city of Monrovia, Liberia, Oct 7, 2011.

/ AP Photo

(CBS News) As traditional African society lurches its way slowly into a halting embrace with the modern world, few arenas create more tension than gay rights.

Across the continent, being gay doesn't just mean a constant struggle for acceptance. It usually means a constant struggle to stay out of jail or away from the lynch mob. While there are many modern thinkers on gay rights in Africa, their voices are often the quietest, and they rarely if ever hold positions of power. Even the most progressive African leaders have been known to hold views on gay people that would give Rick Santorum pause.

In an interview with The Guardian, Liberian President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf defended her nation's laws which makes the committing of homosexual acts - "voluntary sodomy" - punishable by up to one year in prison.

"We like ourselves just the way we are," Sirleaf told the Guardian, when asked about the law, as well as proposals for even stricter anti-gay legislation. "We've got certain traditional values in our society that we would like to preserve."

Sirleaf has long been held up as an example of progressiveness in Africa. She was the first woman elected president in modern Africa, and she was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2011 because she "contributed to securing peace in Liberia," promoted "economic and social development," and strengthened "the position of women."

Across Africa, many of the more traditional societies have been pushing back against gay rights since U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton announced in December of last year that U.S. foreign aid would be used to promote rights for gays and lesbians abroad, including combating attempts by foreign governments to criminalize homosexuality.

Homosexuality is illegal in as many as 38 African countries, according to the BBC. In 3 countries, it is punishable by death, while the rest impose punishments that range from life sentences to probation for simply displaying sexual intentions with someone of the same sex.

[Molly-Pchr]

We have some nerve forcing our liberal mores on other nations. I'll take the words of another Nobel Peach Prize winner who said "For so many of you morality is merely group consensus. In your modern sociological lingo, the mores are accepted as the right ways. You have unconsciously come to believe that right is discovered by taking a sort of Gallup poll of the majority opinion." Martin Luther King, Jr. His writings speak loudly even today. What a human being.

[Molly-Pchr]

Peace

[Zoonotics]

This winner of the Nobel Peace Prize who condones hatred against Gays & Lesbians is a DISGRACE to Peace, the Nobel Peace Prize, and to Humanity! Go to her Facebook page and tell her what you think.

[honestabe8]

"This woman is a champion for human rights, normal humans that is."

Which of your rights is she championing? To be a bloward angry bigot? Shucks, you had that with the First Amendment. Now, go wander in front of a speeding bus, please

[honestabe8]

F'ing closet queen

[tmn]

Africa - backwards pretty much says it all...

[D-Waarheid]

Sorry, but its people who engage in sex with their own gender that are backwards .

[Gillyala]

Can Nobel Peace Prizes be revoked?

[prince4gayrights]

I think it will be revoked. There is a campaing on the way by gay rights activist in Norway already to revoke the Noble Pace Prize.

[steeepe]

It's tough to apply our cultural standards to tribal culture, either in the Mideast or Africa, but criminalizing love and sexual behavior is certainly wrong by basic human rights. Even in the USA, there's a substantial minority that would probably love to criminalize homosexuality, and we're "educated" and "enlightened".

[RichZubaty]

Thanks for this report. It gives some balance to the constant drumbeat of gay issues that seem to regularly displace REAL issues like stopping war and getting living wages. I was sick to see all the leftists applaud that war mongering, Zionist, national health care vetoing, slime ball Joe Lieberman for advocating gay marriage. Here they want to get married. In Africa they want to stop from being murdered. We've come a long way baby. But gays won't stop until they get complete equality and I'll tell you right now, unless they make and raise babies, they will never get complete equality. How come my working age kids are paying my Social Security and that of retired gays too! I don't care what people do in bed. I care how they contribute to society. And gays don't pull their weight. In fact now we are burdened with enormous AIDS expenses that gnaw at federal and state budgets. Equality mans you pull your weight, into the next generation. Not that you get to do whatever you want to day and if you create a mess the rest of society has to pay for it. No, I don't want them put in jail. I just want them to shut up. Or better yet: do something for Occupy, bring down the big banks, do something for all of society, not just themselves.

[honestabe8]

"But gays won't stop until they get complete equality and I'll tell you right now, unless they make and raise babies, they will never get complete equality."

"Never" is a long time. The percentages supporing gay marriage are growing. Soon it will be a majority. It upsets the bigots. Good.

[I-C-Warming]

Yeah, how about no rights for all infertile people? Unless you are adding to the global warming of the future, you don't deserve to be treated with the same respect as a breeding human. Parent a new consumer by age thirty, or move to the back of the bus.

[FormerUSMCSergeant]

"We've got certain traditional values in our society that we would like to preserve."

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Like bigotry.....

[BigAssFan]

A human embryo is capable of producing both male and female genitalia. The human psyche is capable of producing emotions simply from our senses. Phobias are an excellent example of illogical responses to our senses. Whether it's a fear of heights, water, enclosed space, snakes, rats, spiders, dirt, germs, or any plethora of fears, I believe that a defect in the reproductive system can cause an illogical response to one's sexual preference.

[BigAssFan]

What would you do when a hermaphrodite is born??? The status quo? Mutilate what is not wanted?

[OnTheCrown]

That is different. The anti-gay laws are based on behavior not how they were born.

[honestabe8]

OnTheCrown: Do you feel that orientation is a choice? If so, at what age did you make yours?

[markamichaud]

Save the animals in Africa and let the humans eat each other.