A claim on How to help homeless LGBT Jamaicans ......

also see: More snags for the cruising community in 2013

As cynical as I ever be I'll take this one with a grain of salt as we have seen so called assistance come before and a so called can drive where tinned items were collected and after persons got patted on their backs with thank yous it died and it was business as before, the tokenism pity for the homeless MSM while only where it gets really bad then there is another outcry and alarmist LGBT crisis reorting supposedly in a bid to save them.

Now comes a post on 76crimes on the issue but do not forget the historical context of all this and that MSM homelessness is not only a New Kingston problem but is islandwide and has always been there from ever since the district was built. The very title of the post suggest a filthy disposition of the men and also referring to "informed activist" as if to suggest that those who openly criticise the failure over the years of groups such as JFLAG and the very suspicious way this new thrust suddenly appears are not in the know when persons like myself are on the road almost every night seeing the sights and the sounds of the men in various parts while foreigners blog about it from more privileged activists who do not go on the road themselves but expect the poor overburdened crisis intervention folks to do the dirty work.

Jamaican-style ‘Les Mis’: Help for LGBTs forced into the sewers?

Homeless LGBT men whom Jamaican police burned out of their shelter in a drainage ditch have relocated to the sewers, according to an informed activist.

The men’s plight — evicted from their homes by family, chased out of abandoned houses by police, forced out of a ditch where they huddled, now hiding in the sewers — has touched the hearts of a few charitable souls, who have provided a little food and financial assistance. See the bottom of this post for information about how you can help too.

The men are typically referred to as “unruly gays,” because their behavior is sometimes obnoxious or abusive.

But the police strategy of driving them out of wherever they live is short-sighted. At this point, a comprehensive, longer-term solution is under discussion, but remains far from reality.

Here’s the latest on the homeless MSM (men who have sex with men):

UPDATE ON HOMELESS MSM BURNED OUT BY JAMAICAN POLICE

A female Jamaican senior citizen and mother was so moved by the plight of these young men who were burned out by the police on Oct. 15 that she started providing them with non-perishable food items and cooking utensils from her own meager resources. Since a plea went out for assistance last week, several persons have agreed to help her defray some of the costs associated with this venture.

Thanks to this generosity we have been able to provide the youngsters with very basic sustenance and we also collected clothes which we will be sending to replace some of what they lost.

These youngsters (some of whom are just teenagers) have to be very mobile as they have been chased out of every home they occupied. Some of their previous residences were actually torn down after the boys were evicted by armed police. Now they live in sewers and even there they are not safe from police attack.

The gully in New Kingston, Jamaica, where the homeless men lived.

While we work on meeting their immediate needs, we are also collecting and documenting their stories so we can decide which course of action to pursue in order to provide them with long-term assistance.

It is clear these boys need a dedicated facility as they are harassed and abused when they use the government shelters. This is not surprising as our national revulsion against homosexuality makes homeless LGBT the lowest on the national totem pole of poverty. Any facility for these damaged youth will need to address their physical and emotional needs caused by crushing societal and family rejection.

Jamaicans should care about this issue because “the measure of a nation is how it treats its weakest members.”

Anyone who wants to help these homeless young men should leave a message in the comments section below this post or on the Erasing 76 Crimes page on Facebook.

also 

Some money and plenty of encouragement have flowed in for Jamaicans who are seeking to help a group of homeless LGBT men and boys who have been hounded out of their homes and temporary shelters by family, police and homophobic attackers.

One activist reports, “We are now beginning to think medium-term for the funds. Some of the homeless youngsters have expressed a desire to continue their schooling. We want to help but they need to be in a home so they can actually focus, so we are looking at boarding facilities.”

A planning meeting is scheduled for next week.

Meanwhile, a tax-deductible method of contributing to the cause has been set up in the United States.  Similar arrangements are in the planning stages in Canada and the United Kingdom.

For people in the United States, tax-deductible contributions can be made via PayPal at the website of the Open Arms Metropolitan Community Church in Rochester, N.Y.  To make sure the contribution goes where you want it to, add a notation that the donation is for  “Homeless LGBT Jamaicans.”

ENDS

We shall be keeping a close eye as we always do on matters like this as I said above we have had pretentious interventions before from various quarters and it dies mid or after the fact leaving the men needy or in a worse state as before, while a few influentials burned out are still trying with mixed results due to the sheer numbers. The deceptive crisis reporting strategy is also on in earnest and merely using the men for data collection especially since the upcoming buggery challenge in our local Supreme Court slated for November 21, 2014, also check out this entry on Facebook:

The Jamaica Observer Clovis cartoon depiction of the problematic homeless MSM scenario relocated to the Barbican area, the online version from their website was removed following some complaints but I managed to get it scanned from my hardcopy edition of May 31, 2013, the paper has been in love hate relationship sorts ever since their first coverage of the matter when the men launched an attack at the former JASL/JFLAG offices August 23/4, 2011: MORE HERE and HERE

Peace and tolerance

H