Bullocks. I can easily prove that I am straight by pointing to the women I’ve had sex with, the relationships I’ve been in, and the oodles of straight dirty videos on my computer. I’m sure you could do the same.
I think you are bigoted one here. You’ve ascribed all of these anti-gay feelings and beliefs to a Judge that did nothing worse than not believe Mr. Orozco’s story.
Heterosexist? What the fuck is heterosexist? Seriously, listen to yourself.
No, she said:
“I found the claimant’s many explanations unsatisfactory for why he chose not to pursue same-sex relationships in the U.S. as he alleged it was his intention to do so and he wanted to do so.”
That’s it. She didn’t say he wasn’t gay because he didn’t fuck every man that moved. She saw a man that for the first time in his life openly claimed to be gay to gain asylum, and she didn’t believe his reasons for concealing it up to that point. That’s it (as far as I know).
What the hell are you talking about? It’s not an anti-gay stereotype to think that it’s odd that a straight or gay 19 year old hasn’t experimented sexually. Good lord, is there anything you don’t see an anti-gay bias in?
No, what she said was “I determined on a balance of probabilities the claimant did not pursue same-sex relationships in whatever capacity … because he is not a homosexual.” She did not say you didn’t have sex, so you’re not gay.
So could Ted Haggard.
It seems to me if the kid were lying about being gay, he would have lied and said he pursued gay relationships while in America. What do you want, a picture of him with a dick in his mouth? Would that prove it?
Look, I’m no immigration lawyer, and I’m sure as fuck not a Canadian immigration lawyer, but my general understanding of the asylum process is that the applicant has an affirmative duty to show that they are at a particular and specific risk to persecution or violence if they return to their home country.
So, simply saying, “my home country is a shithole,” isn’t sufficient to gain asylum, and although Nicaragua may be sexually repressive, as far as I know, gays aren’t being rounded up and hung from street lamps by mobs. Also, I’m confident that Nicaragua’s a pretty large place, and as a well bodied young man, he won’t have to be chillin’ with pops if he returns there.
So, again, you don’t have to prove that you’re gay for asylum, but you have to be able to point to some sort of evidence to why you really cannot return home.
That said, I disagree with American and Canadian restrictions on immigration; I think he should be allowed to stay in Canada or else I’d welcome him in America, but right now, it is what it is.
A comparable example might be the US army’s, “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy. I can guarantee you that more than a single Marine has appeared before his base commander and pronounced, “I’m gay, I want to have sex with men,” but that alone certainly won’t get them out. What does it take, a photo with a dick in their mouth?
Incidentally, I put a link to this in the OP, describing the situation under which not only gay people but also their defenders are subject to arrest and conviction, there are actually cases of this (i.e. it’s not just one of those laws that are on the books and never get enforced), and they’re actually trying to increase the penalties. Nicaragua is different from most other Latin American countries in this way.
I don’t know why I’m even bothering with this nonsense, but there are tons of gay guys who’ve made it with women and have straight porn. Besides, maybe you downloaded all that porn just to try to make your story more convincing, hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm?
Heterosexism is the state of operating under the default assumption of heterosexuality, and may include operating under a set of stereotypical assumptions about gay and lesbian people. If you don’t know a vocabulary item, you could just ask, and leave off the little flip at the end.
Are you even reading the quotations I’m supplying? The reason she is stated to have given in post 14 is that he didn’t have homosexual relationships when he was in the US, which is what I said.
And “claimed for the first time to be gay?” He started living as an openly gay man as soon as he got to Toronto. Before that, how can I get it through to you that one is unlikely to start putting on reenactments of La Cage aux Folles when one is non-status, teenaged, frightened, abused, and being cared for by Seventh-Day Adventists? I would certainly have been disinclined to come out in that circumstance, that’s for damned sure.
No, that in itself isn’t anti-gay, it’s just stupid. What is anti-gay is using this stupid statement as a basis for making a claim about someone’s sexual orientation, especially when you add the circumstances I mentioned.
Given his circumstances while he was in the US, how could he have possibly done anything analogous to prove he was gay? Seems to me that given where he was staying it would have been difficult for him to get into any gay relationships and accumulate gay dirty videos while he was south of the border, and even if there was a possibility of doing that, common sense would dictate that he abstain while he was trying to avoid getting booted out of the US.
By the way, I’m single and socialize very little (so, I’m a computer nerd ), and I do not have any dirty videos (straight or otherwise) or dirty pictures on my computer. What does that make me?
Matt hit the nail on the head in his first post. We have a grave problem with our procedure in that one adjudicator is given the power to make a decision that will greatly change, and perhaps end, a person’s life.
The nature of many immigration claims is that there is little evidence upon which to hang one’s hat.
Having a second adjudicator will help reduce (although not prevent) errors made by ill-informed or biased sole adjudicators.
And a fortiori for refugee claims, as I pointed out earlier. Repressive governments and abusive families don’t tend to give out commemorative certificates of their crimes against the person.
There is or was a gay and lesbian AI branch here in Montreal; I wouldn’t be surprised if they were on top of it, though they tend to work more with political prisoners rather than refugees, in my experience (having written more than one letter to Nicaragua on their behalf, incidentally).
If they needed evidence to back up the guy’s story, why didn’t they ask for evidence of the abuse rather than evidence that the guy is gay. I understand that that might be hard to prove and all. But wouldn’t it be something that’s more objectively provable and even more relevant to why the guy is a refugee? Or is that crazy talk?
Domestic abuse is not grounds for a refugee claim in Canada.
State sanctioned abuse against gays is.
If someone provided evidence of the child being beaten for being gay, then that would be very helpful, but what are the odds of the refugee being able to come up with such evidence? Slim to none.
The fellow presented evidence - his sworn word that the tale he told was true. Unless there was evidence presented to the contrary, or evidence presented to impinge his credibility, then the decision should have been made based on his evidence and his evidence alone.
From what I have heard in the media so far, no evidence was presented to the contrary, and no evidence presented to impinge his credibility.
Therefore, unless there was something presented that we have not heard about, the adjudicator botched the decision by not accepting the evidence and by deciding the matter on something other than the evidence.
If the government wanted to change the rules, it could: it could change the burden of proof from “balance of probabilities” to “no reasonable doubt”. It could out and out require independent third party confirmation of an applicant having been abused. But it has chosen not to do so. It has chosen to leave the test at one of a balance of probabilities based on credible evidence.
Which would mean, of course, that essentially all refugee claimants would be allowed in. There would be no reason, really, to even have hearings. Sure;ly the balance of the evidence could be found to be against the applicant if her or his evidence seemed dishonest or extremely unlikely?
Much hand-wrining and accusations of bigotry are being made here based on, well, very little evidence aside from a news story that’s pretty light on the details.
), and I do not have any dirty videos (straight or otherwise) or dirty pictures on my computer. What does that make me?