SeaHeart

Heinous and unthinkable things happen to LGBTQ people every single moment of every single day. We, here in America, are fighting for the "right" to be equal before every other human being. It's a heartbreaking battle, a dehumanizing battle, but one that I believe in with all my heart. Until that day comes where I am recognized by my government, I will not be silent, I will not be quiet. I will live openly and compassionately with my soul mate, and be unshrinking in my adamant argument for change. I have friends who have received open and hostile discrimination for being openly gay, but save for one very frightening and life-changing rape threat, I have gone almost completely untouched by the deep ignorance and hate that many people hold for these people, my people. I am still fighting for my basic rights...but I can do so openly without too much fear of violence and recrimination, thank the ever loving gods.

Elsewhere, on this beautiful world, that is not the case.



This is Kiana Firouz. She's twenty-seven, Iranian, beautiful, out-spoken, and unless something changes, she will soon be deported from England, where she is seeking sanctuary, back to her home country of Iran. She will be brutally murdered in a public spectacle that almost outpaces the Salem witch trials in horrific glee and hatred, for the "sin" and "crime" of unrepentant homosexuality.

The British government has rejected her application for asylum. Her deportation is imminent, and knowing the story, knowing how hopeless and helpless she must feel, I am overwhelmed with a sick feeling of sadness that resounds through me to my very core. If you think about it, we're hardly different, she and I. We both love women, we both believe in equal rights for everyone, we're both outspoken in our deep-set belief in equality. But the difference, the really core difference that separates us? I'm allowed to do so. I have the freedom to do so. No one is going to kill me in front of a jeering mob, no one is going to "hang me until dead" for a "sin" that we both unrepentantly and outspokenly share.

And that's what's going to happen to Kiana.

I am sickened and heartbroken and soul sick, and the only thing I can do to reach out, to try in the most damnable of ways to "help," is to send a letter to the British government and beg them to show mercy. Because, really, that's what this is. This decision will either save a life, or condemn it to torture and murder. I feel like it's five hundred years ago, and I'm banging on church doors, but there's no one inside, and there's not very much of a chance it will be heard. That's wrong, that's sick, and that should not be.

This isn't politics or opinion or rights or equality. This is the basic survival of one life.

I am saddened beyond measure that I live in a world where this is even a remote possibility. But it happens every single day. Every day, women are brutally murdered in Iran and many other places for being just like me. To Kiana Firouz, her predicament is not a distant news story, it is not a statistic. It's real and raw and almost definite. We're separated by land, an ocean, a thousand cultures and customs, and yet we are not different. She will die, and I will live, and it is for the exact same thing.

I have no words.

- Everyone Group -- Kiana Firouz Risks Deportation
- Save the Life of Kiana Firouz
- Cul De Sac movie, an Iranian equality documentary with Kiana Firouz