Science Misused to Justify Ugandan Antigay Law

摘要

On 24 February, Uganda's president, Yoweri Museveni, signed a draconian Anti-Homosexuality Bill into law, after 2 months of declining to do so. Science, he says, changed his mind-in particular, the findings of a special scientific committee his Health Ministry had appointed earlier in the month. "Their unanimous conclusion was that homosexuality, contrary to my earlier thinking, was behavioural and not genetic," Museveni wrote to President Barack Obama on 18 February, in response to Obama's pleas that he not sign the bill. "It was learnt and could be unlearnt." But some scientists on the committee are crying foul, saying that Museveni and his ruling party-Uganda's National Resistance Movement (NRM)-misrepresented their findings. "They misquoted our report," says Paul Bangirana, a clinical psychologist at Makerere University in Kampala. "The report does not state anywhere that homosexuality is not genetic, and we did not say that it could be unlearnt." Two other committee members have now resigned to protest the use of their report to justify the harsh legislation, which mandates life imprisonment for "aggravated homosexuality," such as sexual acts with a minor, and prison terms of 7 to 14 years for attempted and actual homosexual acts, respectively.