Madras has always been known as a hub of the arts and cultural activities. But has the city, with its legendary conservatism, embraced the rainbow of queer identities and cultures? To discuss this, an hour-long online discussion ‘Nam Madras kadhai pesalam: Arts, Colour, Queerness and Madras’ was organized on Aug 28, 2020.

The panel discussion was curated by Muhilann Murugan on behalf of Nam veedu, Nam oor, Nam kadhai,  a local social history initiative of archictects and artists conceived by Thirupurasundari Sevvel in 2013. The focus of the discussion was on the involvement and contributions of queer and trans communities to Madras culture, social history and life. It featured filmmaker Malini Jeevarathnam, photographer Harish Subramanian, artist Gokuleshwaran, and activists Jaya and Ramakrishnan. As the discussion proceeded, artist Srishti deftly transformed the content of the discussion to the sketch, reproduced above with permission.

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Nam Madras kadhai pesalam : Arts, Colour, Queerness and Madras . As we all know, Madras has always been known as a hub of the arts and cultural activities. But has the city, with its legendary conservatism, embraced the rainbow of queer identities and cultures? . With @muhilann_ @sarcastic_saroja @hush_o.o_ @gokuleshwaran @sahodaranchennai Jaya ma @lramakrishnan.insta . Thank you so much @madhavchitra for the sketch Thank you so much @kaushikbn for the quote Thank you so much @unsaid_dezires for the Kavithais . On this Madras day, we celebrate the queer side of the city with a panel discussion on the city’s queer arts, activism and culture scene. The focus will be on the involvement and contributions of queer and trans communities to Madras culture, social history and life. Date: 28th August 2020 Time: 6-7 PM Celebrate Art, Colour, Queerness, Madras and much more. #madrasinspired #madraspride #chennairainbowpride #namlocal #madrasheritage #personalhistory #madrasmag #namlocal #31daysofmadrasinspired #namchennai #nammachennai #engaoorumadras #heritage #socialhistory #nammadras #suyamariyathai_perani #madras_social_history_group #madras_life #teastories #nammadras #nampride #namveedunamoornamkadhai #nvok #nam #namveedu #namoor #namkadhai #madrasinspired #madrasstory

A post shared by Nam Veedu Nam Oor Nam Kadhai (@namveedu_namoor_namkadhai) on Sep 2, 2020 at 5:30am PDT

Muhilann Murugan (@muhilann_) is an architect, artist, volunteer with the Madras Literary Society, Nam veedu, Nam oor, Nam kadhai, and Orinam.

Srishti (@anchoredhues_) has been painting for the last 18 years. She has learnt over 35+ styles of drawing and painting from various artists and experiments on her own. She creates artwork that showcase strong ideas of colour. Her passion project explores the different connections between colours and the city.

View the discussion (English, Tanglish)  below.

Resource centre for Youth Mental Health by SCARF is an inclusive space for youth from different walks of life. Orinam is an all unregistered collective of LGBTIQA+ people and allies based in Chennai,Tamil Nadu. It functions as a support, cultural, and activist space.

Suhavana- Clinical Psychologist, SCARF
Dwarak – Mental Health Counsellor
Mujeebur Rahman – from Orinam
Namithaa – Gender and Sexuality Educator

Resource Center for Youth Mental health by SCARF – on Instagram @ryms_scarf
rYMs Email : ryms@scarfindia.org
SCARF : 044 2615 1073
SCARF COVID HELPLINE : +91 7305928515
Email: info@scarfindia.org
Website http://www.scarfindia.org/

Part 1: You love them without a body.
They is an entity,
They wraps themselves around myself
And I will touch their every curve and crevice,
Plunge myself into their cracks and touch them
Where I’d want to be touched.
Kama comes bodiless and swift
…Much like me in bed.
Yet it is always she that I see,
Me, I am as visible as I believe.
And invisible when I am everything
The world wishes me to be.
Part 1: You love them without a body.

Part 2: You are the object.
She comes and asks me who I am
Asks me to grip harder.
When the moon is unreachable
I push myself into the breachable
Her eyes feel my insides and suddenly
I am nobody.
I am nothing that matters
Nobody insignificant.
my desire is entire.
My love is above
All these contracts of rough
And the ragged is all I am.
Part 2 – you become the object.

Part 3: you love yourself.
They say it for fun
They know it hurts, but say it anyway
“He” likes attention,
“He” is the butterfly stuck to the wall
The flower without nectar
And “he”
“He he he he he”
It’s like they’re laughing at me
“He he he he”
I smile. I correct them. I tell them to call me “they”
Every time I smile, I remember the abuses entertained,
I remember the warmth of that day
That day once, much long ago
When she called me and said she needed me,
And I was hers since then, forevermore.
Each time you call me a man, a boy, a son, a sir,
I lose myself in the depths of the darkest days
And I can’t love anymore, again.
I can’t. Because I must spend that love for myself,
And I am not much, but everything at once,
A speck of stardust trying to wipe away immovable rust…
Part 3 is me, and I am such –
I am they, for I am many,
and my love doesn’t need your touch (but wants it).

I am the zenith of your imagination,
And I had to learn to say “I” again.
They told me it’s selfish of me, and I had to learn to say it…once more.
To love myself, I remember the resentment, the guilt and the fear,
I remember that my penis is not me,
My throat can be musical, as it can be deep.
That within this dysphoria,
I can craft my own Utopia,
And love will forever be, mine.
Part 3 – you love yourself.

Part 4: And this is the hardest when you love. You listen.
She taught me this. I always used to say, I can listen. I can listen.
She told me of when she used to be the master, the “Babu” of her home,
When Kama rushes into my soul,
I can’t hold myself. I relate and converse
She tells me she loves purple,
I say, “Oh! That’s my favorite color!”
Tells me she used to dream up fantasies, and was a dreamy child,
I said, “Hey that sounds like me!”
She says she’s been through abusive relationships, and I say “Me too!”
says there’s nothing as tasty as cold water on a summer afternoon, and I say “How true!”
Every sentence must be relatable, every word must deal with me. Empathy, empathy
That’s everything I should be.
But in order to see, to truly truly see
I needed to listen, to listen to her, and listen to me
Know that abuse isn’t the same for us all
That different pain is felt differently,
That we’re humans, to be queer is to be different
To standout from the crowd is to form a crowd of misfits and strangers who see all that’s invisible
And when she could see me…
She could, she really could
When she could see me when no one else did…
My penis doesn’t matter!
My beard doesn’t matter!
My body doesn’t matter!
All that mattered was to listen.
Listen to the histories that whispered to me, telling me who I am and was, when I seemed to forget.
Listen to her as she tells me her fears
Feel the sweat form on my brow as her horrors become my own…
And listen to her voice when she called me “They”…
Listen to her correct every soul who passes my way
And for once, I can be anything.
Nothing is finally everything
And feeling is believing.
Listen, listen to the unheard voices and finally
Listen to hear
When she tells me she loves me.

How to love someone without a gender, a manual in four parts.

Note: Q read their poem at Orinam’s 40th Quilt poetry and spoken word event (Chennai Pride 2018 edition) at ICSA Chennai on June 17, 2018. Thanks to Archanaa Seker for the video.

On the evening of Friday, March 2, 2018, Coimbatore saw the public screening of ‘Ladies and Gentlewomen’, a Tamil documentary film. Directed by Malini Jeevarathnam and  produced by Pa. Ranjith’s Neelam Productions, ‘Ladies and Gentlewomen’ is the first effort in the history of Tamil cinema to break the silence around the dynamics and body politics of lesbian relationships, which are often socially stigmatised. Also screened were ‘En Aasai En Kanavu’ and ‘Won’t the Real Transformers please stand up?’, two short films on the lives of transmen and transwomen.

These screenings were organised by Queerbatore, a collective formed in 2015 by a few individuals who were part of the Orinam mailing list and network. Queerbatore is now an active WhatsApp group and offline space for people belonging to the LGBTQIA+ community who either live in Coimbatore or have a personal/professional association with the city.

The event commenced with a song rendered by Shyam, a volunteer of Queerbatore.

The song was followed by the screening of Malini’s film.

Post-screening, Vivek Kumaran gave an informative presentation on gender and sexuality to make the audience aware of LGBTQIA+ terminologies. Vivek also urged the audience to  be sensitive, respectful and accepting of persons with diverse identities and to address them by their preferred choice of pronouns.

This was followed by the panel discussion featuring Kalki Subramaniam, Selvam, Vinodhan,  Malini Jeevarathnam, Saurabh Masurkar, and Srijith Sundaram.

Representing the transwomen, transmen, intersex, lesbian, gay and ally communities, these panelists come from different walks of life. What they have in common is their extensive and passionate work for the welfare of the LGBTQIA+ community through their engagement with art, theatre, film, media, activism, advocacy and life.

The intention of this interaction between the panelists was primarily to make people within and outside the community aware of the diversity of identities that exist under the LGBTQIA+ umbrella. Kalki, Srijith, Malini, Selvam, Saurabh and Vinodhan passionately spoke of the challenges, breakthroughs and experiences in their personal and professional circles. The audience was also encouraged to accept whoever they feel they are and to live without the fear of anyone.

Most of all, this event was an Out and Loud call to people from all sections of the society to stand up and unite against oppression on the basis of sex, gender, caste, race, appearance, personal choices or, for that matter, violation of any human right. Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.

In the video excerpt below (courtesy Prasanth), Kalki speaks about gender stereotypes within the community, followed by a discussion with Srijith on queer history and intersectional activism.

Thanks to the Queerbatore volunteers who shared the images above.

In the words of Moses Tulasi, filmmaker and producer,  TransVision “aims to provide accurate scientific and anthropological information on medical, social, cultural and economical dynamics of transgenders in an Indian context. The content on this channel is written and directed by Hyderabad’s own born-in-Andhra, living-in-Telangana trans rights activist Rachana Mudraboyina. The first offering from the channel is a web series named అఆ ఇఈ…అంజలి (aAA eEE…Anjali).”

Orinam is pleased to bring you the videocast of the panel discussion, in conjuction with filmmaker and festival curator Moses Tulasi, who facilitated the panel. Panelists included Mahesh Kathi (Film Activist), Rachana Mudraboyina (Transgender Activist),  Gautami Challagulla (Writer), Neha Vyas (Psychotherapist), Manoj Sunanda (Filmmaker), and Rohan Kanawade (filmmaker).

The panel covered a wide range of issues pertaining to representation of women and LGBTQ characters in mainstream cinema, including representation, the sacrosanctity of sexuality and monogamy, the future of independent film distribution,  indifference towards bisexuality, psychology as perceived by the community and society, victim shaming, assertion vs. victimhood narratives.

This talk was part of ‘TransForm: Transgender Rights and Law‘ conference, organized by the Centre for Law and Policy Research (CLPR),  on December 14-15, 2016, and held at the Indian Institute for Human Settlements, Bengaluru.

Orinam thanks Gee for consent to share this on Orinam, and CLPR for making this available in the public domain (see TransForm site for links to other talks).

There’s a new hazard to Indian school and college students on the horizon, and it’s particularly toxic for LGBT youth and women of all sexualities. It takes the form of Abhishek Clifford, the CEO of a Mysore-based NGO named Rescue. Or, if you prefer, Paul Clifford Jacob, of Rescue ministry.

As part of the Fresher’s Orientation at SRM University in Chennai, he presented a seminar on ‘Moral Values’  on 19 August 2015 at the University’s main auditorium in Main Campus, Kattankulathur. He gave the lecture to multiple batches of 500 to 1000 students, covering about 5000 students in total. Details below are paraphrased from a report provided by members of Prism, the unofficial LGBT student group at SRM.

He started off with a rant against abortion, and attributed it to consumption of pornography by today’s (heterosexual, cis-male) youth. He claimed that porn leads men to have casual sex,  leading to women getting pregnant and seeking out abortions. He spoke about how porn is also the biggest reason for divorce, as it leaves young men unsatisfied with monogamous vanilla relationships and prone to seeking out dalliances with sex workers and other men’s wives. Besides urging a ban on porn, he said traditional sex was the only safe way to have fun.

He then proceeded to show an image of two guys kissing on the screen and talked about how homosexuality is a mental disorder, and how it affects the younger generation. He said there is no possibility of traditional sex between two men, so gay students in the audience should get their sexual orientation changed at conversion therapy centres. He claimed that people could successfully get their orientations change from gay to straight, and proceeded to give an example of a young man who, prior to conversation therapy, used to like pink colour and other people of the same sex. When he turned seventeen, he changed his preferences to blue and to dating girls. Clifford claimed to personally know doctors who have cured “hundreds of homosexuals” with their therapy.

Further investigation by team Orinam shows:

Abhishek Clifford was in the news in 2014 supplying quotes based on a survey by Rescue that linked online porn to sex offences (The Hindu,  The New Indian Express, Herald). Among his claims are that about 70 per cent of youth in the 18-21 age group watch four hours of sex videos per week, and that 76 per cent of students said that watching rapes leads to the desire to actually rape someone. In July 2014, Goa’s netizens had protested Clifford being allowed to preach his regressive ideas to school and college students. Rescue was one of two organisations (along with Rhoumaia) that led a protest at Cubbon Park in Bangalore on 31 Aug 2014 demanding the government ban porn sites.

In a sermon given on 30 Aug, 2015, at the Ark Victory Church in Sembakkam, Chennai,  he lamented that “We live in a time and culture where pornography, pre-marital sex, LGBT relationships, abortions and many other unnatural practices are the norm of the day.” In that sermon, he proposed reaching out to colleges to initiate discussions on porn, abortion and gay issues, and “sow seeds of God’s truth”.

A Youtube video uploaded by the Eagle Missions ministry featuring Abhishek Clifford has the following blurb “his ministry team reach[es]  50,000 college students a year with the 7 Mountain Mandate, rescuing sex slaves, fighting abortion and porn businesses, while leading to many salvations. They get permission from government officials to speak in public colleges and to raid sex shops. Hear about resurrections and miracles exploding in India.”

The website of Eagle Missions refers to him as Paul Clifford Jacob, one of their missionaries, and to Rescue as a “ministry devoted to shining the light of God’s word in the power of the Spirit in the colleges and though the media in South India”, with plans of reaching 15000 students leveraging “open doors in Muslim, Hindu, Catholic, Government and RSS colleges” [emphasis ours]. Check out their website to read more of Clifford’s insidious agenda.

Incidentally, the Rescue website and FB community site mention nothing of Rescue being a ministry.

Students and school/college administrators: beware of misinformation, hate and fear being sown by Clifford and his ilk.

Take some time to learn about resources for educational institutions, ongoing campus LGBT initiatives,  hosting LGBT-inclusive fresher orientations, and what leading doctors in India have to say about conversion therapy.

For those of the Christian faith, note that there are LGBT-inclusive churches in India that are part of the National Council of Churches of India (NCCI). Resources for LGBT Christians are here.

Watch Clifford’s SRM lecture below, if you can stomach it:

We thank Aaditya Joshi of IIT-Bombay and members of Prism, SRM University’s LGBT student group, for information.

When we thought of how we could take forward the legacy of the ‘first love‘ video last year, we thought of involving our allies. After all, the campus is an ecosystem – and the earliest fear that LGBTQ students may have is whether they will be accepted by people around. Our allies in the video must have gotten rid of their doubts.

Our introduction video this year is called ‘Mere Saathi’ (My Companions) and is directed by Anisha Bajaj, a third year student of Energy Science and Engineering, and IIT-B’s first out lesbian student.  Says Anisha, a photography and video-making enthusiast, “Orientation should not matter in friendship. We have been lucky to have such awesome friends and we hope new entrants see the warmth too. My focus was to ensure this message comes out as clearly as possible”.

The video has three LGBTQ students, with their friends. It was first screened to a packed hall of first year undergraduates on 28th July 2015. The session continued with informal conversation with the students.

The video was picked by Buzzfeed and Storypick, and continues to spread warm vibes about friendship and acceptance.

Click to llisten: