Czechs Defend Arousal Testing of Gay Refugees
I’ve heard people described as “card carrying gays.” Maybe we should all start carrying cards that certify our sexual orientation—that way we wouldn’t have to undergo silly tests like this one…
In this class, we have been discussing the evolving and competing definitions of homosexuality throughout history. Is it defined by acts, desire, or identity? Looking at this article, how does the Czech government define homosexuality? Here is a summary of the article: the Czech government has introduced a new test to “verify” the claims of gays seeking political asylum for reasons of discrimination on the basis of their homosexuality. The test is as follows. Those indicating homosexuality as the reason for seeking political asylum are exposed to heterosexual porn. If they show sexual arousal (the Czech government assures that the examinee’s responses are monitored by a “medical specialist”), then they fail the test (not a certified gay, so to speak) and therefore cannot obtain asylum.
Clearly, the Czech government’s test defines homosexuality solely as a type of attraction/desire and shows no interest in the type of sexual acts in which the examinee has partaken nor does the test care how the examinee defines himself (granted, sexual history and self-identity are harder to test than bodily responses). How does this construal of homosexuality stack up against past conceptions of homosexuality?
In Katz’s Inventing Homosexuality, we read that before the late 19th century (when the term homosexual was first coined) those who partook in same-sex acts were viewed as just that, people who partook in same-sex sexual acts (not as a separate group or identity). In colonial America, for example, sodomy was an act, not a sexual orientation or identity. Not until the late 19th century did specialists such as Freud and Hirschfield begin to frame homosexuality as a medical condition—as a type of attraction. We can see echoes of these specialists’ focus on same-sex attraction/desire (and not acts or identity) in the Czech Republic’s arousal tests.
Can homosexuality simply be boiled down to biological responses to certain stimuli? After watching Victim, we talked in class about Farr’s (ambiguously presented) sexuality. Can a man who has same-sex desires but has never acted upon them and doesn’t identify as a homosexual be labeled as one? Can we judge homosexuality solely on attraction?
Another criticism I raise against this test is that it forces a binary categorization of sexual attraction/desire. Either the examinee responds to the pornographic images or doesn’t—there is no gray area. What if the person is bisexual, or just responds to the erotic nature of the pornographic material? I agree with the EU Agency for Fundamental Rights when it questions whether the test “reaches sufficiently clear conclusions.”
And what of the sexism inherent in this “phallometric” arousal test. How would one test lesbians (or other female-bodied persons without a penis) who seek asylum?
The government states that this phallometric arousal test is used only as a last resort or when “it was not possible to use a different method of verification.” Let us hope they find a more humane (and less awkward) manner of conduct their work.
I think that Mac brings up several extremely interesting points in his discussion of the Czech testing method for homosexual refugees, but I think what is even more interesting is what this testing says about the assumptions of sexuality in the Czech Republic and in the world today.
ReplyDeleteFirst, this “phallometric” arousal testing is completely biased towards a binary view of sexuality- one is either heterosexual or homosexual, and there seems to be no room in the Czech government’s eyes for alternative sexualities, such as being transsexual in some way or being bisexual or pansexual. This leads to the exclusion of these groups from being allowed to seek asylum, and it serves to also exclude them from the dialogue of sexuality to some extent.
In addition, as Mac brought up, there is no equivalent test for lesbians, who could also be trying to seek asylum from discrimination based on sexual orientation. In my mind this shows a bias towards male sexuality, as the Czech government is seemingly only concerned with homosexual men seeking asylum, and are not putting the same effort into overseeing lesbianism. Does this mean the Czech government is unconcerned with female sexuality? Or have they just not come up with a way to “test” for that sexuality?
And finally, this method of “testing” for someone’s sexuality is extremely crude and demeaning to a person trying to seek asylum because of their sexual orientation. Should someone’s sexuality be taken as what they say it is, or is it purely based on their acts or reactions? In addition, this test does not take into account that certain people may be turned on by different things, and sexuality (in any form) alone may be enough to arouse some people, while others will never be turned on by pornographic imagery. Does this show a bias in the Czech government towards sexuality that can be affected by images of strangers engaging in sex acts? And I wonder further what they would think of or try to do with someone who claims asexuality as their preference or orientation.