#respect people

A beautiful dancer from Afghanistan, a lovely person, a friend…

If you follow me andwatch my art, please read this, it is veryimportant.

A few years ago I made these artworks of an afghan dancer and posted them on my blog. Later I had to delete them because of many negative reactions from people – people who didn’t know the truth that this young man was, in fact, my closest friend! Yes, he was someone I knew for a long time.

I couldn’t talk about it then, because I would have to explain and risk way too much. Reality was morecomplicated than it seems. When I tried to be positive about the Afghan culture without touching something that hurts us both, people’s response was only hatred, disgust. NOBODY even asked me! Nobody was interested in “whydid you draw him”? They just attacked and accused. Eventually, now, I still have to explain.

First of all, Afghanistan is a homophobiccountry, it does notacceptanything LGBT+, it denies gay/trans/queer rights, andnotonlythat – anyonewhosupportsqueerness, equality, or even “looks queer” will be condemned, criticized and persecuted there. So how could I, a foreigner who openly supports queer rights, tell everyone “THIS IS MY FRIEND”? If the public of his country discovered that he befriended someone like me, he would just get even more hate. I didn’t want this negative attention for either of us.

If you see any videos of him on Youtube or other sites, there will be plenty of negative comments. But these people don’t know him personally, they draw the wrong conclusions based on their assumptions.

I will notshare personal details with respect to his privacy and safety, but as a friend I must defendhim, and defend myself too, for just trying to treat him not as a stereotypical negative image, but as a human being, a person with self-respect, pride, honor.

Originally from North Afghanistan, he enjoyed dancing since his youth; performing at parties was his entertainment and a job for himself and his family. I featured videos with his amazing performances before. While avoidingsensitive and scandalous terms, I used tags like Uzbek dancer, talented artist from Afghanistan and ‘bacha’بچه - in Farsi/Dari - boy, young man (I’m fluent in Persian language enough to know what term to use). I wished he could be recognized as an artist. However after seeing how much hate he still gets, I removed all videos and links.

For the majority “a pretty and young looking dancer” automatically means something else. Everyone keeps pressing on negativity, people call him “bacha-bazi” – butHE IS NOT! Concerning how twisted and notorious this term is,Idon’t call him like this. And don’tcall him this, please.

He only performed the “bacha-bazi” style of dance as it was a part of a Central Asian folk theater, nothing more. NOBODY forced him to dance. He is a completely free person. Dancing was his owndecision.Needless to say, my friend is already 38 years old. In all previous videos of his performances he is above 25-30 years old, surely he looks young but NOT like a child.

ALL rumors or assumptions about him on the internet are false. Despite that it’s uncomfortable for me to say, I will say it to be clear: he is NOT a slave, NOT a prostitute, NOT an abused child! Please, don’t label a grown up artist with such horrible assumptions just because he is from Afghanistan.

I know, the condition of this country is sorrowful, with the past war, conflicts, poverty, lack of education etc. so people from other countries aren’t aware of many things that happen there, thus controversies remain, but I wish people to stop judging before knowing the truth.

If you really care about somebody’s safety, try to contact them directly, ask them if they need help, but what’s the use of shamingon the internet? If you actually want to help children and youth of Afghanistan, help them in reality, increase education, security, welfare. But putting up a scandal in the media, accusingsomeone you don’t know personally is useless and harmful. You think you spread justice? You just spread hate.

I condemn anything that violates human rights. I don’t care what it’s called, if there’s a violation – it’s a crime. But my friend has NOTHINGto do with it. I knew his family and friends, who were very protective. They love him and care for him, and he loves and respects them as well. The whole of Afghanistan is not like what you imagine based on the negativity in the media. There are good people too, who can love, who have feelings too.

This dancer is an adult who decides his personallife, which is noneof others’ business. He had a dream to become a performer, but sadly in his country it’s a stigma. Four years ago he stoppeddancing (all videos with newer dates are wrong), and guess why? Because of people’s hate and misunderstanding. He cannotdance anymore. In his country they say “it’s gay”; they forcehim to live according to heteronormativestandards: look like a man, marry, have kids, and stop befriending “queers”… while in foreign countries they keep saying “pedophilia victim”, “abused child” etc. He is NONEof this. With your aggression you are not protecting him, you’re just making it worse for him.

Nobody actually cares if he got a job, how he lives and what are his dreams and life goals? They judge him only for one thing. I was also accused of… drawing him? Accused of doing something that made him happy.

He was aware of my artistic skills and reallyappreciatedthat I portrayed him, he even requested me to draw him! He also allowed me to publish those paintings. Receiving praise and compliments from friends was pleasing to him. However there was a lot of negative reaction and hatred, which forced him to delete his social media accounts. I also care for his safety and peace and the reason why I spoke about it all now is because reading all the misconceptions about him is too painful to ignore.

These two works I made were some of his favorites. He really loves Persian myths and poetry, so I depicted him in a fairy tale theme, seeing him the way he is: graceful, pure, and joyful. I admired his beauty, his talent; he was, indeed, a very nice and sweet person, always cheerful and smiling whenever I talked with him.

Unfortunately I can’t share any more of his portraits I painted, people will just keep judging him, judging me,judgingeverything they don’t understand. I doubt that this situation will change for the better. Now, at least, if you read this, please don’truin his life. Let him live peacefully.

Elv