'White queers are really good at erasing us': the lives of LGBTQ Somali-Americans

Minneapolis is known for its large Somali-American and LGBTQ communities. But for those who are part of both, a sense of belonging can be hard to find

Hassan remembers watching his friend spiral.

It was 2013, and Hassan’s 25-year-old friend had just told his family that he was gay. They disowned him and rebuked him publicly before kicking him out of their house. Hassan’s friend descended into a deep depression and drank heavily, drifting to the edge of his circle of friends before falling off the radar completely.

Three months after Hassan last heard from him, he found out that his friend had trekked into the woods outside Minneapolis, doused himself in lighter fluid, and set himself on fire. Hikers came across the scene and called the police.

He was dead before help arrived.

“He was one of my best friends,” Hassan, now 28, recalled. “He helped me move a couple times. He was an absolute sweetheart. He was kind. He was really bright. He was going to be an environmental scientist. It was a very traumatizing thing for many of us. It was a catalyst for a lot of us to start thinking about our own mental health. I started seeing a therapist after that.”

For people like Hassan, who is queer and a Somali-American, community can be a difficult thing to find. On the one hand, homophobia and transphobia plague the Somali-American community. On the other hand, xenophobia, Islamophobia and racism are deeply rooted in Minnesota’s largely white LGBTQ community.

I recently sat down with six Somali-Americans who identify as LGBTQ to hear about what their lives are like in a time where these demographics are under attack. Theirs are all stories of resilience, and of finding strength in each other amidst waves of rejection.

One interviewee stood outside a popular gay bar in Minneapolis and saw gay white men call Somali taxi drivers “goatfuckers”. He has also been called “faggot” by straight Somalis outside the same bar. Another interviewee had a parent follow them around the house with Zamzam water – from a sacred well in Mecca – after being outed, and had also been accosted for wearing hijab at an LGBTQ event.

“A lot of times you feel like you have to chose,” said Hafsa Guled, a 21-year-old who identifies as genderqueer and uses gender neutral pronouns. Guled consented to having their real name published in this article.

“It’s pretty normal. It’s expected,” Hassan said of homophobia and transphobia in his Somali-American community. As for being Somali in Minneapolis’ LGBTQ community: “It has been awful. I should not be surprised that just because we happen to share a sexuality that it would absolve them or cure them of all prejudices that exist.”

One woman, who identifies as queer, wrote in a text message: “If you want my thoughts, Islam is toxic, my community feels distant from me. Queerness is something I feel estranged from because white queer communities have a different experience than I do. I feel that all my experience as a queer Muslimah has influenced me and now it bites me back.”

Recent surveys estimate that there are more than 30,000 Somalis living in the Minneapolis-St Paul area – nearly a third of all Somalis living in the US. Minneapolis also has a reputation as an LGBTQ-friendly city, with some estimates placing its LGBTQ population at more than 10% of the city’s three million residents. Nearly two-thirds of those 3 million people are white.

“White queers are really good at erasing us,” Hafsa said. “There’s a lot of Islamophobia and xenophobia, and I feel like Trump has brought a lot of that out of people in the community.”

Minnesota’s Somali-American community has been scapegoated for crime and terrorism, having been publicly berated by Donald Trump and specifically targeted in the president’s failed attempt at banning immigration from seven Muslim-majority countries. Even though Minneapolis’ LGBTQ community is large and visible, many of the individuals interviewed for this piece say it has largely met them with hostility – an extension of the overt racism, xenophobia and Islamophobia boiling in the US at large.

When asked about LGBTQ Somali-Americans becoming further integrated with Minnesota’s larger LGBTQ community, Michelle, a 29-year-old Somali gay woman who came to Minnesota seven years ago, said: “I don’t really foresee that happening in this country. Especially during this administration. There’s a hate already being formed. I could see all LGBT people coming together, but at some point that privilege comes out. If [African Americans] can’t even [be accepted], why do you think that LGBT Somalis and East Africans can?”

“Now that I’m older, I’m seeing how toxic it is to be Somali, to be black, to be Muslim and an immigrant in America,” Hassan said. “Oftentimes, being accepted by the Somali community for my queer identity is something that falls much lower on the hierarchy for me. I’m worried about family members who have [immigration] status issues, who are at risk of deportation, who are harassed by the criminal justice system.”

“We have now a situation that tells us that we are not American, overtly,” said Hussein, a 24-year-old gay Somali-American man. Like many of the individuals interviewed, Hussein has been involved in recent demonstrations supporting Somali, Muslim and immigrant communities. He said he was recently detained – twice – by US Customs at the airport, despite having no criminal record. “But I have found that, in the current context, I have to minimize my LGBTQ identity to show up as a Somali Muslim.”

Even so, the individuals interviewed for this piece are still critical of the anti-LGBTQ views many in their Somali-American community hold. But they reject the idea that their hardships in the Somali-American community be used to legitimize anti-black, anti-Muslim and anti-immigrant views.

“In Somalia, [gay people] only exist in social media, not in real life,” said Ali, a 28-year-old gay Somali-American man. He came to Minneapolis several years ago with his parents, who do not know he is gay and routinely pressure him to get married. “I don’t know what I’m going to do. I don’t think I can have that conversation with them because of how they view homosexual people. I don’t want to go through that struggle.”

“It’s really hard to live in a society you belong to, but people don’t accept you just because the way you are,” Michelle said. She came out after starting college in Minnesota. “I knew what I was getting into, but I didn’t give a damn about it. I didn’t want to go back to those years when I struggled and when I used to have a big problem of talking about it and hiding who I am. It’s like knowing the house is burning but you’re going to fly into the fire.”

She added: “I lost some friends of mine because of that.”

“[Homophobia] is deeply woven into our culture, and it’s deeply woven into contemporary interpretations of Islam,” Hassan said. “At the same time that Islam is a deeply homophobic religion, there is an incredible amount of community and connectedness that it helps facilitate. Ramadan, for example, is something that brings people together – Eid, the prayer, all the different things that come with being Muslim. I know it might be kind of hard to interpret, but if I believed in God a little bit more, I think that homophobia, for me, would be a small enough price to pay to still be a part of that community.”

“In the West, we have been seeing an uprising of masjids [mosque] that are really inclusive,” Hussein said. “I think we will see much more support for LGBTQ Muslims, Somalis in particular.”

Perhaps it is that underlying pull of community that has allowed them to find strength in each other. After Hassan’s friend self-immolated in 2013, many LGBTQ Somali-Americans began to informally and quietly organize. They have potlucks, group outings, shared apartments. “It’s been amazing,” Hassan said. “It’s a community, I feel like I can be the most honest version of myself.”

Michelle said: “It feels really good, it feels like we are welcome. Right away we just get along with each other. I’m really optimistic. Because whenever I talk to the youth, I get a lot of support from the youth who are not LGBT. If that’s happening to me, then it could happen to anybody.”

Hussein agreed, adding: “I find a lot of faith in the younger generation of Somalis growing up in the West. I’m not longer interested in seeking acceptance. I’m much more interested in creating community internally.”

Note: The individuals interviewed for this piece requested various levels of anonymity. Unless otherwise noted, every name is a pseudonym not intended to identify any individual. Interviewees selected their pseudonyms.