Maurice Tomlinson
Legal Advisor, Marginalized Groups
Maurice has been involved in HIV/AIDS and LGBTI activism in Jamaica for over 12 years. He is an Attorney-at-Law and law lecturer with current research interests in sexual rights and HIV/AIDS advocacy. He regularly writes on gay rights in Jamaican newspapers is leading an initiative of the major Jamaican NGOs (J-FLAG, JASL and CVC) working in the area of HIV/AIDS and LGBTI rights to have the country’s anti-buggery law repealed. He is also seeking to have the legal prohibition against sex-work modified to allow for consensual adult sex work. Maurice regularly attends local and international conferences where he presents on the state of Jamaica’s law and homophobia. He also conducts human rights and advocacy training sessions for Jamaican LGBTI and conceptualized Jamaica’s first ‘Walk for Tolerance’ for April 7, 2010.
Contact Maurice: Maurice_tomlinson@yahoo.com
An Interview with Maurice Tomlinson
Q: The Caribbean has the biggest epidemic outside sub-Saharan Africa. What is most compelling to you about the many parts of this?
A: The attitudes! Jamaican people have been through so much oppression and violence. We know what discrimination and intolerance can do. When it comes to this—sexuality and HIV— we have a blind spot. We should be the last people to discriminate. It boggles my mind that we can’t follow our own motto: “Out of many, one people.” We of all people!
Q: How did you connect with these issues?
A: I came to this work through friends. I had spare time. I wasn’t a lawyer yet. I was a flight attendant, bumming around, did a few different things. At that time, people were dying of AIDS, and it was very scary. I became aware that this disease can impact anybody. It respects nobody.
After studying law and being exposed to concepts of human rights, my eyes were opened and I began to see that discrimination doesn’t have to be a given.
Q: What’s the biggest thing that’s wrong? Who can fix it, and how?
A: Stigma. And it can be fixed by honest acceptance by our leaders. We as a country are ready to be dictated to by our leaders. It won’t happen overnight, but they need to do two things: speak honestly about sex, and change laws to be more tolerant. Political and religious leaders, and even musicians, who help form public opinion, have roles to play. Lyrics can hurt or help.
Leaders are not addressing stigma. They refuse out of cowardice. Such hypocrisy. We were brought here for sex – to work and breed! Now we have a disease. The disease has an intimate connection with sex. Straight sex and gay sex BOTH. Women who are infected are treated as badly as gay men.
It isn’t only about gay sex. I just want the hypocrisy to end. We need behavior change at the top. We need leaders to change. They have an impact on how people respond. They make statements, and people listen. We need honest, responsible leaders. That transcends everything.
We know leaders engage sex workers, take young lovers, and have gay sex. We have a “culture of promiscuity” that we don’t face, although we are also proud of it. Former Prime Ministers with records of promiscuity would boast of it.
Q: How do you spend your advocacy time, and what do you find most exciting?
A: I spend most of my waking (and sleeping) moments thinking or strategizing about my activism. For example, first thing in the morning I scan the papers to see what has been said about any of our vulnerable groups (MSM, sex workers, drug users); if there is something that needs responding to then I draft a letter to the press. I usually do about three or four letters per week but not all get published. There is usually at least one article per day as the issues which drive AIDS sell newspapers. Then I check my emails for what’s going on globally with similar groups around the world and if this needs to be brought to the attention of the Jamaican people I try and do so.
I then get down to my day’s work, which involves responding to emails for information about our work with especially MSMs, or planning the next public event. For example, in a few days we plan to have a protest in front of the Prime Minister’s house. We will call for decriminalization of homosexuality. The police have been supportive. Then there are training sessions on advocacy to plan, reports to write to document violations reported to us, and making sure the groups we work with are clear about the advocacy support we can provide. I also do some traveling to international conferences explaining our work.
The letters I write to Jamaican papers have a resonance. They have definitely made a difference. It has encouraged other allies who see the value of broad-based tolerance. I get letters from grandmothers who say they are proud of my letters, and want a return to a more tolerant society. It is very inspiring.
The first time I had a discussion with sex workers and brought up rights, they were stunned. It had never occurred to them that they actually have rights.
Q: You’re a lawyer and you’re an activist – you’ve been involved with this for 12 years. Which hat is more effective? Why are both these necessary, and how are they different and connected?
A: As a lawyer, when I take on a matter, it consumes me until it’s resolved. Activism is the same! I don’t see distinct roles. Everything I do is activism towards tolerance, and being a lawyer helps me with that.
Q: Do you feel as though you’re part of a move toward change in the Caribbean?
A: Having AIDS-Free World behind me is crucial. It is a known entity, well respected, and it brings an international perspective to the work in Jamaica as representative of similar circumstances elsewhere. It shows that the discrimination associated with HIV is a worldwide phenomenon.
Sex workers and other marginalized groups want to do more advocacy, and we can support them.
There is discussion in Jamaica now: what kind of society do we want? A tolerant one or a theocracy?
I think Jamaicans as a whole embrace tolerance, and our Prime Minister, Bruce Golding, who is an Adventist, represents a vocal minority and not the silent majority.
I think we are making a difference. Even Bruce Golding recently used the word “tolerance.”
When I spoke with Audrey Marks, Jamaica’s Ambassador to the United States, she was very interested. She was unaware of the legislation criminalizing male same-sex intimacy and the impact on HIV and AIDS prevention treatment and care. Advocates like us can show leaders that they won’t lose political capital by supporting us. They don’t have a clue, otherwise. They don’t know what people want.
We can influence leaders. There is nothing better we could be doing!