Documentary Film- Transgender: Pakistan’s Open Secret

Introduction

Similar to communities in other nations where such sexual orientation and identification are not yet fully accepted by society, the transgender community in Pakistan faces numerous difficulties.

Challenges Faced by the Transgender Community in Pakistan

The majority of gay guys in this country consider themselves to be women. For a long time, the community has branded transgender insults and hurtful names like queer, tranny and faggot, and to a certain degree, some of the people in this group have become immune to the insults. Being an Islamic country, transgender and those who engage in sexual pleasures between the same gender are viewed as outcasts, and this kind of intimate relationship is punishable by death.

Families and sexually straight friends have abandoned them, and the only people they can identify as friends are their fellow gay people and their abuse and manipulative gurus. The gurus buy transgender, provide them food and water, and in return, the novices have to engage in prostitution to raise money and occasionally pay their buyers.

Negligence and Abuse by Gurus

Most of the gurus do not care whether their clients abuse their novices through gang rapes and beating, and often take pleasure when they see the beginners cry due to the pain and torture they go through when servicing their clients.

Sometime back, the Supreme Court acknowledged transgender and ordered that they are provided with Identity Card. However, the relevant authorities took no initiative to fulfill the order, making transgender suffer identity crisis since they can only be recognized by the names their parents gave them during birth but not who they identify to be. To a great surprise, some of the high-profile government officials and TV personalities who condemn and deny transgender their rights are their sexual clients.

Lack of Employment Opportunities

In Pakistan, getting a respectable job is next to impossible as most of the government ministries do not accept them. Until recently, the tax collection ministry employed them, and the result was impressively positive as tax generation increased to higher levels. Although the lives of some transgender employed as tax collectors have changed, the rest continue to suffer under prostitution, poverty, and the hands of their gurus. The government does not offer any help to these people in case they are abused since they claim that those vices are a norm in their line of work of prostitution and street begging.

Reaction and Conclusion

It is quite disheartening to see the manner in which transgender are mistreated and stereotyped in Pakistan. What is seen in this country is precisely the same situation in other countries across the planet. It is high time that humanity accepts each other for who they are and acknowledge that denying another their rights makes the world an unsafe and risky place for every inhabitant.

Most of the people who sexually use and abuse transgender have spouses, hence increasing the chances of contracting HIV/AIDS with transgender who would instead engage in prostitution than die of hunger, and the world denies them equal opportunities. Therefore, what the government fails to see is the bigger picture; risking the lives of many citizens by denying equal transgender chances and decent job opportunities. There is nothing to lose by allowing people to be who they are as long as they do not infringe on the rights of other people in the country.

Work Cited

Real Stories. “The Transgenders: Pakistan’s Open Secret (LGBT Documentary) - Real Stories.” 2016, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cvehhXaFh8U.