Nigerian Men and Homophobia

In my experience of interacting of Nigerian men, I've discovered that one common ground that most (read: 100%) of them share is their views on gay men. I've polled both ends of the spectrum and found that whether the man was raised in the trenches of Nigeria, or he was raised abroad and otherwise considers himself to be open minded, when it comes to the topic of gay men, they all think along very similar lines. In summary: Very deep rooted homophobia.
What I've found pretty interesting is how lesbian women get a pass and these men aren't as averse to the idea of two women together...but a man and man? God forbid! Even the Lucifers amongst us will bust out their moral compass on this matter.

A while ago, I was discussing the gay people topic with some folks and one of the guys said that people like Bobrisky should be definitely be imprisoned because they are sending the wrong message to young men. He then added that "homosexuality is not part of the Nigerian culture and values", to which I scoffed and asked what exactly the Nigerian culture and values are. I mean, there's old ass men marrying underage girls, a lot of men and women who sleep around for money, plenty embezzlement and corruption in the system, etc, so I highly doubt that gay people are any threat to the so-called Nigerian culture and values when there's bigger fish to be fried. How is a man who chooses to date another man a part of Nigeria's problem? Chileee, the thing pass me abeg.
Another man in the group stated that no gay man would ever be allowed to visit his home (but please note that lesbians absolutely got a pass). He then gave a ridiculous recount of when he worked in Nigeria as a supervisor, some gay dude came to the office to visit one of his subordinates and he walked the man out of the office and told him never to come back. When the subordinate asked him why he did such a thing, he told her to shut up and face her work or else she would get written up. Brethren, I was speechless.

What really baffles me about the Nigerian man's view on homosexuality is how hypocritical it always is. Ninjas who are not even prepped and primed to see the Kingdom of Heaven instantly start to preach and quote scripture whenever whenever the topic comes up. As I've asked a lot of people, "if you are out here fornicating. What makes you better than them?". And one man's response? "In my book, fornication is not a sin because sex between a man and a woman is natural". I ain't eem have a response for that one. I no fit shout.

Seeing that pretty much all the men I know want to choke every time homosexuality is mentioned, the question that I always pose to them is...how would you react if you found out that your son is gay? The varying responses always always go like these:
"God forbid, that will never be my portion" 
"Then from that point, he is no longer my son"
"What? I will send him to Nigeria so that they can pray the gayness out of him"
"My son ke? I will drop him in a whorehouse for 2 months so that those women can cure him of being gay"
etc etc

I tell you that absolutely none of them wants to entertain the with the idea that hey, this could happen. And I get it to an extent. I'm sure that as a Nigerian parent to a gay individual, life will probably be hard because no matter how open minded and loving you are, you still have to deal with the opinions of Nigerian society and try to protect your child from any backlash. But still, there are Nigerian gay men in our midst...some of who were probably taken to MFM for prayers and then pressured to get married because their parents hoped that prayers and marriage would cure their sexual orientation. We all know how stories like that end...

Sha, after all the outrage and "chillaligans" ontop this matter, according to what I hear, there are still plenty gay/bi-sexual men roaming around Nigeria. I'm sure they are not sleeping with themselves. So much for our so-called culture and values.

And that is all she said.