Sorry but as much as I support Palestine this video creator’s reasoning is similar to that of Southerners who say that because there is more southern hospitality the south is actually less racist than the rest of America. At the end of the day legal protections are what matter most, allowing your same-sex spouse to inherit your estate or make decisions on your end of life care is what matters, allowing openly gay/trans people who are terminated from employment or denied housing to sue for discrimination is what matters. If leftism is about focusing on the material we cannot forget that.

Having lived in developing countries I know the kind of “pro-gay” milieu she’s talking about where you have a populous street here and there with gay bars and you have a trans person here and there and people who are nice to you face to face but outright tell their kids you are an aberration you hope they don’t turn into. They have these kinds of gay spots everywhere from Russia to Nigeria to Hungary, where you go to a local Pride celebration at a gay bar then quickly scrub off your pride facepaint and hide your flags before your train stops at the next part of town because there are roving gangs looking for people like you to beat and zero social outrage campaigns on your behalf if you’re attacked because “why would you be gay and go to ___” is the popular sentiment with no popular countercurrent.

Hell, even when I was in Shanghai gay bars were allowed to operate and teemed with femboys but would just arbitrarily get shut down by cops on random days as a flex of power and to remind the gay people there to stay in their place. That’s how it plays out in these cultures, the “leaving people the fuck alone from centuries of precedent” that we grade on a curve and consider a fair enough consolation prize for their queer communities just because we hate western hegemony and liberal western chauvinist ignorance. Oh and of course in these cultures if you are with a partner and their parents tell them it’s time he/she gives them a grandchild and daughter/son in law, your partner will likely do it in a heartbeat and cut you off forever without notice, and everyone you disclose your heartbreak to will say you should have known the deal.

In these milieus you have people refusing to entertain the idea that gayness isn’t a choice because that’d unravel society, who are polite enough to gay people face-to-face but in their mind think that they’re just irredeemably lost adults, and that kids should never be made aware of homosexuality lest they “catch it.” It’s racism to liken all Palestinians or even just Hamas to ISIS, and claim that Palestinian people are just throwing gays off buildings, but this TikToker using words like “progressive” and “supportive” to describe the overall view of LGBT in the West Bank and Gaza is its own sort of milder whitewashing and equivocating. After all the IDF ghouls would not be blackmailing queer Palestinians left and right with the threat of outing if they weren’t betting on the high likelihood that said Palestinians feared life changing negative consequences for being outed.

I fully agree that the right to life free from danger and torment by Israel is the first and foremost worry for queer Palestinians, and I clench my fists thinking back to Israelis spying on queer Palestinians having sex and choosing that as when to shoot them, and I know Israel itself is also rife with homophobia. But still this TikTok 2nd gen college kid style messaging that the West Bank is “actually progressive” is the kind of message that sets the pro-Palestine side up for being mocked and discredited.