Sometime back I remember a Twitter post asking “why is it that only countries with White people are passing same-sex marriage into law?” That question was from a gay racist.

That question has bothered me ever since.

If one were to think of homo sapiens along skin color lines, most of the progress we’ve seen on LGBT rights have taken place in countries which are predominately White and Christian, with the two exceptions of South Africa (predominately Black and Christian) and Israel (predominately White and Jewish).

It is rather difficult to live as an openly-LGBT person in most of Africa or in the Caribbean. Sodomy laws abound in these parts, as do highly-patriarchal Abrahamic religions and superstitious beliefs about sex and STDs.

Someday, I’d like to go to a Barbados which doesn’t have sodomy laws and welcomes LGBT African-American tourists to their annual Season of Emancipation. Someday I’d like to go as an openly-gay man to Trinidad and Tobago for Carnival. Someday I’d like to go to the Bahamas without fear for Junkanoo.

Someday, if I am married, I’d like to visit Elmina Castle with my husband and look out of the “door of no return” without fear of violence from folks nearby, but with tears in our eyes. I’d like for us to experience the sights and sounds of Lagos together without homophobic mob violence lurking around us. I’d like for us to go to Kuchu Pride in Kampala in a time when none of the attendees need to wear rainbow masks.

Id like to visit a Mr. Gay Africa contest in Windhoek or a drag show in Harare. I’d go to Soweto Pride in a time when Black lesbians feel much more safe and are not being targeted for corrective rape and murder by cishet men.

This vision of a more queer-welcoming African civilization is something I hope will become a reality in my lifetime.