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Bangladesh gets its first ever lesbian comic strip. Read on...
Meet Dhee, a curly-haired middle-class Bangladeshi girl who loves to ride her bicycle and falls in love with a girl in her class. While there are many such Dhees among us, this comic character has taken birth to address sexuality and gender-based taboos in a society that often paints LGBTs (lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender) as no equals of humans.
Dhee in Bangla means wisdom.
#ProjectDhee is the brainchild of Boys of Bangladesh (BoB), the country's oldest running and largest network of self-identified Bangladeshi gay men. It was launched at Dhaka's British Council.
But what is more surprising is Dhee being born in a country that has become notorious for treating its secular bloggers with machetes -- four liberal bloggers have been murdered by machete-wielding extremists this year -- and where homosexuality is a crime punishable by a maximum life term, although prosecutions are rare.
Bangladesh is a socially conservative, Muslim-majority nation. Dhee is the country's first ever lesbian cartoon character.
The comic strips are designed as 10 individual flash cars rather than a regular comic book. On the backside of each strip there are general descriptions about heteronormativity, homosexuality, sexuality and patriarchy to educate people. These will be distributed at workshops, seminars and conferences across the country.
Transgender community was recognised as a 'third gender' in 2013 in Bangladesh. Last year, Roopbaan, the country's first magazine for gay men was also launched with little opposition. Whether Dhee will be able to give the LGBT community the freedom and courage to come out, only time will tell. But the sensitivity with which the character is given a new life certainly gives us some hope.
Sample the group's other creative works that spread gender awareness in a simple-yet-effective way:
The above post reads: "Sir, I have been feeling very homosexual since last night, please give me leave for two days." It smartly replaces the word 'sick' for 'homosexual'. This shows the stigma that homosexuals face in society.
Photographs: #ProjectDhee/Facebook
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