Proudly atheist since the age of 15, André Gagnon has been active in the Quebec gay and lesbian community since 1992. After founding in 1994 a gay and lesbian student paper Homo Sapiens at the University of Quebec at Montreal (UQÀM), he continued to pursue gay and lesbian journalism upon leaving university, publishing the magazine Être beginning in 1998, then 2B Magazine in 2002, both of which he continues to edit. In 2008, he also acquired the longest running gay publications in Quebec, magazine RG and Guide gai du Québec.
In addition to his professional activities, André organized the first gay pride parades in the capital, Quebec City, from 2002 to 2004 as well as the most recent convention of the GBLT community in that city in 2004. This convention set in motion the community and governmental processes leading to the adoption of a national policy against homophobia, which the Quebec Minister of Justice announced in 2009.
André Gagnon at the podium, 2010-10-03
Photograph : R. Thain
André Gagnon at the podium, 2010-10-03
Photograph : F. Ward
While throughout the world homosexuality is no longer considered a mental illness and homosexual acts have been decriminalized in most countries, the mainstream of the three great monotheisms, which originated in the Middle East, are today the principal bastions of homophobia in the world.
Today seven states, all Islamic, impose the death penality for crimes "against nature" while some 60 states, mostly Islamic as well, criminalize homosexuality. In the west, the burning stakes of the Inquisition have been extinguished for centuries, but the condemnation of homosexuality remains in most Christian churches. In Europe, churches, mainly Catholic and Orthodox, are still powerful as in eastern Europe, Italy and Ireland, and despite the decriminalization of homosexuality, the fundamental rights of gays, lesbians and bisexuals continue to be trodden underfoot in the name of "traditional religious values." In North America, both in Canada and the USA, the religious right leads a fierce counter-offensive to resist the advance of rights for homosexuals and bisexuals.
The religions which took root in agrarian civilisations have historically promoted the patriarcal nuclear family, the new basic cell of a humanity no longer nomadic. Defenders of this new sexual and social order, the Jewish, Christian and Muslim monotheisms founded their condemnation of homosexuality and their homophobic practices and dictates on the myth of the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah. Proclaiming themselves religions of peace, they have for centuries spread hatred of any form of sexuality other than reproduction within the patriarcal nuclear family. The rights of gays, lesbians and bisexuals and the fight against homophobia, recognized by the Government of Quebec as a necessity in December 2009, cannot advance without being liberated from these religious dogmas.