WashBlade.com – Elizabeth A. Perry
Editors? note: This is the second installment in a series devoted to examining the views of various religions on transgender issues. This week: the Islamic perspective.
The execution of two Iranian teens last year reportedly hanged for being gay served as a grim reminder of the Islamist regime?s policy that condones torture, even the death penalty, for gays. It might seem logical to assume that such harsh policies would also apply to transgender people, but, surprisingly, that is not necessarily the case.
Faisal Alam founder of Al-Fatiha, a gay Muslim organization located in the United States, said many Quran scholars believe that transgender individuals are ?biologically imperfect.? Alam, who is gay, said that in the early 1990s a fatwa, or religious decree, was issued to allow a university student to undergo an operation to transition from male to female.