Were Joan Didion & bell hooks Homophobic? Is New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani?

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This photo is called “bell hooks in love”. According to The Marginlian, it’s from the 1960s (she turned 18 in 1970…so young to not be with us any longer). bell hooks’ estate holds the copyright on the photo, and they have not shared the name of the original photographer.

Mayor of New York and Leftist America’s latest darling and hero Zohran Mamdani holds dual citizenship in the United States and his birthplace, Uganda. This is important to note: it’s an active decision he made when he chose to retain his Ugandan citizenship instead of renouncing it to become solely a U.S. citizen.

In August 1972, Ugandan dictator Idi Amin gave Indians in Uganda (such as Zohran’s dad Mahmood Mamdani) 90 days to leave the country. Indians had been brought to Uganda as migrant laborers, working to build Ugandan railways.

That’s small potatoes, compared to Uganda’s current attitude toward LGBTQIA+ people. The country has some of the harshest anti-LGBTQIA+ laws in the world. In 2023, President Yoweri Museveni signed into law Anti-Homosexuality Act (AHA). The original 2023 law imposes life imprisonment for homosexuality and includes the death penalty for what is called aggravated homosexuality. It was changed in 2024. The law included life imprisonment for consensual same-sex acts/behavior, and up to twenty years in prison for promotion of homosexuality. Promotion of homosexuality operating an organization, funding activities, or advocating for LGBTQIA+ rights can face up to 20 years in prison. Landlords who knowingly rent to LGBTQIA+ individuals face up to 10 years in prison, and individuals who fail to report witnessed same-sex acts face up to five years in prison, motivating ordinary citizens to become vigilantes in reporting LGBTQI+ people.

If I was in Uganda, I’d be in prison. Even if I wasn’t caught in a consensual sexual act, I’d certainly be imprisoned for this Substack.

In other words, I will never set foot on Ugandan soil. Homosexuality is illegal in about 66 countries, which are primarily concentrated in Africa and the Middle East. Same-sex marriage is only legal in 38 countries in the world1. Growing up in a progressive city…there is part of me that cannot quite believe this is the reality that I must live with. There’s a part of me that does not want to believe that I’d be this unsafe for wholly consensual activities that harm no one. Because I’m immigrating out of the U.S., I am painfully aware of this reality, too, and I keep going back to the maps that make me more aware than ever.

It is not Mamdani’s reality. He held his multi-day wedding ceremony in Uganda, on his family’s multi-acre estate. He held another nikkah (Islamic wedding vows) in Dubai (city), another place that has criminalized LGBTQIA+ people. UAE officials have looked through private messages and digital activity and used it against LGBTQIA+ people. They have gone so far as to detain trans people for merely passing through their airports.

Mamdani has proudly smiled his unrealistically wide grin through pride month, claiming allyship. He has done so with the support of some gay men who head LGBTQIA+ organizations, who cite his pro-LGBTQIA+ voting record. That voting record is not a surprise; after all, he ran as a progressive, socialist candidate. His personal actions, though, betray his lack of genuine care or allyship.

He wore that same cheesy grin that helped make him so adored as he posed with one of architects and promoters of the Anti-Homosexuality Act (AHA), First Deputy Prime Minister Rebecca Kadaga. Instead of apologizing sincerely, he offered ignorance as his defense.

While Mamdani has offered no comment on the criminalization of LGBTQIA+ in Uganda, though he has offered constant commentary on something he has no ability to affect; the situation in Palestine/Gaza. The former does not affect his ascent to power nor his adoration, the latter does.

I am instantly suspicious of anyone who fits the young male genius archetype, as Mamdani does. Someone unproven, without a track record of work or success, who is upheld for his potential, and turned into hero before he undertaken actions which are heroic. Forgoing a salary raise is hardly that when he’s an only child of a family that has the kind of wealth that allows for such an expensive series of wedding ceremonies. And history and industry (TECH!! Mark Zuckerberg and Sam Altman!! And the tech-rapists!!) are littered with examples of the harms these men have caused.

Mamdani began his ascent into politics in 2019. He is also a millennial. I hold Mamdani to the standards of our times and generation. By those standards, he is a rank hypocrite and opportunist. This should not come as a surprise; to success in politics often requires hypocrisy. It is why making heroes and darlings of men like him is such a poor choice.

Though that he grins through LGBTQIA+ pride related photo opportunities and press releases while also proudly posing with an architect of a law to kill and imprison LGBTQIA+ in a country he’s a citizen of makes him a rank hypocrite2 regardless of the values of the era and generation.

Joan Didion was of the Silent Generation. bell hooks is of the generation after, a boomer. While people defend Mamdani, that these two women of past generations were and are questioned as being homophobic isn’t a surprise. There’s this reddit post in which someone who read Feminism is for Everybody took away from it was “kinda homophobic”, that she was “shocked”, and “really appalled” by this. It’s not the first time hooks has been called out.

What I’m inquiring into is whether or not these criticisms are warranted and valid, or are these women being held to an unduly high standard by other women. Because the accusations of homophobia are specifically focused on whether or not these women are lesbian phobic.