Framing their government as "conservative authoritarian nightmare" follows the imperialist narrative. It's a progressive nationalist country resisting imperialism, they would be thrown backwards with regime-change. It's not about binaries, but about forces at play.

[–] Warl0k3@lemmy.world 0 points 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago) (1 children)

Absolutely! It's not about binaries, and I'm not and never have been advocating for a regime change.

You yourself have described them as socially conservative:

their social conservativism isn’t intrinsic to being Yemeni but is a consequence of nationalist resistance to imperialism

And I continue to agree - and the reality is that right now, as a consequence of the imperialist system they're forced to exist within, they are a socially conservative government that supports authoritarian actions as a consequence of outside pressures. I don't think either of us think they intrinsically are that way, but they are that way right now - and the result is a situation I am absolutely comfortable describing as a "nightmare" for queer people to live within.

I don't think that every aspect of Yemen is a nightmare, nor that it is a nightmare for every Yemeni citizen. But it is for some of them, and carrying that through as a description since the originating topic was based on the plight of queer yemeni is not particularly unreasonable.

[–] Cowbee@lemmy.ml 5 points 5 months ago

For the queer Yemeni, liberation comes from opposing imperialism first and foremost. This is clear, and is why I take issue with framing the government as a reactionary nightmare. Rather, in resisting imperialism, it's more common for social progress to accelerate. Yemen is one of the poorest countries in the world, and trying to frame it as an "authoritarian nightmare" just cedes the narrative to imperialists.

Yemen is progressive in the global context, and socially has a long way to go, but in that it already fights imperialism, is capable of progressing socially more expediently. This is the problem with trying to use moralistic terminology and loaded phrases like "authoritarian nightmare," it makes it seem like Yemen needs outside intervention to progress, rather than internal progress.