In the aftermath of the Orlando terrorattack – the deadliest incident of violence against LGBT people in American history – queer Muslims felt the chill when it was announced the killer was Omar Mateen, a homophobic Muslim man who was reported to be gay.
“It was a particularly fraught moment for queer and transgender Muslims because the attacker was unfortunately a Muslim,” said San Francisco artist, writer and curator Zulfikar Ali Bhutto.
“It caused a lot of us to feel isolated by our own queer community and there was a lot of Islamophobia in the queer community,” he said. “You were either queer or Muslim, but there is the resistance to say no – we are both. We inhabit both identities.”