INTERVIEWS & PRESS

Washington Blade 
The Taliban 'will kill us one by one': LGBTQ Afghans weigh options after country's government fell

Read the article.

ABC The Drum (Australian Broadcasting Corporation) 
'No bright future': Afghan women share their concerns for a future under Taliban rule

Read & watch the piece.

NowThis News
Afghan Activist Speaks Out Amid Taliban Takeover

Watch the video.

Your Call with Rose Aguilar - KALW Public Media, Bay Area
The Plight of Afghan Refugees: Who is Leaving, Where Are They Going & How We Can Support Them?

Listen to the show. 

BBC News
'Bacha bazi' outrage after pandemic takes play to the small screen​​

Read the article.
The musical is not only an orientalist depiction of Afghans as a whole, but it is also painfully damaging to the queer and trans Afghans...queer and trans Afghans are tired of the white gaze into their lives and experiences. They rather tell their own stories, in their own voices and with their own imaginations for a queer future."

​The Conversation
Suicide of Egyptian activist Sarah Hegazi exposes the
​‘freedom and violence’ of LGBTQ Muslims in exile

Read the article.
A queer suicide during Pride, a month dedicated to celebrating LGBTQ lives and resistance, is a painful thing to process, made harder by the coronavirus lockdown. For queer and trans Muslims in isolation, separated from their chosen communities in what may or may not be accepting family homes, mourning Hegazi’s death has been a lonely, even secretive, process."

​MPR News with Kerri Miller
Friday round table: Muslim Americans react to 'The Big Sick'

Listen to the Friday round table with Kerri Miller.
I felt really sick watching it," said Qais Munhazim, director of the Gender and Sexuality Center at the University of Minnesota. Munhazim took issue with a scene in the movie where Nanjiani's character burns a pile of photographs of eligible Pakistani women his mother has tried to set up with and presents the ashes to Emily. "That is such a painful scene to watch knowing that there's a lot of domestic violence that goes around the world... and [women] have been burned, they have burned themselves to free themselves from a lot of domestic violence."

KFAI
The Invisible: Queer Muslim Voices

Listen to the show, hosted by Qais Munhazim.

Minnesota Daily
QueerX lecture covers toxic masculinity and war

Read about the lecture.
Masculinities [have] been ... looked into as something stiff, that every man has it and it’s only one form,” said Munhazim. Instead, he said “[masculinity] shifts with space, with time, with context.” 

In his lecture, Munhazim argued there are forms of masculinity that are much healthier than the stereotype, and masculinity should be realized as combating systems of power, oppression and misogyny. Males often see discussions of masculinity “as an attack on the entire identity of men or men as a whole,” he said. “My argument is that not all masculinities are toxic. There are healthy masculinities.”

BuzzFeed News
It’s Pride. It’s Ramadan. And It Still Isn’t Easy To Be An LGBT Muslim

Read about the Iftar for Love.
It was overwhelming...I’m still processing it. Of course, there were moments that I was fearful that anybody could walk in and start shooting, but at the same time, I just wanted to enjoy every single moment.”

Star Tribune 
More than 2,000 join pro-refugee, pro-immigrant march in Minneapolis
Read about the Walk of Love. 
Qais Munhazim, an Afghan refugee and doctoral student at the U, read aloud a message to his mother, whom he has not seen in five years. “Mom, I’m scared to sleep ... I’m scared of losing you,” said Munhazim, who missed his father’s funeral for fear of not being able to re-enter America with his student visa."

Newsweek
AFTER THE ORLANDO SHOOTING, CONFUSION AND ISOLATION FOR SOME GAY AMERICAN MUSLIMS
Read about the reactions.
The moment I introduced myself to someone who is also part of the (LGBT) community, she asked me what my nationality is and I said I am Afghan," said Munhazim, a doctoral political science student at the university, on Tuesday.
​
"Immediately her answer was, 'this is not the right time or place for you.' I went there trying to be among my own community, to grieve together with them. Even my grieving was questioned because of my identity."

MinnPost
Minneapolis Afghan man fights misconceptions about his homeland
Read about the project.
Since arriving in Minneapolis, Munhazim said, he has faced similar questions on almost a daily basis. “There is a huge disconnect between the U.S. and Afghanistan,” said Munhazim, an international student who earned his bachelor’s degree in political science in 2012 and is now pursuing a Ph.D. in international security and political Islam. “All [that Americans] see is Afghans in the news, which portrays us in a very dark light: suicide bombers, savages, warlords, poor and uneducated.”