Gay rights in venezuela
The LGBTIQ+ Community Still Repressed in Venezuela
- by Humberto Marquez (caracas)
- Inter Press Service
CARACAS, Mar 30 (IPS) - The vulnerability and struggles of the LGBTIQ+ community in Venezuela were once again highlighted when the Supreme Court finally annulled the military code statute that punished, with one to three years in prison, members of the military who committed " acts against nature.”
The Constitutional Chamber of the Supreme Court dominated that the statute, in force since the last century, "is contrary to the fundamental postulate of progressivity in terms of guaranteeing human rights," and also "lacks sufficient legal clarity and precision with regard to the manner it was intended to punish.”
The statute, in the Code of Military Justice, was the only one that still punished homosexuality with jail in Venezuela, and it was overturned on Feb.
However, "in Venezuela LGBTIQ+ people (lesbians, gays, bisexuals, transsexuals, intersex, queers and others) must still fight for the right to identity, to equal marriage, to non-discrimination in education, healthcare
Last week the Executive Secretary of the opposition coalition Mesa de la Unidad, Chuo Torrealba caused a kerfuffle within the conflict when he suggested that marriage equality was a “first world” issue and would not be a legislative priority given the current crisis. This generated an immediate response from Venezuela’s transgender opposition deputy Tamara Adrián, whose recent election has generated considerable expectations regarding an advance on this issue. Adrian responded that Torrealba was not a deputy and did not set the legislative agenda. The issue lit up social media over the weekend.
Javier Corrales is a leading Venezuela scholar as well as a leading analyst of the struggle for LGBTQ rights in Latin America, coediting in The Politics of Sexuality in Latin America: A Reader on Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Rights. Over the weekend he agreed to do an email interview on the issues surrounding the push for marriage equality in Venezuela.
In your research you have looked at marriage equality around the region and the quite different outcomes we have seen betw Venezuela is under a dictatorship, and this authoritarian context has severely affected the rights of LGBTIQ people and the ability of civil culture to operate freely. The erosion of democratic institutions and the rule of law has enabled the government to impose increasing restrictions on civic cosmos, including harassment and criminalization of organizations working on human rights and equality. LGBTIQ people carry on to face systemic discrimination, and there are no national laws recognizing lgbtq+ partnerships, protecting against discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender identity, or allowing for legal gender recognition. In July , 33 men were arbitrarily detained at the Avalon Club in Valencia and charged with “indecent behavior,” a case that sparked national and international condemnation for its homophobic underpinnings. This event reflects the broader pattern of exclusion, abuse, and state-sanctioned stigma that LGBTIQ individuals continue to encounter in Venezuela. *Outright investigate indicates that the bodily autonomy of intersex people is not re It was an otherwise ordinary evening at the Avalon Club, a bar and sauna popular with the LGBTQ community in Valencia, Venezuela’s third-largest city. Music was playing, drinks were flowing and guests were enjoying the accommodations, which included a restaurant, smoking room and massage parlour. But that evening, on July 23, police would burst into the club, propelling the venue and its patrons into the national spotlight — and sparking questions about LGBTQ discrimination in Venezuela. Patrons would later recount how the police arrived shouting, “Hands up!” “I was having a sip with some of my optimal friends,” one guest, Ivan Valera, later told local media. “I thought it was a joke.” But the officers proceeded to rotund up the 33 men in the establi Venezuela
Mass arrest at LGBTQ club in Venezuela prompts outcry over discrimination
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