As in the feminist movement, this year there has been more than one dissent in the LGTBI collective, but all of them have been erased at the stroke of a pen in the last few weeks.
The reason is none other than the “fear of losing rights achieved with great effort and over decades of struggle and that they make us invisible, puts us back in the closet,” explains Rubén López, founder of the Observatory against LGTBIphobia. The latest political events that have occurred and after the deployment of a large canvas of the far-right formation Vox “in which it makes it very clear that the LGTBI movement is a political objective”, the organizers of the central demonstration of Madrid Pride next Saturday have changed its motto, which has gone from focusing on diverse families (“Embracing family diversity: equal rights”) to the more direct and forceful: “For our lives, our rights. With pride”.
Always crowded, the demonstration on Saturday is expected to be “massive and massive,” say the organizers, the State Federation of Lesbians, Gays, Trans, Bisexuals, Intersexuals and more (FELGTBI) and the Madrid collective COGAM. “It always is, but this year is different because there is fear and fear in the air, but also a lot of indignation and desire to fight against the involutionist movement that is spreading throughout Spain,” they explain from COGAM. And they remember the words of the activist Pedro Zerolo: “Rights are conquered, enjoyed and defended.”
A regressive movement” that they had been warning about for a little over five years and that translates into an increase in hate crimes based on sexual orientation and gender. According to the latest report prepared by the Ministry of the Interior, these specific crimes against the LGTBI collective have increased between 2020 and 2021 by 68.5%, reaching almost half a thousand (466 complaints and 530 victims). And that is just the tip of the iceberg, because the vast majority of taunts, threats and even physical attacks do not reach the police stations because “the stigma still weighs heavily.”
A clear example of this is that, according to data from the Ministry of the Interior, Madrid was the community with the second most hate crimes, after Catalonia (101), with 70 cases. However, according to the Observatory against LGBTIphobia, there were 191 different incidents in the Community of Madrid in 2021, which left at least 211 victims.
The vast majority of these crimes take place on public roads and, sometimes, in front of many people who decide not to intervene (for example, an assault on the Barcelona metro committed in mid-June by a man against a trans woman recorded and broadcast on social networks).
According to the Ministry of the Interior, 75% of the victims are men, while the attacks on women are more testimonial. “They are more afraid of showing themselves on public roads because they are more afraid of rejection and attacks,” they explain from COGAM.
Of the total number of victims (530), there were 31 minors. Contrary to what happens in the global data, in the age group of those who have not reached 18 years of age, the majority of the victims are women (24).
Most of the victims are between 26 and 40 years old, followed by those between 18 and 25. The same happens with the aggressors. 36 aggressors had not turned 18.
It is very worrying, not only about the increase in attacks, but also that those who carry them out are young. In fact, the community with the third most cases of hate crime, the Basque Country, published a survey a few weeks ago in which it indicated that in 2022, 13.8% of people between the ages of 15 and 29 reported having lived in first person a situation in which they had felt discriminated against because of their sexual orientation or their sexual identity.
And the hate crimes that are being committed on social networks are also very worrying. According to the Ministry of the Interior, they have increased by 87.5% in one year.
Along these lines, the report Hate Speech and LGTBIQ Pride in digital conversation, prepared by LLYC within the framework of Pride 2023, indicates that Spain is one of the countries with the highest percentage of promoting conversation on social networks about this group (bordering on the 60% on average in the last four years). However, hate messages are gaining ground. Its volume has increased by almost 132% between 2019 and 2022. In contrast, supportive tweets have fallen by 15.85%. That means that the difference between the promoter and the detractor conversation has been reduced to a minimum last year, 53.5% compared to 43.5%.
