Anti-gay violence

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This article or paragraph presents the situation in Germany . Help us to describe the situation in other countries.

As anti-gay violence is violence , made up, for various reasons, targeted against real or perceived gay judge.

In addition to physical violence, especially bodily harm , this also includes the very related topics of threats , extortion and robbery with an anti-gay background and specific insults as "verbal violence ", which is often also part of bullying . Anti-gay violence counts as hate crime , in which the victim is deliberately chosen based on the criterion of real or presumed belonging to a social group and the crime is thereby (intentionally or unintentionally) directed against the selected group as a whole. Due to the selection criterion, the act can have special effects on the person directly affected; it has an intimidating effect on the group that can affect the mental health of the group members, which can even affect members of other minorities. Overall, gays are more likely to be victims of violence than the population average.

frequency

A report on discrimination against gays showed the following frequencies (100% correspond to all types of discrimination mentioned): insult (§185 StGB) 30%, simple and dangerous bodily harm 21% (StGB §223), coercion and threat 17% (§241 and §240 StGB). If the victim and the perpetrator are known, it can lead to bullying / defamation (§186 StGB). Theft and robbery can also be anti-gay violence.

The victims

The circle of victims

Some believe that victims must have acted conspicuously. But it is not necessary to be a victim of anti-gay violence. You don't even have to be gay. It is enough to be considered homosexual , often by appearance or place of residence, to be with lesbians or gays or even to be in a relationship with a homosexual. Many acts are not immediately classified as anti-gay acts of violence or not at all.

  • Straight Mike, freshly moved to South Boston, and his roommate Peter were beaten up by about ten local teenagers on their way home from a pub four blocks from their house in 1994 for no apparent reason and without saying a word. They could not help identify the perpetrators. A local family friend, whose father and brother are with the police, asked for advice, had heard of the incident. He had an idea who might be behind it and advised to leave it alone. Mike later learned from two different local sources that they had been thought to be gay. The father of a youth is a police officer. Since Mike and Peter apparently don't want to do anything else and the youngsters now know that they are straight, they have nothing to fear. The two soon moved away anyway.
  • A straight cross-country runner from a California high school was attacked by a school football player in 1996 because the former's coach, Eric Anderson , was openly gay - a rarity at the time. The police did nothing further through their line of argument “that's just the way the boys are”. For Anderson this was the reason to develop into one of the leading academics in the field of homophobia and sports.
  • In an attack with a nail bomb by neo-Nazi David Copeland in Old Compton Street in London's gay and lesbian district Soho on April 30, 1999, Andrea Dykes, who was four months pregnant, died in the trendy pub Admiral Duncan and her husband was seriously injured. Also, her friends and hosts for the evening, Nick Moore and John Light, the child's godfather, died. A total of 79 people were injured, some seriously, on the busy street.
  • In the early morning of July 12, 2008, a 41-year-old heterosexual father of two cycled with two companions through the Volkspark Friedrichshain , which is also used by MSM for cruising . He was stopped by a group of youths, dragged from his bike and beaten, causing bruises and a double broken jaw. Shortly beforehand, the young people had walked through the bushes with shouts like “gay swine” and tried to stop another cyclist who, however, was able to drive past due to his energetic demeanor.

Behavior of victims

Some gays do not report the perpetrators after acts of violence. In 1994, for example, a 19-year-old confessed to having committed 400 crimes against gay men, many of which had not been reported. Many victims avoid gay counseling centers for fear that they could be recognized by gay haters and attacked again with violence. When a complaint is made, the sexual identity is often concealed, even if the victims are certain that this was the reason for the attack. This can subsequently lead to inconsistencies in the statement, such as the withholding of important details, which in turn has negative consequences for the credibility of the victim. In an investigation in Manchester and London , the victims gave the following reasons for failing to report:

  • the incident was assessed as not serious enough, that is, relevant to the police;
  • Fear that the police will not take the incident seriously;
  • possible negative reactions from the police;
  • one did not want to reveal one's sexual orientation openly to the police for fear of possible consequences for one's own private life;
  • Fear that a police "dossier" will be created on the victim;
  • Fear of revenge or isolation;
  • the fear that one will not be believed;
  • the assumption that the police would do nothing.

Support to the victims

In Germany, there are so-called "gay attack telephones" (SÜT) in some larger cities for the victims of such acts of violence. There they receive help, support and information to cope with what they have experienced. If desired, the victims can also be accompanied to the police, the public prosecutor's office or the court. They were formed from self-help organizations and are run by them.

In 1990 the Schwule Überfalltelefon Berlin (SÜB) was founded, which still offers direct help in the Maneo project , especially in Berlin and Brandenburg. It carries out local public relations work, organizes surveys and documents anti-gay violence throughout Germany. Other positions in the working group for gay attack telephones and anti-violence projects in Germany (ASAD) are located at the LSVD Cologne, LSVD Magdeburg, LSVD Münster and the Munich Sub. In addition, there is the unbeatable / gay anti-violence project in Frankfurt and the gay attack phone at AIDS-Hilfe Düsseldorf. In 2007 there were still ambush phones in Aachen, Bielefeld, Bonn, Dortmund, Hamburg and Leipzig, some of which could be reached under the uniform local number 19228 through an initiative of the LSVD .

Due to the work of these initiatives, among other things, some police associations now have their own contact persons or a representative for same-sex lifestyles who also work internally and sensitize colleagues to the problems. In 1993, Heinz Uth became Germany's first point of contact for same-sex lifestyles (the Berlin police) .

literature

See also

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Province of Ontario, Ministry of Ontario: Crown Policy Manual. Hate Crime and Discrimination (PDF; 123 kB), attorneygeneral.jus.gov.on.ca, March 21, 2005
  2. ↑ Diane Elmore: The Psychology of Hate Crimes (PDF; 137 kB), apa.org, September 29, 2009
  3. ↑ http://www.maneo-toleranzkampagne.de/pdf/maneo-umfrage2-bericht.pdf
  4. ↑ Archive link ( Memento from October 16, 2013 in the Internet Archive )
  5. ↑ FEEDBACK: "YOU DON'T NEED TO BE GAY TO BE THE VICTIM OF A HATE CRIME." , October 19, 1998, Matthew Shepard Online Resources Archive. LATEST NEWS (Archive 3) ( Memento of the original from November 4, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.wiredstrategies.com
  6. ↑ Cyd Zeigler jr .: Moment # 37: Eric Anderson's runner attacked allegedly for coach being gay ( Memento from October 14, 2012 in the Internet Archive ), outsport.com, August 29, 2011
  7. ^ Nail bomb explosion at London pub kills two , Guardian , April 30, 1999
  8. ↑ Mark Honigsbaum, Denis Campbell, Tony Thompson, Sarah Ryle, Nicole Veash, Burhan Wazir: Bomb factory man seized as death toll rises , Guardian , May 2, 1999
  9. ^ Gay community hit by nail bomb , Guardian , May 5, 1999
  10. ↑ Jeevan Vasagar: Celebration did ended in deaths of three friends , Guardian , 1 July 2000
  11. ↑ Berlin Friedrichshain, dangerous bodily harm in the VP Friedrichshain ( memento of the original from November 24, 2015 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link has been inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , Maneo case reports of July 8, 2012, 3:30 a.m. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.maneo-fallmektiven.de
  12. ^ Greater Manchester Lesbian and Gay Policing Initiative 1999 and Metropolitan Police London 2001
  13. ↑ Noftalladressen , 2004
  14. ^ The gay attack phone ( memento of August 12, 2007 in the Internet Archive ), LSVD, copyright entry: 2001, version of September 21, 2007, accessed on September 9, 2012
  15. ↑ Fred Hasselmann: Heinz Uth, Gay Police Officer , Berliner Zeitung, November 16, 1995