Homophobia, hate crimes, and the fear of violence, are part of the daily experience of gay men, lesbian and bi women and trans diverse communities in Southern Africa.

Two recent incidents highlighted this issue for me. The first one was a missing LGBT activist in Lesotho – he did not arrive home on Friday and was missing the entire weekend. Talking to my colleague we discussed the fact that he may have been abducted or murdered because of his open sexual orientation. Sadly he had died in a car accident but that almost came a relief, that he was not targeted because he was an openly gay man, and we did not have to deal with another act of violence because of sexuality.

The second incident was a posting in my adopted son’s face-book page – he had mention that two of his school friends, who were assumed to be gay by others, were going for an HIV test. A vitriolic discussion about “homosexuality” ensued - and one boy posted the following “I hate gay people and I think they should all be killed brutally.” This comment was not met with the outrage and disgust it deserved – seemingly it is ok to spew out such homophobic hatred amongst teenage boys.

Growing numbers of LGBT people are experiencing physical, verbal, emotional and sexual violence because of their sexual orientation and lifestyle choices – and this is becoming more and more blatant. Throughout the region the pattern is the same, and even in South Africa, with our progressive constitution, LGBT people are just not protected. In short, violence has reached epidemic proportions in our region with murders of lesbian women not uncommon: women who have sex with women are systematically targeted for abuse such as abduction and murder (1), for example, the killing of 19 year old Zoliswa Nkonyana in February 2005 by a gang of youths simply because they deemed her behaviour to be too masculine. (2) The murder of two lesbian activists, Sizakele Sigasa and Salome Massoa, on the 7th July 2007, in Meadowlands Soweto, shocked the lesbian community globally, and gave rise to the 07-07-07 campaign against hate crimes. (3) In April 2008, a prominent lesbian and former national soccer player, Eudy Simelane, was gang raped and murdered. Many other acts of violence, on un-named LGBT people go un-noticed.

The 16 days of activism does raise public awareness about violence against women, and although the responses are never enough, and action is lacking there is a sense of outrage at such violence. Violence against LGBT communities is never condemned, never highlighted – an indication of the high levels of global homophobia that cannot and should not be addressed by LGBT groups alone.

* Vicci Tallis is the HIV/AIDS Programme Manager for the Open Society Institute of Southern Africa (OSISA).

Endnotes:
1. Johnson, C.A. 2007
2. Johnson, C.A. 2007
3. http://www.jwg.org.za