DISCRIMINATION OF WOMEN IN THE LGBTQ+ COMMUNITY
The Story
Violence and discrimination can happen to anyone at any time, but as a study by the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) National Intimate Partner and Sexual Violence Survey shows, the rates of physical violence are significantly higher in women of the LGBTQ+ community compared to heterosexual women.
The survey states that 44% of lesbians and 61% of bisexual women experience rape, physical violence and/or stalking, compared to 35% of heterosexual women.
Transgender people also face alarming rates of violence, with almost half (47%) of transgender people experiencing some form of sexual assault in their lifetime.
Although physical violence is a serious breach of human rights, LGBTQ+ people are also subjected to everyday discrimination, both in their ordinary lives and in the workplace.
For example, employers as of 2016 were 30% less likely to hire or interview a woman who was perceived as LGBTQ+ compared to one seen as heterosexual.
HATE CRIME
Additionally, 1 in 5 LGBTQ+ people have experienced a hate crime/incident due to their sexuality or gender identity in 2017, and that number rose 78% from 2013. 3 in 10 LGBT people say that they feel uncomfortable walking down certain streets due to their sexuality and/or gender identity, and more than a third says they feel anxious holding their partners hand in public due to the discrimination they face.
A respondent of the survey said:
“I had one incident where girls did not want to enter the bathroom stall I had used despite a large queue, like as if I was infected. Straight people don’t know how privileged they are to not have their love questioned, or to have romantic days out and not think about who is around you or how safe you are”