
LGBT is the acronym for the term that means Lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender groups. The term was introduced in the early 1990s because referring to non-heterosexual people as gay was not representative enough and neither was it accurate. The term represents the diversity of the different sexual orientation of different identities based on their culture. Recently, a new initial has been added which is “Q” or “Queer”, but it wouldn’t be included in this research since it is focusing on older cases. Cases of violence against the LGBT community has increased over the past decade from individuals who simply do not concur with their diverse beliefs and practices; this is due to the increase of governmental legalization for such practices, meaning that some people who disagree with such practices might present their beliefs with violence (Park and Mykhalyshyn). Statistical data collected by the Federal Bureau of Investigation indicates that the LGBT encounter more attacks compared to heterosexuals relative to their various population sizes in the US. 

There is sufficient evidence that violence and bias-motivated crimes are a big problem across the United States and the entire globe. The impact is felt greatly not only because of the frequency of the crimes but also because of the effect they have on the victims, the victim’s families, their communities, and the entire society. Cases such as the violent murder of Sean Kennedy, a US transgender citizen, who once was leaving the bar, when a strange man approached him, calling him anti-gay names and beating him that later led to his death. This shows the need for national hate crimes legislations implementation (Mustanski, Brian, Rebecca, and Jae 528). The local law-enforcement agency officials were to take the case as a hate crime, but since there were no such laws against hate crimes in South Carolina at the time, the charges were reduced to involuntary manslaughter from murder and Kennedy’s assailant was sentenced to only three years in prison. 

Hate crimes or bias-motivated crimes usually occur when perpetrators of the particular crimes select the victims because of their unorthodox identity. Normally, any act of violence on any individual is tragic; therefore, the crimes based on prejudice have a bigger impact caused by the motive of the crime, which is to terrorize a group or an entire community (Euronews). The LGBT usually face violence that is also motivated by hate attitudes to their sexual orientation. It includes violence that is executed by the state in many forms, which can be; laws that subject corporal punishments for the homosexual acts, intimidation practices from members of other groups, mobbing, different forms of assaults and lynching which affects them against psychologically or physically.

Since 1991, approximately 100,000 cases have been reported on hate crime offenses to the FBI. In 2007, 1265 of the LGBT biased hate crimes cases were reported and this was a 6% increase from the previous year (Meyer). Sexual orientation ranks as a third highest motivator for the hate crimes, which is 17% of all the attacks. Lesbians of color are often victims of violent crime but they have the lowest rates of reporting the bias crimes against them. Gay men lead in most reports for the hate crime at 81%, followed by white lesbians at 71%. Gay men of color are at 61% in reporting of cases of hate crimes. A person’s multiple identities such as the race for example usually play a key role in instigating the attack and their likeliness to report them.   

Hate crimes against the LGBT community are under-reported in the United States. Some victims do not exercise their right to report hate crimes. One of the reasons is that they do not want to be labeled or identified in the police reports as members of the lesbian, bisexual, gay or transgender community. Moreover, the responding officer does not view the sexual orientation and gender identity-based hate crimes as bias-motivated (Park and Mykhalyshyn). This is usually because the responding officers are inexperienced, lack education on handling them and have their own formed bias. Most of the police departments do not include protocols for accurate reporting of the hate crimes and other bias crimes. For example, A black gay man was once tortured and shot by police officers in a department just for speaking up saying he had no business in an incidence (Meyer).

Another reason is that many of the hate crime victims usually have more than one out-group occupation position from sexual orientation, sex, gender identity, ethnicity, race, religion, disability and national origin; meaning that discrimination towards an LGBT member can be related to a specific identity in themselves, like whether being male or female and black or white and more. One example is of Kevin, a 62-year old black gay man, he has experienced violence because of his race and sexual identity. He mentions “I have experienced violence because I am black and gay” (Meyer). For this reason, hate-based attacks are viewed in much simpler terms than before. In some cases, their details are lost since the characteristics are normally grouped in general as multiple bias attacks in police reporting (Tyson). Only 72% of the sexual orientation hate crimes were reported in 2006. This means 28% of the hate crimes were not reported to the police agencies. Gender strongly implicated police mistrust and the reporting behavior of the LGBT sexual orientation hate crimes.  

Bias crime reporting responsibilities solely fall under the responding officers and the victims that are involved. The victims’ low involvement in standing against the wrong rule applying officers has made it as a habit in some departments. Furthermore, some of the Anti-violence projects launched that were run by the LGBT community were early responses to the police inaction in matters regarding violence against them (Meyer 105). The projects played an important role since they provided the victims with alternative avenues outside of the law enforcement to report the hate crimes incidences freely. An example of such a project is the National Coalition of Anti-violence program (NCAVP), which was an LGBT network of the community that encouraged victims to report the hate crime freely without fear and receive counseling. The federal hate crime reporting departments do not have or serve these offers. This means the program is responsible on LGBT hate and crimes by its own investigations with no interference of public police departments, and also deal with the effects of violence that affect the members socially and psychologically.

Some of the reasons that the actions are directed towards the LGBT community is because the assailants may be homophobic, transphobic, lesbophobia and at times influenced by the cultural, political and religious biases. The hate crimes are connected mostly by conservatives or different religious ideologies that do not approve and condemn the LGBT acts and community (Park and Mykhalyshyn). In some instances, the violence against the LGBT is often perpetrated by individuals that associate the victims such as the homosexual moral standing as weak and immoral (Nunez). Since the practice is legal in most countries in the western countries and in American, while illegal in 38 African countries, the middle east and some Asian regions (Saner), the perpetrators of violence against them perceive the acts as unpunished and therefore see fit to take action through violence. 

Outside of the western countries, many others such as countries that the dominant religion is Islam, some African countries, Asian countries except Japan and Taiwan and former communist countries such Eastern Europe and Central Asia are dangerous places and are prone to LGBT violence. This is because of their discrimination on the sexual orientations of the LGBT, which also influences discriminatory legislations in those countries and physical violence (Saner and Emine). In history, state-sanctioned homosexual’s persecutions were only limited to the gays in males then known as sodomy (Huebner, David, Gregory and Susan 1200). In the earlier period, the penalties for sodomy was ultimate death but later in the 19th century to mid-20th century, the penalty reduced to a hefty fine or a sentence in prison. Throughout the world, around 80 countries still consider homosexuality as illegal especially in areas such as the Middle East, Africa, and Central Asia. In areas such as the Caribbean, five countries still carry out the death penalties in the laws.   

In terms of individuals that participate in violence, These individuals are termed as Homophobic and have a range of negative attitudes and ill feelings towards the LGBT community. Most of the Homophobic individuals are heterosexual members and they encompass the majority. They view the LGBT in contempt and prejudice ways portraying aversion, hatred or even antipathy that at times leads to violence against the community and worse (Meyer 188). This form of violence of the Homophobic towards the LGBT is based on mainly irrational fear and is greatly related to religious beliefs and practices. The homophobia act is observable in the critical areas and hostile behavior of discriminating and rising violence based on one having a different sexual orientation from the non-heterosexual. 

There are two types of homophobia, which include institutionalized and internalized homophobia. The negative attitudes to other identifiable LGBT groups have specific names similar to homophobic such as lesbophobia and transphobia. The institutionalized homophobia examples include the religious homophobia and the state-sponsored homophobia. Some of the Assailants base their reasons for attacking the LGBT community based on their religious beliefs that are not in harmony with their practices. Christians, for example, the Old Testament contains verses interpreted as condemning the LGBT sexual relations. Catholic churches state that the LGBT acts are intrinsically disordered and are contrary to natural laws of nature and do not approve. The Islam’s Sharia Laws forbid the LGBT practices as a crime and are treated as such in nearly all the Muslim countries. Countries such as the Afghanistan treated the LGBT acts as a crime punishable by the death penalty.     

Observers have blamed the LGBT community and victims for their own attacks and attributed their public display of affection as the main cause for their attacks. Most of the reported attacks were found to happen just after the victims publicly displayed affection openly for their partner. The public display gestures were such as holding hands and kissing with no different partner from their own gender. The effect does not apply to heterosexual victims since the public display of their affection is viewed as normal and it is only blameworthy when it occurs from LGBT community. Only in certain areas such as Asian Americans are both genres blamed when they display their affection publicly and prompt the attack.

When the lesbians and gays during the time of attack made eye contact with their assailant or verbally responded to them with a question and an obscenity, the LGBT victims were blamed for those attacks more than the heterosexuals that committed the violence. The blame is attenuated in cases when the offender was found to interact socially with the victims before the altercation occurs. In such a case, observers would lay blame to the victims basing their arguments that the victims were more provocative before the attack. The verbal engagements are the cause of their attacks and therefore causing the assailant to attack with violence. Since reporting this acts would not get a great deal of attention, the assailants get encouraged to carry them out even more. 

The LGBT community is generally to blame for being attacked more than heterosexuals. The blaming behavior highly depends on the witnesses’ attitudes towards the LGBT community as a whole. During the LGBT-biased attacks, when the victims use verbal slurs increased sympathy for the victims only if the witnesses or observers have positive attitudes towards women. The group among the LGBT that hardly get sympathy is the gay men being attacked and the attackers basing their acts on race. The negative attitudes are more from the observers especially when the gay men used the verbal slurs. This shows how attitudes of the observers towards the victims also have a big role in encouraging the attacks than in the heterosexual community.  

A number of issues cause the violence against the LGBT community from the society and contributes to the violence and constant conflicts. One problem is the language which occurs when the member of the society does not use a preferred terminology viewed by the LGBT community as offensive. Some of the terminology that the society use against the LGBT community is considered offensive. The issue comes since the language is vague and ambiguous or no clear definition is given. The term ‘homosexuality’ in the past has been associated with deviance, criminal behavior and mental illness perpetuated by bias behavior. The term sexual orientation is much more preferred and encouraged when speaking about the LGBT community compared to other terms such as sexual preference or gay, lesbian and bisexual. This is because the later terms focus on the individual people rather than being pathological. 

The other problem that the member of the LGBT experience is problems of criminalization. Members of the society do have negative attitudes directed to people of the LGBT community. This is because the most member of the society hail from different backgrounds where the practice is considered illegal and even punishable trough imprisonment. Religious group’s members who the LGBT community also belong turn their back on them and in some cases, some get banished from their original society (Latest news). In some cases, members of the LGBT have been murdered due to their sexual orientation and hate crimes incidents. The member of the LGBT also come from the same society and have families and friends and therefore, in spite of their different orientation, members of the society who have lost their family and friends still are grieved.

Another issue that provokes violence and causes a big problem between the society relationship and the LGBT is that the members of the later community, the transsexuals, are stigmatized and marginalized due to their sexual orientation. The society looks down upon them and views them as targets for hate crimes. They experience harassments from society and at times even police who are meant to protect them (Duncan and Mark 28). These factors affect the mental health and well-being of the LGBT community since they cannot “come out” and confess their stand for fear of being marginalized. When they get to be isolated, they lose some of their friends and family along with the support that comes with it which causes depression and stress. 

The member of the LGBT experience barriers to proper health care whenever they seek medical attention. There have been some cases of competent nurses fearing to offer services to a member of the LGBT community for fear of contracting HIV/AIDS accidentally. This is because of the misconception of most of the LGBT community members being perceived to being victims of HIV. This fear of negative treatment has kept many of the LGBT members from seeking medical attention even in emergency cases. Organizations are not LGBT friendly and some staff is judgmental towards their community to an extent of denying them access to some of the organization’s resources. An example of such an experience is basic resources such as washroom access or cups for water in the dispensers at public organizations may be denied to the members of the LGBT.

The members of the LGBT are vulnerable and likely to be abusers of alcohol and drugs than the society in general. Higher rates of substance use have been seen in the community of LGBT heightened by the personal and mostly cultural stresses and anti-gay bias (Duncan and Mark 29). The series of discrimination experienced increased the pressure of alienation, and the depression after losing some close friends and family contributes to the reliance of bars for socialization (Los Angeles LGBT Centre). Their vulnerability leads them in some instances to substance use, which later turns to abuse. Other contributors are hostility from loved ones, bullying in schools, prejudice and embarrassing responses from professors in schools, no protection against discrimination in workplaces, sexual abuse, verbal harassment and fear of the possible physical violence they may face.      

The widespread violence against the LGBT can be prevented or controlled using many forms such as providing adequate protection against the sexual orientation and gender identity hate crimes. The hate crimes are experienced in many institutions and touch many lives beyond just the courts and law enforcement agencies. The youth may obtain support and help in their various schools and systems such as welfare and mental health institutions (Reuter and Tyson 103). Since the violence occurs in common areas such as domestic homes and community organizations, Professionals should be well trained to recognize when the incidences are bias-motivated to establish the appropriate steps in handling them. This also helps with the victims to be treated with the same care standards and respect that all people are given after experiencing violent crimes. 

Even though most people are sympathetic to hate crime victims, lesbians, transgender, and gays get blamed for their attacks. When the victims survive different severe hate crimes, those incidents go to impede their own well-being and in some cases leads to attempts of suicide, depression, drug and alcohol abuse and certain sexual risk behavior such as exposure to HIV/AIDS. These negative implications affect the society and call for the need for education and sensitivity towards the subjects of different sexual orientation hate crimes (Reuter, Tyson 105). Improving the legislature, prosecutorial and reporting efforts will warn the perpetrators that the crime is intolerable and that serious actions will be taken against them. This will support and protect the victims from the attacks and reduce significantly the violence directed to them.     

The act and practices of homosexuality are still illegal and lots of countries around the world, making the LGBT crime easier in some regions which motivates people from other regions. There is a relation between bias-motivated crimes and the minority of society, making it harder to force the laws in some communities, which affects the minorities members dangerously but there should be ways to minimize the issue.
