International Day Against Homophobia

The history of this day.

In 1990 the World Health Organisation made the decision to remove homosexuality from the list of mental disorders. Therefore, May 17^th is dedicated to the fight against Homophobia, Biphobia and Transphobia. Every year people need to stand up and speak out against the challenges and urgent need to stop the violence and discrimination against the LGBTQ+ community. The council of Europe has been adamant in voicing its commitment to end homophobia and transphobia in its member states.

Some statistic for legal rights that LGBTI couples and families have in the 47 member states of the council of Europe:

28/47 – Provide some form of legal recognition for same-sex couples.

16/47 – Have same sex marriage laws.

17/47 – Allow Joint adoption.

18/47 – Allow second parent adoption.

10/47 – Provide for automatic co-parent recognition.

14/47 – Provide for medically assisted insemination for couples.

Other statistics found in an EU study:

47{6c082c8494c21a03d17f10d863ee8b06d7dc461388e432433da70d4d6afda271} of the LGBT people had been physically or sexually attacked or threatened with violence over the last year.

Only 22{6c082c8494c21a03d17f10d863ee8b06d7dc461388e432433da70d4d6afda271} of the incident were reported to the police.

60{6c082c8494c21a03d17f10d863ee8b06d7dc461388e432433da70d4d6afda271} of LQBT people have experienced negative comments or conduct at school because of their sexual orientation or gender identity.

2 out of 3 children hide their sexual orientation while at school.

1 out of 3 young adults hide their sexual orientation from their family

How the LGBTQ+ community is represented in TV shows now.

In TV shows recently there has been so much LGBTQ+ representation, which will really help young people come to terms with their sexuality and they can relate to the situation these characters are going through.

In April 2022 Netflix brought out a new show Heartstopper, adapted from the graphic novels and webcomics from author Alice Oseman. When bringing her stories to life, the show covered so many topics and challenges within the LQBTQ+ community.

Heartstopper covers topics such as coming out and coming to terms with your sexuality. In the show we see this through characters, Nick Nelson who was struggling with his sexuality and coming to terms with being Bisexual. We also see character Tara Jones coming out as a Lesbian and she starts to receive negative comments both in school and over social media. We see how she overcomes these and accepts herself.

Young adults have used the Heartstopper series as a positive light for coming to terms with and figuring out their sexuality. Some have even been using a scene from the show, where nick finally tells his mum he is Bi, to come out to their parents.

We have other shows such as Russell T Davies’ ‘It’s a Sin’, this follows the story of the 80’s AIDS crisis and the hard-hitting truth of how this affected the LGBTQ+ community. While this crisis was going on AIDS killed millions and it really put a negative light on the Queer community, many blamed them for this, and it was a totally unfair judgment. There were so many lives lost due to this disease and we see all different aspects of this time in the show.

There are so many more shows and TV characters that are used for representation of the LQBTQ+ community and their stories will help people watching these relate to this and help them get through these.  Such as:

Rosa Diaz from Brooklyn nine-nine. She realises that she is Bisexual and when she tries to come out to her parents she isn’t accepted, so many people face this where their family don’t support them, but Rosa can teach us to not let this affect the way we accept ourselves and we shouldn’t change to fit other people’s ideology.

Representation in magazines

Many would think it is hard to find magazine with good LGBTQ+ representation and something that is solely dedicated to gay lifestyle and culture but, here at Unique Magazines, we stock many LGBTQ+ magazines and these offer a lot of different things such as culture, activism, art, fashion and much more.

We have Attitude magazine, which we get to see well respected reviews, tips and techniques in term of making sure you look and feel you best every day.

Then, Boys! Boys! Boys! Is a photography magazines that just shows the art of queer and gay artists. There’s a range of styles, fashion, portraits and photojournalism but all have representation and show the amazing talent of the artists.