Homophobia

• Anti-LGBTQ+ hate from religious conservatives and far-right extremists in the United States, and now in Australia, is a worrying trend.
• Out gay politician Alex Greenwich has brought a defamation suit against Latham over an offensive homophobic tweet.
• Yet the issues remain a concern in any jurisdiction where US news media has audiences and digital platforms operate.

Commercialising hate and emboldening extremists

• Notions of “sexual purity”, linked to nationhood by religious groups and far-right extremists, are circulated via the “manosphere”: an overlapping group of websites, online forums and blogs that promote masculinity and misogyny.
• The Center for Countering Digital Hate estimates that anti-LGBTQ+ extremists are picking up followers at quadruple the rate since Elon Musk acquired Twitter.
• The monetising of hate through YouTube includes the sale of mundane items such as sweatshirts and mugs adorned with homophobic slurs.
• TikTok is the only platform to have improved on the timely removal of hate speech.

Political permissiveness and the ‘Trump effect’

• It can also undermine confidence in democratic elections and propagate climate denialism, feeding the misinformation and disinformation ecosystem.
• This has occurred within a broader context of misinformation driven by domestic politicians and permissiveness by digital platforms towards hateful conduct.
• Read more:
  Clickbait extremism, mass shootings, and the assault on democracy – time for a rethink of social media?

Visibility as a double-edged sword

• In Australia, an estimated 11% of the population have a diverse sexual orientation or gender identity.
• In the US, 7.1% of the adult population identify as one of these non-heterosexual identities, double the percentage from 2012.
• This visibility has become a double-edged sword.
• Communities have gained recognition through identity politics, but their visibility makes them a potential target for violence.

Addressing the hate feedback loop

• What needs to be done to address the hate feedback loop?
• Digital platforms also need to address online hate in a timely manner and their responses need to be coordinated across platforms.
• The origins of the anti-LGBTQ+ hate feedback loop are complex.
• Not addressing them will leave a growing number of people susceptible to violence, which diminishes us all.

• The 30th Constitutional Convention of the Canadian Labour Congress called for changes to labour laws to make it easier for workers to unionize.
• They also passed resolutions combatting homophobia and transphobia, in support of reconciliation with First Nations, Métis and Inuit peoples, and to tackle systemic racism.
• “We are honoured to continue serving Canada’s workers and to build on the work of the past two years,” said Bruske.
• “A major theme of this year's event focused on how unions can lift everyone up.

• For his new book “Black and Queer on Campus,” American studies professor Michael Jeffries interviewed 65 Black LGBTQ college students across the U.S. – 40 from historically Black colleges and universities, or HBCUs, and 25 from predominantly white schools.
• The Conversation asked Jeffries to discuss what he learned about how queer Black students view LGBTQ student organizations, their general experiences on college campuses and their opinions about current events.

What specific challenges do Black LGBTQ students face on college campuses?

• The Black LGBTQ students I interviewed understood that college is an opportunity to explore their identity.
• But many still struggled to move past the bigotry and difficult experiences they had growing up as young queer people.
• Candace, who attends a large, prestigious public university, told me that one of the problems that Black LGBTQ students face in white LGBTQ spaces is tokenism.
• And I’m just like, they don’t really date Black people, so there’s that.”

How do they overcome those challenges?

• One of the most common and powerful ways that students said they overcome these challenges is by building community with one another.
• “It’s like whenever Black queer people get around each other, I feel like we get strong in our personalities.
• “We started hanging out to where we spent all our time together,” he said.

What stereotypes and threats to safety do Black queer students face today?

• Some students felt that common stereotypes about gay people still exert a powerful hold on the way queer folk are treated within Black communities.
• Patricia, who attends a historically Black university, told me about her experience growing up in a small, predominantly Black town in the South.
• There was a sense that they were not taken seriously as students or did not deserve their positions at the college.

Are students optimistic about the future?

• Though there were students who see progress with respect to LGBTQ issues, very few offered optimistic views of the future for Black people in America, including queer Black people.
• Some were extremely discouraged about the future, and they believe the U.S. is becoming a more hostile place for people like them.
• Still, several students pointed to changes in American politics and culture, like the legalization of same-sex marriage in 2015 and the increasing visibility of LGBTQ celebrities, that give them hope.

• Unfortunately, the practices described in the declaration are included in the 2023 Anti-Homosexuality Bill proposed by Uganda’s parliament.
• PsySSA president, professor Floretta Boonzaier, has described the bill to me as “an attack on human dignity, well-being, autonomy and self-determination”.
• Research conducted in three African countries in 2019 found that half of the respondents suffered some form of conversion.
• South African psychologists with expertise in sexuality and gender have condemned the bill.

No scientific grounding

• But he has ignored evidence-based critiques that have been presented to him over the years, dating back to 2010 and 2014.
• Brouard has said the bill
  is anti-science and represents a backward step in contemporary understanding of human nature.

Perpetuating harm

• Professor Kopano Ratele, an acclaimed African psychology scholar, said via email that
  the bill is, at its core, inhuman.
• It seems that the bill is essentially about some people desiring to control the bodies, relationships, and the inner lives of others.
• It criminalises identity by prescribing prosecution for how people think, feel, identify, and, ultimately, who and how they love.
• Christian evangelical churches from the US have been directly linked to current anti-LGBTIQ+ ideologies in African countries.

The next steps

• We call on mental health professionals from across Africa to sign and endorse the declaration and to join the growing chorus of experts who have condemned Uganda’s dangerous bill.
• The PsySSA Sexuality and Gender Division, for example, has been at the forefront of leading a science-informed critique of the Ugandan bill.