Gay rights in venezuela




Lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people in Venezuela face legal challenges not experienced by non- LGBTQ residents. Both male and female types of same-sex sexual activity are legal in Venezuela, but same-sex couples and households headed by same-sex couples are not eligible for the same legal protections available to opposite-sex. Interested in LGBT rights in Venezuela?

gay rights in venezuela

Whether you're planning a trip or simply curious, our comprehensive guide covers laws, acceptance, and more. LGBT Rights in Venezuela: homosexuality, gay marriage, gay adoption, serving in the military, sexual orientation discrimination protection, changing legal gender, donating blood, age of consent, and more. Venezuela's shrinking economy has sparked an exodus of LGBT+ people as the economic crisis has put the brakes on the country's growing tolerance towards its gay and trans community, activists.

This guide aims to empower human rights activists, offer guidance for policymakers, and generally support LGBTQ rights in Venezuela, fostering a more inclusive society where LGBTQ individuals are fully recognized and enjoy equal protection under the law. For most of his life, Marco has suffered from social anxiety. He does not like large groups and therefore has got used to using headphones as a strategy for dealing with the overcrowded world around him.

This has allowed him to avoid hearing much of what is said about him, but at some point he does have to connect with reality. Marco is a year-old trans man who has been living in Lima for four years. He came to Peru from Caracas in search of better living conditions as the social, economic and political deterioration of his country made it unsustainable to stay there. As of May , the mass displacement crisis from Venezuela has led to more than six million refugees around the world, according to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees.

The reasons for fleeing are manifold: lack of safety, violence, the constant threat to human rights and the lack of food and medicine. As an only child, Marco took responsibility for helping his parents, but he no longer had any options in his country. On the contrary, each of these letters contains within it a variety of experiences which are combined with social class, skin colour or migration status.

In addition, gender expression, which forms part of these diverse identities, plays a very important role in how each person is treated by society as attitudes, clothing, gestures etc. Marco, who has not had hormone treatment or surgery, believes that his appearance — outside the norm — is used to discriminate against him. People basically see me as a butch woman. Marco believes that the worst discrimination that he has experienced is due to being trans, although that is alongside the ever-present xenophobia.

People look at me and laugh at me, regardless of whether I can carry them. Colombia and Peru are the main destination countries for people fleeing Venezuela in need of international protection, with approximately 1. Both Colombia and Peru have ratified different international treaties that oblige them to guarantee the human rights of all people without discrimination of any kind, including due to nationality, sexual orientation or gender identity.

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Nevertheless, the entrenched machismo in these societies, the xenophobia, and the violence based on prejudice against sexual and gender diversity create a hostile and unsafe environment. For example, although the new migration regularization programme, known as the Temporary Statute of Protection for Venezuelan Migrants, allows trans people to obtain documents that reflect their gender identity, in order to obtain this documentation in practice trans people must go through extra procedures that generate additional costs and therefore limit effective access to this documentation.

They therefore travel without documentation, putting them in situations of greater risk and generating further obstacles in access to regularization. Furthermore, in this country equal marriage and the right to legal recognition of trans identity are still pending approval. A major barrier for Venezuelans in Colombia and Peru is access to healthcare. The social security systems have intrinsic deficiencies in terms of effective and timely access for the national population, which is exacerbated for those who do not have a regular migration status or cannot afford private services.

The denial of this right puts their lives at risk when faced with a lack of timely care. Alixe, a trans woman refugee in Peru, is proof of this. For her, the barriers are interlinked and range from the costs of procedures for obtaining documentation and registering with the system to direct discrimination from healthcare staff.

It is an odyssey to find work, then obtain the documents and then that document turns out to be useless. Alixe has had HIV tests performed on her without her consent and has received misdiagnoses because doctors have decided not to have physical contact with her. We have friends with poisoned bodies, people who die of heart attacks because they get blood clots from self-medicating, trans friends who have problems in their uterus due to testosterone use Alixe.

When it comes to hormone treatment, for example, trans migrants do not have adequate medical support. For four years Alixe has not been able to see an endocrinologist and has not been able to check her silicone implants. This varies from person to person and the gender expression they have chosen to construct. For Alixe, a trans woman in Peru, cisgender lesbian or gay people, including trans men, are less visible socially because their transition is less noticeable and they can live with less stigma initially, although she clarifies that this ends when they have to present an identification document that does not correspond to their gender identity.

Augusto says that they have not experienced any violence but have experienced discrimination.