As the world celebrates IDAHOBIT 2024 the International Lesbian and Gay Association (IGLA) has highlighted the growing pushback against LGBTIQA+ rights on a global scale.
Each year International Day Against Homophobia, Biphobia, Intersex discrimination and Transphobia (IDAHOBIT) is celebrated on 17th May.
The date aligns with the 1990 decision by the World Health Organisation to formally remove homosexuality from it’s list of mental illnesses.
The day was first observed in 2004, and twenty years later the event is now being marked in over 60 countries around the globe.
This year’s theme, “No one left behind: equality, freedom, and justice for all,” is a call for unity and solidarity at a time of global anti-democracy and anti-rights pushback, when many LGBTQIA+ individuals continue to face violence, stigma, and discrimination.
In a statement released ahead of IDAHOBIT the IGLA said despite significant progress, data from the ILGA World Database indicates that LGBTQIA+ people continue to face challenges in accessing their basic rights.
As of today sixty-two UN member States criminalise consensual same-sex relations, either by law or in practice.
At least 59 countries have restrictions on freedom of expression related to sexual and gender diversity issues, and the past two years have seen an alarming acceleration of states in the USA enacting and debating such provisions.
While laws protecting individuals from hate crimes based on sexual orientation exist in 59 UN member States, only 38 do so based on gender identity, 9 on gender expression, and 5 on sex characteristics.
On area there has been progress though is on the issue of conversion therapy. To date, 16 UN member States have implemented bans on so-called ‘conversion therapies’ at the national level, while 9 have introduced nationwide restrictions on unnecessary interventions for intersex youth.
Western Australia however is not included, and advocates for practices that encourage people to fight against their same-sex attraction have described our state as a refuge from laws that have been brought in on the east coast.
Seventeen UN member states allow for legal gender recognition based on self-determination at the national level, while he in Australia the laws are on a state by state basis. The Western Australian parliament is currently debating legislation to remove the WA Gender Board and replace it with a simpler administrative process.
Across the world 35 countries have legalised marriage equality, a move that Australia achieve in 2017. Since then Costa Rica, Austria, Equador, Taiwan, Chile, Solvenia, Cuba, Switzerland, Mexico, Estonia, Greece and Andorra have also changed their laws.
Nepal is the most recent addition to the list, but in Bermuda the right for same-sex couples to wed was taken away in 2022 – marriages made between 2017 and 2022 remain legal but no new unions can be granted.
The IGLA says that amidst progress and pushback, the theme of this year’s IDAHOBIT is a call for solidarity, and for everybody to unite in creating a world with social justice, where no one is left behind.
